Sail 2: Cowes to Beaulieu River

We woke up with slightly sore heads after a few bevies with our new friends Sandy & Pete and the trip up to Cowes Week. We ended up coming back to Fathom early but it didn't stave off the hangover. The weather forecast today is predicting 10-15 knots with some strong-ish (for Fathom anyway) 20 knot winds from 16:00. The tide is with the wind until about 15:00 and then we're in for a bumpy tide against wind experience. When the tide goes against the wind it makes a very big swell and the fast tides in the Solent magnify this. Our aim was to fight against the tide and wind so we can get into Beaulieu before the wind picks up.

Passage plan

Leave Cowes by the main channel to Gurnard buoy.

Sail up then tack to Sevenstar Yacht Transport Buoy, aiming to sail along the following bearings, 297°, 198°, and 334°. There will be 3 Knots of tide running against us, need to feel the best tack bearings when we're out there.

No major hazards, avoid the shipping lane and turning circle.

Enter Beaulieu on transit 324°

Approx 3-4 nautical miles, 1 hour

Passage log

Left Cowes at 10:00, Cowes week starts today. Traffic is F**K*** mental.

Tacking towards Beaulieu, making 2-3 Knots against the tide with just the stay, main and mizzen sails. Still, just outside Cowes, the wind is 15-18 knots South Westerly, the sea state is choppy with a few white horses.

12:15 less frightened of wind so put head sail up now making 3-4 knots. Wind seems to have died down. Had our stowing skills tested by a motor boat doing 20 knots about 10 meters away. Not sure they saw us, we got covered in tea and coffee. No sign of any wine, beer, tonic/ginger ale getting broken but I didn't taste the bilge when it started pumping.

13:35 entered Beaulieu river, the wind got spicy and as tide eased we managed 5 knots with all four sails running. Mizzen mast stay popped off so had to drop mizzen and head sail to fix it. Tide change meant sea state increased and then the wind picked up. 1-2 meter waves. With just a staysail we were doing 3.5 knots to Beaulieu river. Boat was flying, making shuddering noises as it ploughed through the waves. Both cold and now drinking teas while motoring up the Beaulieu river towards Bucklers hard.

No moorings near Bucklers hard, moored up the river near Keeping Marsh on a small craft mooring buoy for dinner. Phew!

Passage reality

The tide truly is king, we left early to avoid the wind, but as you can see by the very neat figure of eight above we should've waited. Having an old boat sometimes makes you hesitant of going out in strong winds. 20 knots is the biggest we'd seen yet with Fathom and it was a good shakedown sail as it exposed the mizzen stay issue. We've learnt that we can point the boat closer to the wind than previously thought, but the mizzen can't cope with it.

During the passage, we felt like we were looking at Cowes and Lepe for what felt like forever. We've never been so happy to see Gurnard appear on the horizon.

We predicted it would take us 1 hour and we'd been doing around 3-4 nautical miles. The moon had other ideas and we actually did:

Distance: 15.4nM

Time: 4 hours 27 mins

Average Speed: 3.4 Knots

Max Speed 8.2 knots

We are proud of how the boat handled the heavy seas, wind, and traffic. We really tested our knowledge or lack of it today. Moored up in Beaulieu River to wait out some more winds and unfavourable tides. We don't want to go back to Cowes.