Sail 5: Yarmouth to Poole

This is our longest passage on Fathom to date, it's also got a few hazards that we've got to watch out for. The Needles Channel is infamous for its wind against tide standing waves, it also converges all the tide running from the back of the Wight with the faster stream leaving the Solent through the Hurst Narrows. To the West, there are the Shingles which move around depending on the weather, often forming small islands for a couple of tides before disappearing again.

There are two options either go North of the Shingles or go South past the Needles and out to the English Channel. Whatever way you choose, once you're going there's very little chance of turning back, especially in Fathom as the tides can reach 5 Knots through here.

Once you're past the Needles channel, you have Christchurch Ledge to contend with, this ledge creates eddies up to 2 miles out, so a wide berth is required to avoid sluicing the decks and potentially the wheelhouse. Eddies are patches of confused sea caused by the tide rushing over a rough and shallow sea bed. The general rule is don't go there if the wind is against the tide and it has any strength, ideally keep far off to be safe.

With these two hazards in mind, it was quite the mental leap to actually cast off and go. Once past the Needles channel, we'd be 8 miles out at the mercy of the channel and around 10.5NM until we reached Poole our next available port.

We spent two nights in Yarmouth to prep the boat and restock our supplies. We also checked the engine over and we noticed the engine oil was at half, so we topped that up before setting off.

Passage plan

Wind Forecast:

AROME model 14 Knots reducing to 10 Knots by 16:00 351-325°

UKMO model 10 Knots reducing to 7 Knots by 16:00 343°

Wind veering from NNW to NW by 16:00

Gusting from 17-20 Knots at 8:00, reducing to 12-13 Knots at 16:00. Big Westerly wind off Anvil Point, Dorset from 16:00 15-20 Knots.

Aiming to leave Yarmouth at 7:00, passing through Needles Channel at 9:00 approximately 3 hours after high tide, 2.2 to 4.4 knots of tide with us.

The plans

Made two plans in case the weather changes: one going South via the Needles Channel and another going North via Hurst Channel.

- Leave Yarmouth harbour pass Black Rock buoy to port on bearing 265° passing Sconce Q bell turning when on a bearing of 171° from Fort Albert 2.6NM

1. Needles Channel Option

- Turn to 225° pass Mid Shingles Buoy, Shingles Elbow to starboard, pass Bridge Buoy to port. Pass South West Shingles Buoy to starboard, follow bearing until Fairway Bell. Broad reach, starboard tack. 6.5NM

2. Hurst Channel Option

- Turn to 122° approaching West Shingles cardinal. Pass North Head buoy to port 1.7NM

- At North Head buoy turn to 227° broad reach, starboard tack. 6.7NM

- Once North 1/2NM from yellow PA buoy turn to 276°. 8NM to Poole

- Turn to 276° change to a beam reach starboard tack, aiming for No 2 Bar Buoy Poole. 10.5NM

- Follow channel into Poole Harbour.

18NM total, 3 knot average speed journey time approximately 6 hours.

9NM to The Bridge Buoy off the Needles from Yarmouth

Speed to Black Rock estimating 4 knots, 3 Knots boat speed + 1 knot tide, 2.25 hours. Need to be at Black Rock for 6:45

Leave Yarmouth at 6:30, Call NCI in the morning for weather report and sea state, open from 9:00.

ETA 14:00 at entrance to Poole Harbour.

Passage log

Left Yarmouth a bit late, at 07:00 so under motor for now. Tide is ripping. We're doing 9 knots!! Calm seas in the Needles Channel, we've decided to go South! Shortly after we see an old gaffer taking the North Channel, too late to go back now, just saw 10.2 Knots on the speedo. Did we make the right choice? (video below is us captured from the Needles live webcam)

Sea is calm so far in the Needles Channel. Have wind crossing tide, stunning views. Decided to motor through channel as the wind is less than predicted to ensure we can avoid the Shingles and make better progress to Poole.

Horizon looks jagged, it is not a mirage as Ruby hoped (the video below shows the hope dissipating rapidly, the realisation that there is no going back and the jagged horizon is real).

The sea is very bumpy, not just over the Shingles. Fathom is a trooper, slicing through the sea, a few thuds and bumps but looking after us. Sails up are stay, main and mizzen. Wind not as predicted, more Westerly and we're very close hauled.

Mizzen struggling so took it down. Still flying with the tide at 4/5 knots. Sea state making it hard to maintain course, waves are 2-3m on the beam. Switched to engine, doing 6 knots. No photos or video, things are extremely rough, both hands required at all times, writing this on hands and knees in the wheelhouse.

Shouting at the sky about weather forecast.

Things have calmed down, all we can see are the white cliffs of Old Harry and the skyscrapers of Bournemouth. Poole is assumed to be the gap in the land masses, pointing for Old Harry on 275° as close-hauled as we can get.

Relieved to see Old Harry getting closer on the horizon, sea state has reduced but the wind has remained nearly on the nose the whole way. Both exhausted and exhilarated in equal measure. Boat seems very happy to be in a rough sea. See the same old gaffer anchoring up in the distance at Studland, we probably should've gone via Hurst Narrows.

Arrived at Poole Quay about 4 hours earlier than planned. Lots of angry power boaters, moored next to Medallia and Pip Hare. We received a polite welcome from the people of Poole, they say hello with their middle fingers, an unusual custom. Straight to Wetherspoons for breakfast, starving.

Passage reality

Oh boy, what a passage. It was exhilarating, exhausting and a huge learning experience.

The first thing we learnt was about timings, the wind was due to die down later in the day but we needed to go through the Needles Channel as it was beginning to slack but with enough tide still going West to push us onto Poole. This meant dealing with the heavier winds earlier on in the day to make this work. There's definitely a balance to be had here that we're still learning.

The second thing was that it's way better to have the wind behind you when it's strong, especially in Fathom and in hindsight, with a Northerly wind that was veering to NW later in the day, we should've gone via Hurst Channel to avoid any chance of having to close haul the boat. The route via Hurst Channel was actually longer and had more hazards but the old gaffer had it right, we passed Hurst Castle (the turning point for the two channels) with them around 0.5NM behind us, they anchored up when we were still about 2NM from Studland. Our reasoning for going via the Needles Channel was also influenced by Andy wanting to see them up close.

The third thing we learnt was, do not trust the weather models, they can be totally whack. It's much better to call the National Coast Watch Institutions (NCI) to get a weather report and also check the observed weather station data.

It was a wild ride, but it proved that the boat will look after you, it really hated taking the sea beam on and kept pushing us off course so that the sea ran behind us. This is great as it means if we'd lost power or steerage it'd look after us but it made steering her quite hard. It definitely made us think about choosing the right course for the boat in the conditions. We're definitely grateful for the engine as we'd have had a very long journey otherwise, beating to windward all the way to Poole.

This was actually an unusual journey as we arrived earlier than expected, the tide is a powerful beast and we saw our fastest max speed ever on Fathom. We predicted we'd travel 18NM and that it'd take us 6 hours.

Distance: 22.8NM

Time: 3 Hours 56 Mins

Average Speed: 5.8 Knots

Max Speed: 10.7 Knots

The increased distance included our route into Poole Harbour which is much bigger than we expected and has a really long swashway to the entrance which is nearly 2NM long!

For the route back we'll definitely pick the route that works for us and the boat. Now we're off to chill out in Poole Harbour for a few days before we make the next hop to Weymouth.