Noises in the night

australian-possum-male-22avAt 2.30 in the morning I was woken by the sound of an animal eating- loudly! It was a new sound, much louder than the mob of black swans still mewing on the estuary. The sliding door was open and I crept out onto the balcony where we had slept out under a rash of stars the night before. The sound of mighty munching was coming from the corner of the garden; it paused as I leaned over the rail peering into the darkness, and then resumed. I could see nothing. By the time I found a torch the munching had stopped; whatever it was had moved on.

In the morning I examined the scene; that corner was considerably less dense than it had been and some of the branches had been stripped. The most likely suspect is a possum, not entirely unknown in New Zealand, having somehow crossed the Tasman Sea from Australia, but unheard of here in Southshore. So not only are we being forced out of the house by the earthquakes, we are being eaten out of the garden by possum as well. Whatever is the world coming to?

The Japanese Emperor Hirohito, Jolene, and me

SONY DSCWe were at a pre-Christmas dinner party the other evening. It was eclectic affair- an Australian lady, a Scottish lady, a Sri Lankan man, two young New Zealand women, our hosts and friends, Jonny and Linda- a home grown Kiwi couple, me as the token Welshman, and Betty, currently a Kiwi but previously an Aussie and before that an English girl with a Welsh father. It was a rather splendid evening with good food and great company. In conversation, Jolene, the Australian woman, and I discovered that, more than forty years ago we had been just yards apart in a London street.  How do we know? Because on the 5th of October 1971 we were both standing outside Victoria Station to witness the arrival of Hirohito, the 124th Emporer of Japan on a State visit. He travelled to Buckingham Palace in an open horse-drawn landeau. Jolene was there as a spectator and I was there on duty as a police constable sprung from the training school especially for the occasion.

Swimming in the rain

P1040733evBoxing day- began in bright sunlight and a wild southerly gale. Not long after we talked to the Cardiff clan on Skype, the wind dropped and it greyed over. It began to rain as we set out on a two mile walk along the estuary, around the point passed Shag Rock (now locally known as Shag Pile since the earthquake reduced it to one third of its previous pinnacle size) and onto the glorious sandy beach that stretches northwards for many miles. It is a walk we do often- at the end, a short sprint across the road brings us neatly back to the house.

   By the time we reached our favoured swimming spot, the rain was coming down in earnest and we lost sight of the headland beyond Sumner. But the water was warm although the surf left over from the earlier blow was a bit messy. We had no towels but since it was pouring with rain there was no point in drying off anyway. Back home, we stripped off for the outdoor shower to wash away the sand and the salt, hung togs on the line and disappeared indoors for a steaming mug of coffee.

The annual migration: time flies

The last eight months have been incredibly busy- rushing towards a faraway date in November with increased intensity as the amount of time left grew less & less. Enquiring, writing, organising and meeting commitments (or sometimes not) along a self-elected path. Enjoying time with my family and friends but knowing with certainty that I should have been doing more of it for longer. No-one else to blame but me.

 Never before have I set out for anywhere in such a rush. Closing the front door with my fingers crossed, leaving some undone things in the hands of others for which my grateful thanks. I despatched the Sailing Gaffers manuscript a few hours before I left, and posted final letters on my way to the airport. No hassle though; I made it to ‘Coryton International’, my local end-of-the-single-track-line railway station with four minutes to spare. Twenty-eight hours later I was with Betty viewing houses for sale along the beach in Christchurch, South Island. Standing on the top of a sand dune on the edge of a city, a 180 degree arc of empty horizon was spread before us. Long-distance ocean rollers washed onto a wet sandy beach that disappeared into a shimmering blue haze in each distant direction. There was not a soul in sight.

An Unremarkable Day

Chloe approachingThere are so many things I should have been doing- a book deadline in just over a week for one thing. But the boat is due out of the water next week and there is just such a good spell of mild settled weather at the moment. Anyway, I like deadlines, I love the whooshing sound they make as they going flying past, rather like waves rushing under the boat on a lively downwind passage. It was one of those drear, late October days you hope will stay dry and it did. High tide was 2pm-ish, a whopping 13.7 metre spring tide so there’ll be no messing with that in the Bristol Channel! Nutmeg locked out of the barrage at 11.30 together with a small motor fishing boat. There will be two hours of flood remaining- a nice hop up-channel, or so I thought. But there was little wind and it was a north-easterly headwind (of course), so it meant tacking ever so slowly up-channel. An hour after putting to sea I hadn’t made a mile.

But the wind did pick up a little and I gave a little whoop when the GPS clicked over to show 2 knots of speed. Apart for the dim outline of a ship on the horizon, there wasn’t another vessel in sight. Glorious. Then I spotted a red sail with a topsail aloft. Even in the distance I recognised Chloe and called Charlie up. We both changed course for a quick natter across the water. Soon after, the tide turned and so did I and enjoyed the gentle rush of a downwind return. In the midst of an empty sea an ocean-going tug suddenly appeared over my shoulder and crossed in front of me. He wasn’t tramping but his wash was enough to give the 19ft Shrimper a bit of a wake up. After a slow drift back up the River Ely it was 5 o’clock before I was back on the berth. An unremarkable but utterly satisfying day on the water.

An unexpected sail in lively seas

We drove a 200 mile arc across Wales to arrive at Holyhead on the north-west corner of Ynys Mon, the beautiful isle of Anglesey, where a traditional sailing festival takes place every year in late summer. Though we had to leave Nutmeg, the newly acquired Cornish Shrimper behind with a mis-firing engine. But that led to a hitched ride on TÍr na nÓg, Sean Walsh’s Dublin Bay based Heard 28. A guff-cutter built on the lines of the sailing oyster dredgers of Falmouth, she is a fine sea boat and a seasoned campaigner of many a festival on both sides of the Irish Sea as well as across Channel to France.

We raced at noon in fresh conditions. It began quietly enough in the sheltered waters of Holyhead harbour but once outside the breakwater the sea grew alive. A windward leg took us the first mark following a tack to clear a buoy marking the wreck. Then the main was set loose for the long downwind leg to the green Bolivar buoy, hard on the heels of arch rival Happy Quest. There had been no talk of shortening sail but suddenly the wind did it for us. With an alarming bang the ten foot long bowsprit leapt from the horizontal to the vertical, wrapping itself in the foresail in the process. A bobstay shackle had given way under pressure.

The foresail was quickly stowed and the now idle bowsprit put back in place. With order restored and progress resumed, beer and sandwiches were passed around- well this is an Irish boat! More than a dozen gaffers began the race and we were now well down the fleet, not an accustomed place for TÍr na nÓg – we pressed on.  Out towards Bolivar, conditions got livelier still- 25 knots of wind stirred rolling green waves crested with white foam that enveloped the lee gunnel and sent dollops of cold spray rushing over the coachroof into the cockpit. The helmsman glistened wet in the sunlight. Much of the fleet retired, especially the smaller boats including the beautiful little Herreshoff designed fin keeler Winifred that continued gamely until she became waterlogged and had to be taken in tow.

The forestay on the Cornish Crabber Tilley parted and she limped home with her mast lying along her deck. Her owner’s other boat, Shearwater did not even make the start, she snapped her mast when single-handed on her way to Holyhead and was escorted in by the inshore lifeboat. It did not however stop her from taking part in the parade of sail with a shorted line of flags flying from the stump.

   TÍr na nÓg finished the race as a sloop rather than the cutter she began it as, but in a creditable third place and second in class. So once again the winner was Happy Quest, with Lassie of Chester taking the honours for working boats and was the only other finisher. TÍr na nÓg sailed for Dublin the next morning.

Hebridean Flame’s Summer(!) Cruise in the Firth of Clyde 2012

In the beginning, it was Largs Yacht Club that seemed to be Scotland’s most appealing place; current weather- wet and windy. The next couple of days were a mixture of motor-sailing in a calm or reefed main and jib, both with lashings of Scotch mist. However the quiet serenity of East Loch Tarbert was pure joy. Amongst its eclectic set of lovely old wooden boats reflected in dead pan water was Swn-Y-Mor, the old Welsh lifeboat, once of St Davids Pembrokeshire. Her name translates to Sound of the Sea, and is honourably justified for she has two wooden plaques fixed to her cabin. The first records the loss of one of her crew, washed overboard attending a stricken vessel in 1921. The other records her 84,000 mile, nine-year world circumnavigation between 1984 and 1993.

The forecast for the next two days was identical- east or south-east F3 or 4 increasing 5 for a time. Sea state slight, occasional rain, visibility moderate or good, occasionally very poor. It could have been worse, especially considering the deluge of rain falling over most of England and Wales with flood warnings scattered across the land. We explored Upper Loch Fyne, picking up a mooring for a lunch stop in the shadow of an ivy-clad ruined tower, before re-tracing our track to fetch up at Otter Ferry and the excellent Oystercatcher Inn.

All that was visible the following morning was grey. The sky, the sea and the rain in between. Yet it was perfectly calm, giving a strangely comforting view of a mono-chromed world. A light south-easterly ensured a series of long tacks back and fore across the loch. In between, we were busy watching gannets majestically sky-diving into the sea to feed in a high speed-vertical dive from two hundred feet, like a stone from a catapult. By the time we moored at Lochranza the grey had been replaced by idyllic sunshine and blue sky. It is a magical harbour with the ruins of a 13th Century fortified house still dominating the upper reaches. A family of deer grazed on the exposed sea-weed in the harbour, searching out a sea food supper. We ate in the only pub in town, the Lochranza Hotel and afterwards sat in HF’s cockpit with a glass in hand, watching the last reflections of daylight fall into deepening twilight.

After a better than expected cruise along Aran’s east coast, we spent the next night moored off Lamlash, behind the Buddhist retreat of Holy Isle. The continuing easterly set up a petulant little swell which gave us a rocky night, listening to the moan of the wind through taut rigging and the anchor rattling it it’s cradle on the foredeck.

Abandoning plans for a circumnavigation of Aran, HF set off to the north and tacked a mile or two out to sea. From there we watched rain clouds gathering over the island giving the hills around Goat Fell a dark and brooding feel as they slipped by to port. We sailed along a crease in Bute Sound, steel grey seas to starboard and deep bottle green specked with whitecaps stretching to the ominous shoreline on the other side. A ring of dark water my precious!

Ducking inside the island, we passed though Inchmarnock Sound and eased into the Kyles of Bute, scattering a small crowd of gannets resting on the water. Here at last, we got a few close-up photos of these beautiful birds, once known to sailors of old as the sea goose.  Our last night was spent at Colintraive Point and a splendid meal at the eponymous pub where our haggis-hatted crewman George, regaled the entire bar with his impish sense of humour.  As ever though, it is the combined consent of the crew, be they friends or strangers, that determines the worthiness of any cruise. And ours was a simply a privilege.

A High Point Sees The Truth

When I look in the mirror I see this crusty old profile looking back at me. Sometimes I am not even sure it is me- the years go by. My eldest son was forty recently- impossible to believe.

We have been holidaying at Croyde on the north Devon coast since he was three, and his younger brother a babe in arms. So what better place to return to, to celebrate a landmark birthday. On the day, Ben took his father, his father-in-law, John and his ten-year-old daughter Bethan, for a five-mile walk around Baggy Point to Putsborough.  It is as fine a coastal headland as can be found anywhere and we stopped, as we often used to, to make a brew in the lee of a stone wall.

Twenty-five years ago, probably to the day, Ben and I had risen early and did the same walk. Out on the point stands an old wooden coastguard watch-pole. We both climbed it in 1987 and took it in turns to take each other’s photographs. We did the same today. It is significant that back then it was the son who stopped one step short of the top, while this time it was the father who was a step short. Maybe Bethan, who made it to the first step this time, will bring her father back here in another twenty-five years and we will see then who stands on top. It is what life is all about.

Re-Zoning Southshore- Life on the Edge

A time for some reflection, eighteen months after the first ugly earthquake rocked the unsuspecting city of Christchurch. The Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority (CERA) have announced its decision about the land on the western edge of Southshore spit, that keeps slipping into the estuary with each successive aftershock. It has been orange-zoned for over a year, 400 families waiting- stop-go, stop-go, who knows? Well now we do know, 198 houses along the estuary edge have been re-zoned red including Myn-Y-Mor at number 146B. So we will have to leave this much-loved place, akin to paradise, and let it return to nature. In years to come there will be native bush and walking tracks and maybe a bench where once the kitchen stood. And some young couple will sit looking out over this amazing estuary, alive with birds, and imagine what it would be like to live in a house just here.  Well we have had that privilege, and still have it for a little while longer. When that time comes when we are sitting in the rocking chair on the verandah, playing back the video in our minds, we will recall this place.

Harland & Wolff’s other ship to the Titanic

With a great deal of interest in the centenary of the Titanic tragedy this month, here is my father’s small slice of adventure. He did not, of course, sail on the Titanic but he did sail on a ship built in 1911 by Harland and Wolff, in the same yard and the same year as the Royal Mail Ship Titanic. Just turned 23, my father, George Head, sailed from Liverpool in 1925 on the ss Demerara, a refrigerated meat carrier and passenger ship owned by the Royal Mail steam packet company. During the Great War, when the Demerara had been armed with a 4.7-inch gun, she was chased by the notorious German surface raider, SMS Moewe. On the 17th February, 1916,  200 miles west southwest of the Madeira Islands she managed to escape the raider’s clutches. Fifteen months later, she survived being torpedoed by a German submarine off La Rochelle, France. (As a point of interest, an earlier Royal Mail Packet ship also named Demerara, sailing out of Liverpool sank en route to Gibraltar with the loss of all hands on Christmas Day 1887.)

 The Demerara sailed for South America on the 21st March 1925 and George’s brother Reg, a terminally sick man suffering the effects of gas from the Great War, came to see him off at Liverpool Docks. On the quayside, Reg gave his brother a bible in which he had inscribed- “To George. Wishing him every success. With love, Reg. March 21st 1925.” The two men shook hands in an emotional farewell each knowing that they would never see the other again.  George went aboard the ship to begin a new life in a faraway land and Reg returned to Cardiff where he died exactly a month later. George was heading to Brazil to work in a gold mine in the interior. The mine at Morro Vehlo was, and still is, one of the largest gold mines in the world. George stayed for a year during which time he met up with local families, rode horses and won prizes in rifle shooting compeititions. He only returned, once again aboard the Demerara, when news of the sudden death of his mother reached him. The ss Demerara was finally sent to the breakers yard in 1933. I’m pleased to say that the bible that Reg so lovingly gave  to George, now sits on my bookshelf.