Yarmouth turned out to be very good value as we didn’t find anyone to pay for our stay. We figured the harbour master was based elsewhere and more concerned with the sizeable volume of commercial activity than the odd yacht. As there were no facilities provided other than the wall to tie up to, this seemed fair. Showers and electricity we can live without (Alex under protest), but rubbish disposal would have been useful.
We enjoyed the crazy golf (Alex won again) and the E.ON visitor centre. It was rather surreal sitting in the E.ON cabin on the sunny, sandy beach and watching the seals and wind turbines on the sandbank that we had sailed towards for hours during a wild night. Departing Great Yarmouth at 5:30 am we had another nervy moment as we let go the warps and the fishing boat moored downstream leapt towards us…
There probably aren’t many people that get emotional about the sight of the cranes at Felixstowe. But for us, they were the first familiar landmark since leaving Dartmouth more than 3 months ago. We are back on home territory at last. However hazardous the shifting sandbanks fanning out from the Thames estuary, we know our way through them and finally feel close to home. However, you can see those cranes from 15 miles away and, tacking into a headwind wind, it seemed to take forever to close with the river. Many more yachts about – we spotted more in one day than the total since Tobermory. Where there are 2 or more yachts together, there are opportunities to race, which livened up the last part of the journey and had us concentrating better on sail trim.
It is just as well the river Orwell is so pretty, as we have been stuck here for a week with strong wind. The river is sheltered, lined with trees and low farmland and home to hordes of wading birds. We have moored at 3 separate buoys, stayed overnight in the centre of Ipswich while Stuart and Cathy came to dinner and have now been in Woolverstone marina for several days. We twice tried to leave: the first time we only got as far as Shotley point, the second time we were a bit more determined and tacked our way 5 miles outside the harbour before deciding that doing this for another 50 miles was not going to be a runner. We have been enjoying our time though, improving our average step count for the month with walks along the coast, across fields, through proper woodland (more interesting than the pine forests at home), around a reservoir and taking in cake shops in the afternoons. We are at ‘peak blackberry’ and it has been just about warm enough to wear shorts for walking. We went to the cinema again too.
Today it is cold and wet so we have the cabin heater on, but it does look as if the wind might be OK for heading home tomorrow…
Ventata 