Solent Sailing - Heading back East

Back from whence we came - Racing ahead - Chichester Harbour

  

Sailing out of Yarmouth

Serious Sailing on the Solent

Saturday morning and we all enjoy a nice shower in the marina's facilities. I then prepare breakfast sandwiches of bacon and mushrooms (to finish them up). 

A breezy morning, five to six knots from the southwest and a grey sky as we headed out of Yarmouth.

Out back across the wide Solent after hugging the I-o-W's northerly coastline for a while, past posh Cowes that is readying itself for numerous summer festivities. On a Saturday there are so many more boats out on the water. Various classes of yachts with their spinnakers flying were stretching their racing muscles and they would be doing across this summer's racing season.  

By mid-morning it was warmer with the sun out as we headed east making good speed. A while later lunch was taken on the fly as we prepared to re-enter the waters of Chichester Harbour.

The tide was falling and we had to get across the bar. I took the helm; it was ninety minutes of hard sailing. Rag Doll bucked and reared, complaining of little water under her keel. She acquiesced when we were in calmer waters with a little more water. 

Four weeks later: Rag Doll racing - shown foreground right sail number 1965