I like Hammocks.

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A friends car broke down and I was asked to pull it home, as soon as they woke me with my phone.

Im sure I got my mobile for my convenience, not for everyone elses. Seems I got that wrong.

I sorted that out, then I discovered the trailer had a cracked mudguard again.

Little one fibreglassed the mudguard together.

 

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My mate lost his dog and we ended up running around the common trying to find it.

I had to be the one that fell in the pond.

It took ages to get all the stinking mud off.

Eventually, we reached the slip at 3.15pm.

I was determined.

We WERE going to go test it that day.

Perhaps I should have taken all the hints....

 

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THe tide was coming in and would continue for 4 hours, so I decided to use it to help me sail up the harbour and around the corner.

It was a beautiful afternoon.

The forestay didnt look like it was going anywhere and the kids were getting over their nerves.

Little one was very worried about going swimming again if I had him out on the trapeeze rope thing that hangs off the mast.

I got him to play with it for a bit.

He was trapping off the wrong side of the boat, so I could lean it a bit towards him, and he was hanging off the side with his hair in the water... I hadnt heard him laugh like that for ages.

Later I had him on the wrong side again and was dragging him along on top of the water on his back.

It was a different type of water skiiing.

 

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Next I threw biggest off the boat.

The water there was only 4 ft deep.

I did the panicing bit and left it to my LIttle one to get the boat under control and turn it and go rescue him.

He did it and did it well.

He was so proud of himself he was actually begging me to throw his brother in again so he could go save him some more.

I threw him in instead.

His brother ran him over instead of sailing next to him to pick him up, but other than that, it was another good rescue.

 

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I seriously considered jumping off and leaving them to rescue me....

I occurred to me that they would probably just sail to the nearest island and have a picnic....

 

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The wind wasnt too strong, so we spent some time playing with the spinnaker - a third sail that comes out of that hole in the front deck.

The Osprey Association gave us this sail as we didnt have one. They really are a good bunch of people.

We didnt know how to use it, so we were experimenting..

Little one was just about to go back over the side on the trap again.

 

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Biggest is steering.

The white rope on the right is one off the spinnaker.

 

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Btw, its not exactly normal to have a double ended carbon kayak paddle on the floor of a sailing dinghy. I just couldnt find any oars.

 

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The tide was still running in.

I didnt really want to go any further up the harbour - especially as I had seen some nice looking trees....

Picnic time.

Ham slices, pear drops and custard in rolls, with jaffa cakes and lemonade, of course.

Im surprised they dont break teeth.

 

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I set up my hammock...hmm....cant find any pics! Must have taken some.

Anyhow...

Kids ungummed their heads and asked if they could go exploring along the beach.

I didnt see any problem with that. There wasnt anything in the area that they could break or get into trouble with.

Ok. Dont be too long.

 

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I woke up as the tide changed.

Looks like Ive spent too much time on the water lol.

The kids werent back.

 

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Kids not back.

Hmm...

They had been gone for a couple of hours.

I didnt know where they were.

Not that worried, but just a little uneasy.

I packed up our kit and noticed the tide had turned.

It was now running in the same direction as the wind, and in the opposite direction to where the kids had gone.

I spent an hour trying to persuade the boat to go against the wind and tide, before I slipped up and hit the mud that the receding water was leaving behind.

I could see one of the kids off in the distance, but he couldnt hear me shouting against the wind.

He was wandering around out on the mud.

If he got stuck out there.....

 

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The boat started draging her centreboard and rudder on the mud under her.

She caught up enough that the boat turned sideways.

There was a sharp crack and my steering went all loose.

I had a look as the boat drifted sideways. The pin had pulled off the rudder.

I didnt have much chance of being able to steer it any more.

I turned the boat off the mud and let the wind move me back with the tide and beached it - carefully.

Turns out where we had parked for our picnic was over a load of tree stumps. Now the tide was going out they were poking out of the water, ready to hole the boat again.

I was worried.

One kid out on the mudflats wandering about, No Idea where the other one was, a broken boat, which I couldnt moore as the bottom was all mud and i couldnt get to the shore from it...

Obviously, when I could think of nothing else I could try, I called the only person I could think of.

My Mum.

 

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Im sitting there on the boat, trying not to panic.

I called Mum.

Told her what was going on.

Explained to her how to find the maps of the harbour on Google and where the file was on her drive with my maps in it, so she could have a look and see if there was anywhere I could drift the boat and walk to where I thought the kids were.

This is where we had sailed...

This is where the kids had walked after our picnic...

This is where I had sailed trying to get to them, but failing...

THe straight line through all the zigzags is where I drifted when I broke the steering.

 

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I was sitting there shaking.

Do you call the coastguard and tell them you have lost your children... they sort of walked off that way and one of them was out playing on the soft mud....

This was sort of worse than just drowning them.

 

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Im still sitting there in the broken boat, discussing with Mum what to do about losing the kids, when they just appeared half a mile away from behind an outcrop.

I wanted to jump out of the boat and go thrash them for scaring me - as well as hug them for surviving.

In the end I waited in the boat, as I couldnt really get out of it, and hugged and shouted at them when they swam out to it.

They arrived as the tide changed, and the wind dropped to virtually nothing.

It was already 7.30 pm.

In the next hour, we managed about a mile and a half, and the sun set and dusk arrived.

We were making progress, but it would have been quicker to have walked.

I was panicing. My sailing is bad enough that I can run into things in the middle of the day when the wind is nice and steady....

At night, with no wind and no lights.....

Not a good time to go and potentially crash.

 

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We were taking it in turns to paddle the boat with the one carbon paddle I had thrown in the boat.

Still not making much progress.

Still had another 5 miles to go....

Out of the dark we could hear an aproaching speed boat....

It was big, noisy and had no headlights...

I was sitting there, unable to do anything to avoid a collision - not that I could even see it, thinking Please dont hit us.....

 

[eel28]

You do like your cliff hangers No Idea

 

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The engine throttled back....

It sort of drifted into view.

"I dont want to intrude, but are you in need of assistance?"

"Er.....Yes please!"

I dont think we have ever managed to drop sails so fast!

He had a rope off us before he had fully turned round.

He pulled us right through to just South of our slip.

He dropped us and left us to row the last 1/4 mile - which turned out to be against the current, as he didnt want to risk thmping his prop on the bottom near the slip.

I was sooo grateful. It was now near 10pm, we were cold, very tired and thirsty as we had used all the water and lemonade.

He siad he was going, but sort of sat with his lights off in the dark until he was sure we were going to get in safely.

I offered the man some money to cover his time and fuel, but he refused.

I owe him one.

 

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We arrived back at the slip in pitch black.

They charge £10 per day you launch from there.

Obviously, you cant expect even one light to help you for that.

It took us until 11.30 to get packed up and make it home.