Early June send off …and more

As is always the case on this blog; no names, no faces, no pack-drill. Which makes the first part of this particular post more of a challenge, as half-a-dozen club yachts mustered to support team Calloo with a final farewell to our dear friend and club ex-Commodore. He is sorely missed by us, family and friends.

In addition to Calloo and Indefatigable Banks [us], Joint Venture, Fyne Thyme, Louise, and Maverick were also out on the water, just off our chum, the ex-Commodore’s back garden.

Eagle-eyed readers may spot a figure mid-ships [above] peering into the water. Not satisfied with spreading ashes that day, one of the crew decide to cast his wife’s new mobile phone into the drink too [oops].

Our guests onboard for the day were ladies from Jambel and Solveig. We rafted up alongside Joint Venture, and while the ladies enjoyed something frothy, the Joint Venture crew gave me the opportunity to taste their Glenkinchie 12-year old, which I have to say was appropriately special. In fact, the whole final send-off was moving and special – we were honoured to be invited along …just as we were honoured to know our friend. After returning the yachts to their moorings, assorted crews reconvened in the clubhouse bar.

A few weeks earlier, the crew and I had both stood on our dinghy seat at the same time. That was a mistake which needed some remedial work. After a bit of sawing, sanding, and painting, I managed to make and fit a replacement without too much of a palaver.

Although, when I extracted myself from the mud, it was clear that the oil spill clean-up operation [earlier in the year – see here] really hadn’t removed all of the oil from the harbour and surrounding areas.

Wellies off and back in the car with a clear view of the dinghy, we watched as a loutish crow flew down from nowhere and pranced gleefully all over my newly painted seat. It only flew off when the heavens opened and a relentless deluge of water added insult to injury. Anyhoo, the following weekend, we tested the new dinghy seat taking Twindefatigable Banks out for a trip to the Ghauts when the tide eventually decided to put in an appearance.

We made best use of weekends that for one reason or another meant that we couldn’t be away sailing. Including a trip to the East Pier Smokehouse at St. Monans, where we both predictably ordered the hot-smoked sea bass.

As usual, the food was great, and we’ll be back for more before the end of the season [St. Monans harbour pictured above]. After leaving St. Monans we headed over to check out the Elie chain-walk, but weren’t convinced we had the right tide window to make it all the way to the end and back …so that’s one for another day.

Pre-season & crane-in 2019

There were quite a few things on our pre-season to do list this year, including replacing the V-belt on our Macwester Malin’s Lombardini diesel engine. Fitting was easy enough, it’s just a case of slacking-off a couple of bolts, slipping the new belt on and then tightening the bolts back up again. It’s do-able with two hands, but three hands would be easier.

I really struggled to find a direct replacement for the Dayco branded original V-belt [6633 2440360 05 186 057 05 186 058], so after some help from the lovely staff at Gates in Belgium, I opted for a Gates 6261MC which only cost around £5 or so from the internet.

Replacing the stern gland was more expensive at just over £250 for the parts [old and new shown above], then there was the cost of fitting over and above that. We purchased a Deep Sea Seal Manecraft set 4 high-speed configuration which is good for almost 3000rpm. Our Lombardini LDW1003M is capable of revving to 3600rpm, however the throttle is set to max-out south of 3000rpm.

Fitting the seal was straightforward enough, although the alignment of the face that you can see shining above is always time-consuming, because it moves out of alignment as the jubilee clips are tightened. Other jobs included fixing the dinghy floor, replacing the rear 12mm mooring chains with 16mm chain as part of installing the mooring tackle. Obviously we also recommissioned the heads, and anti-fouled the hull. I’m in the processing of sourcing an engine anode, as the one we have is nearly depleted.

I wasn’t particularly happy with the amount of water that our Jabsco pump was chucking-out of the exhaust when I was de-winterising the engine. It’s a Jabsco 29470 2531C 05K. Apparently the 05K is a date code, and so I imagine that the pump was manufactured late in 2005, although it was fitted after that along with the new engine.

Having consulted friends at the yacht club, I switched the plate around [see above]. While there wasn’t much improvement on the hard, the pump worked well enough after crane in. A new pump is north of £200, but that’s nothing compared to the cost of cooking our Macwester Malin’s engine, so we have ordered one and will replace it during the season if we feel that’s necessary. Otherwise, it can sit on a shelf ready to be swapped-out as and when required.

With hindsight, arriving at the club by 7am was a waste of time as the crane got stuck on the way, and then rather predictably broke down where it was stuck. More than two hours were lost waiting around in cold and damp conditions.

While we were waiting, we watched HMS Queen Elizabeth [R08] slowly make her way into Rosyth dockyard to meet up with HMS Prince of Wales [R09] which can be seen to the left of the photograph above.

Much later than planned, our Macwester Malin, Indefatigable Banks was lifted from her winter resting place and lowered on to the putty. She spent one night on the north pontoon and we popped her back on her mooring the following day. Thanks to our chums for picking us up in the club rescue boat, as our dinghy has yet to get her freshly-painted bottom wet.

We still need to get some sails on, plus complete a number of other mundane tasks, so a shakedown sail isn’t on the cards yet …soon though!

Closed-season black and blues

As usual when our Macwester Malin is sitting high and dry on the hard, we spend lots of time at the coast. The new V&A building above was a little smaller externally than we envisaged, and having ventured inside we felt it was short on museum and big on cafés. Don’t get me wrong, it’s an impressive building; it’s just not very good at being an actual museum.

We walked to the Falkirk Wheel on a very cold and foggy day [above]. Each and every time we visit there, my mind drifts back to a project I worked on in the early 90s. It wasn’t really our bag, but the client wanted a 3D-animated pre-viz of a massive rotating boat lift that would be built in Falkirk. Now obviously pigs would fly before a massive rotating boat lift would be built in Falkirk; however despite my doubts about his sanity, the client was persistent and we were persuaded to produce the pre-viz nonetheless. Hats off to you Jim!

The day we walked across the Forth Road Bridge was also chilly and dull, but the visibility was better. Typically, the weather was brighter on several walks between Aberdour and the recently re-modelled [flattened] Starleyburn.

During a trip to Dysart, we walked all the way east along the coast to West Wemyss, a walk that includes a breath-taking, steep [really breath-taking] incline. We also made it across to Crammond Island via the Dragon’s Teeth [above] when the tide was out.

With the club flag flying forlornly at half-mast, we were subdued, and did what we could to console our friends …which in the end really wasn’t all that much.

We took a trip through to James Watt Dock, where Drum sits …waiting. We also returned to Greywalls over in Gullane, and spent a few days for a birthday celebration. We visited North Berwick, Dunbar, and after a long, soggy walk just about made it to one of two X-class midget submarine wrecks on the beach at Aberlady. If we had skipped breakfast we would have beaten the tide… …but we didn’t skip breakfast… … …hence the sub-optimal pic above… … … …sorry.

The shot above is taken on a sunny afternoon looking west across Pittenweem. Our favourite East Neuk eatery closes over the winter, so there was no hot-smoked sea bass on the go. Baa-humbug!

Meanwhile, back at our mooring there was oil pollution that meant the beach and surrounding area was closed to the public. The black sticky stuff was everywhere. In total six-hundred tonnes of it were removed, taking several weeks at a cost of £600,000.

Well-done to Fife Council, who managed to get the worst of the pollution cleared; thankfully a week or two before crane-in. Yes, our dinghy mooring was trashed in the process, and yes there’s a layer of oil just below the surface of the putty …but they turned it around pretty quickly.

Hard hats at the ready! Pre-season and crane-in up next.

Crane-Out 2018

Crane-out arrived far too soon for us, and we felt more than a little cheated that our season had been curtailed in August. Time, tide, and indeed the crane driver waits for no man, so we forlornly sailed our Macwester Malin around to the club harbour …and waited for our slot.

We had a temporary landing [above] before we eventually reached our final destination, which ended-up being in a less-fragrant [good], but much breezier [bad] spot. Still, we were safely on the hard without incident and that’s a result as far as I’m concerned.

We chose a calm, sunny day to row the dinghy over to the club via stopping-off at the Ghauts for the crew to get her wellies wet, and to somehow extend our season just a little bit longer.

It didn’t take too long to reach the west-facing ramp at the club and we dragged the dinghy up with the help of our chum, who has recently opened up a yacht chandlers [ VisionMarine ]. It’s early days, however we wish him the very best of luck with his new venture.

With our Macwester Malin’s hull power-washed, the heads and engine winterised, sails, sprayhood and cockpit tent stowed, plus having uninstalled our mooring tackle. We took some time to enjoy the coast from the land.

One of our first stops, was the East Pier Smokehouse @ St Monans before they closed down for the winter. We managed to wangle a sunny day with little in the way of wind, and so were able to sit outside on their terrace and enjoy the 360° views. As usual we both opted for the smoked sea bass with fries – yum!

Focaccia the police

Early on Monday the 26th of June, we learned that HMS Queen Elizabeth was due to leave Rosyth for the first time later in the day. After a bit of homework, it became clear that the timings would allow us to be out on the River Forth onboard our Macwester Malin at the same time. We slipped our mooring at 5pm and headed down river via the Ghauts. At the bottom left-hand corner of the shot above, you can just see the Ghauts in yellow on our chartplotter, which ties in with the view I had through our sprayhood.

There were other yachts out on the water when we arrived, but for some reason we were the only ones that were on the north side of the river. We kept a respectful distance from the new aircraft carrier, under the constant gaze of several police craft. Eventually, I switched off our Macwester Malin’s engine and just drifted while we watched the operation unfold. We were joined by friends in the rescue boat from our club which was full, followed by Christina II. Calloo and Chiron would put in an appearance later.

The crew was out on deck when a police rib took a wide arch around our bow over to our starboard, presumably to check us out. While they were about 15 maybe 20 metres away the crew asked them whether they wanted a snack, by holding out the aforementioned snack and shouting “focaccia bread stick?”. The police officers’ demeanour immediately changed, and they had very stern faces as they drew alongside, at which point the crew cheerily re-offered the bread sticks. The penny dropped and the officers’ faces lit up, as they realised that she wasn’t shouting profanities at them after all.

They asked about our movements, so we told them that we would need to be back on our mooring by 7.15pm, and that our plan was to walk over the Forth Road Bridge around 11.30pm at low water when HMS Queen Elizabeth would be passing below. Thankfully, they told us that the bridge would be closed to foot passengers (which seemed like a sensible precaution), so we dropped that from our itinerary.

As it transpired, I would actually be shouting profanities aimed at the very same police officers later on, when I noticed the black marks their rib had left along the length of our gelcoat. However, by then we were parked on our mooring, and the police were well out of earshot.

For a while near ‘Dhu Craig’ (a buoy) it seemed to get quite busy, with tugs manoeuvring left, right and centre, the police craft darting about, and boats from our club milling around, including Calloo shown above. It was a bit reminiscent of mustering for the start of a race or flotilla. Eventually Calloo set a course over to the south side of the river, and we decided to follow.

We have actually been a lot closer to HMS Queen Elizabeth on several occasions over the proceeding years, but she was always partially hidden behind the outer walls of the dockyard at Rosyth. This was the first time that we had crossed in front of her bow without a barrier between us. Fortunately she was at anchor, not angrily steaming towards us at 25 knots.

As time was slipping away we slowly started heading back towards our mooring, but then a couple of choppers approached from the north. They circled HMS Queen Elizabeth and flew over towards us, so we turned and slowly motored back down river for a better view of the action.

Then the helicopters repeated the same manoeuvre, but this time one flew almost directly overhead while the other peeled-off and headed over in the direction of Calloo. It was a fitting end to our time on the river. As we were now a tad behind schedule, I pressed on towards our mooring until I was comfortable that we had some time in hand. Calloo arrived before us, but as they knew we had less water at our mooring, they kindly let us have access to the harbour first. We shut the boat down quickly, and were ashore with time to spare.

In the car it became clear that we all enjoyed our evening out on the river, and rather predictably I couldn’t help but crank-up some NWA from way back in August 1988.

Festival flotilla fail

Preparations for this year’s river festival had been going on for months, and it must have put a smile on the organising committee’s collective face to see things taking shape on Saturday morning. It’s a pity that the weather forecast for the weekend was poor, with rain and gusts over 30 knots.

The main task for the crew and I was helping with the river golf. Our job was to collect the balls after they were struck by the paying public. This meant a three-hour shift in a dinghy, which at some point was interrupted by the arrival of Wave Spirit from Port Edgar. With two 500 hp water jets, we could feel the hum of her engines permeating every inch of our bodies. Yes, I’ll have one of those please!

After our river golf shift was completed, we dried ourselves off and spent some time catching-up with friends on the pier and in the garden. The sun came out for a while, and it started to feel like June. At the bar, the barman gave me a choice of beer from the local brewery. It wasn’t until later that I realised the barman owned the local brewery, and that my favoured tipple would probably have been available too. This would come back to haunt me.

Our plans was to bring Indefatigable Banks, our Macwester Malin round later in the day once the rib trips had stopped. We had a window of about 30 minutes to leave our mooring before the tide would leave us high and dry. I spent a lot of time mulling over the conditions; the wind was picking-up and there were waves coming into the harbour from the south-east. In the end the conditions, the deteriorating forecast for the following day, plus the lack of space to manoeuvre in a busy harbour meant that I decided on the safe option and left our yacht on her mooring.

We enjoyed a good night with live music and our friends in the marquee. As usual, time vanished and I didn’t get to catch up with everyone that I hoped to. With no yacht alongside to sleep onboard, our chums from Calloo kindly put us up for the evening (thanks again team Calloo). Unfortunately the crew had to put up with me keeping her awake for what was left of the night, as three hours in a dinghy obviously represented more exercise than I’m used to, and I had leg cramps all night long. The following morning I was hobbling around like a ninety-five year old cartoon crack-whore who’d been a life-long-nookie-neighbour of Glenn Quagmire.

Giggity-giggity.

We all headed back to the club to help clear away the fixtures and tidy-up the litter left behind the night before. The flotilla was planned for mid-afternoon, and the raft race would take place following that. Although we’re no quitters, with the rain tipping down it became clear that our collective lack of sleep, my ongoing leg cramps (I should really be fitter), the hangover jitters from the local hooch …and the pressing requirement for me to be near conveniences (which again I put down to the local bitter rather than the very mild chicken curry) …meant that sailing in challenging conditions wasn’t the most sensible thing to do next. I guess that makes us light-weights; not heavy-hitters.

As the crew didn’t have a bullet to hand, she scooped me up and took me home for a warm bath. While that was disappointing and represented an epic flotilla fail …sometimes that’s just the way the cookie crumbles.

Crane-in 2017

With our hard hats strapped on we were at the club for 7 am, even before the crane arrived. I say ‘we’, but the crew had other matters to deal with at home, so more accurately I was at the club for 7 am. Okay, yes. I suppose by that token I should really re-write the first sentence, as ‘our’ and the plural of ‘hat’ is also technically wrong, but lets not dwell on that …there’s boat stuff to be getting on with.

Anyhoo, the weather for the first day of crane-in was fabulous given it was early April (day two less so, but still not bad). This meant that we (‘we’ the club) made great progress, as we (‘we’ the club, again) weren’t fighting against gusting winds. In fact by the end of day one only three or four yachts and the pontoons were left to crane-in.

Indefatigable Banks, our Macwester Malin was in the air shortly after lunch on the Saturday. Everything went according to plan, which is always a relief. No matter how prepared we are (that’s a generic, sailor cohort ‘we’), there’s always the worry that something might fail, somehow.

Thankfully, moments later we (collective ‘we’; the yacht, the crew, and I) were in the water and onboard checking all the seacocks were watertight and there was no sign of any water ingress. As usual, one of my first tasks is to burp our (the yacht’s) deep-sea seal, which lubricates the seal and lets some seawater into the bilges in the process. Then we (collective ‘we’, as above) continued preparations to take our (collective ‘our’ as above, again) yacht over to her home for the next six months.

I think it’s probably best that I stop clarifying what I mean by ‘we’ and ‘our’ …and let you (the reader) figure that out for yourself.

It was truly fantastic to be out on the water again. We (no, I’m not going there) did discuss throwing up a sail or two like our chums on Calloo had managed earlier, but it was after high water and we (nope) still had quite a few tasks to nail before close of play.

Reluctantly we headed into the harbour and having popped our Macwester Malin on the mooring, we shut everything down and waited for the club boat to pick us up.

One of the things we wanted to do before the tide dropped completely was row our tender over to the mooring. We enjoyed the journey, but it has to be said that the pull of the tide against us through the Ghauts was pretty strong, and I had to work hard to make progress.

Once our Macwester Malin was safely ensconced in her summer home, we headed back to the club once more to finish-off a number of other tasks. Eventually, we made it to the club patio; the bar was open and we (I just can’t help myself; a club-wide ‘we’) had a really enjoyable time in the sun.

Season 2017 is here at last!

A slow start to 2017

We had an unusually quiet time over Christmas and New Year as yours truly was feeling a tad under the weather. Despite missing out on a few social engagements, team Ragdoll dropped in to see us on Christmas Eve, and we managed to catch up with our sailing chums two or three times.

The weather for the local ‘looney dook’ on the 1st of January was as good as I can remember. It was a prime opportunity to strip-off and take the plunge… …unfortunately I was still recovering.

What a shame!

We carried on with our winter road trips, including a trip to the East Neuk. While we were there, we spotted a couple of yachts from our club that are spending the winter on the pontoons. With an eight-year waiting list it will be a while before we can join them.

Not normally one to be taking photographs of vehicles when there are boats around, for some reason I spent more time than a grown man ought to oogling the RNLI’s tractor. In my defence, given that we’re members, I felt in some small way that I was entitled to be interested.

As well as Pittenweem, St Monans, and Elie we dropped into Crail [above]. We haven’t sailed into Crail before as it has always seemed a bit cramped and busy. Over the winter though, there was more space and it was hard to resist considering an overnight during the coming season.

Above: the view over to Inchcolm from the beach at Aberdour.

There’s no doubt that the weather has been very kind to us so far this winter. As I haven’t been in a position to carry out the onboard maintenance that’s required before crane-in, I have a lot to squeeze in over the next three months.

I’d better get my skates on.

Crane-out 2016

Day one of crane-out was wet, windy and cold. Most of my wet weather gear was onboard, so I had to cobble together an eclectic array of clothing that should have kept me substantially dry.

Like many others, I still got thoroughly soaked.

By mid-morning I felt something snap on my right hand. My finger didn’t feel broken so I carried on, stopping to check my limp finger tip every now and then. Eventually, I accepted that something wasn’t quite right and went in search of a second opinion. The second opinion I found suggested that I needed to pop over to A&E, and following an X-Ray the diagnosis was something called ‘Mallet Finger’, which means that my tendon had snapped. Treatment was a small finger splint to be worn 24/7 until the end of the year, and then a further month wearing the splint at night. Zang!

My injury did nothing to prevent the unrelenting approach of the season’s low point.

When the tide arrived the following day, we brought our Macwester Malin over to the harbour ready for crane-out. We had a short 15 minute wait before the dreaded event was upon us.

The wind had dropped, and the lift went reasonably well. I say ‘reasonably’, because there was some contact between the crane lifting gear, and some delicate equipment at the top of our main mast. At this stage I’m not sure if any remedial action is required.

Moments later our twin-keel yacht was heading for what will become her home for the next six months. This year we have a slightly different spot, roughly twenty feet away from last year, on more even ground.

Once our Macwester Malin was safely deposited on her wooden blocks, we stowed some items and checked that everything was present and correct before turning our attention to other outstanding tasks. Above; muddy antifoul paint power-washed a few days after crane-out – it’s a task that’s easier before the mud and paint dry out.

One of the traditions the crew and I have is rowing our dinghy over to the club one last time, however that was going to be more complicated than normal given the damage to my finger. Hoping to avoid being labelled a finger-malingerer, I was keen to row the tender round as usual …but I was overruled. Instead the club boat did the job for us in a matter of moments.

As crane-out weekend drew to a close, just prior to heading up to the club patio for a consolation beer, I noticed the view through our sprayhood from our new spot on the hard-standing. In that instance, I knew that it wouldn’t be long until I find myself staring out at that view, gently rocking back and forwards on the balls of my feet.

The long wait for crane-in 2017 begins.

Reccy to Seacliff

The day following our trip to Granton on Ragdoll we decided to go on a reccy by road to Seacliff.

While we were up in Anstruther a couple of weeks earlier, we had spent a few hours onboard Pearl Fisher, a LM27 currently up for sale @ 29,500 via Boatshed. The LM’s skipper told us about a fabulous beach just south of Bass Rock, and so we thought we would check it out.

I had seen a photograph of the harbour a few years back, and quite fancied the idea of squeezing in. However once we were actually there, it became clear that it would be a tight squeeze.

A very tight squeeze.

So tight in fact that we’re gonna need a smaller boat. Theoretically our 32ft Macwester Malin might, just about, somehow fit inside the harbour, but the only way she could get in is by crane …as the harbour entrance is less than the Malin’s beam.

To make things worse, the approach is just as narrow and goes around corners, nooks and crannies.

So Seacliff harbour is definitely off our cruising destination list, however the beach is fab and would be a great place to anchor for lunch …or possibly even take the ground given the right conditions.