13 September 2010

London to Ireland to Wales in a weekend.

As one who had to deal with the expense of being weather bound this summer, I felt for Kieran the owner of a Twister 28 and a colleague. He had gone off to Ireland for a summer holiday and got weather bound.
Leaving his boat there for a month while he waited for the weather window was turning out expensive.

He enlisted the help of Dick Durham and myself to help him bring his boat back.

We dashed out of the office in London on Friday evening, caught a train from Waterloo to Alton in Hampshire where we picked up Kierans car. Drove to Basingstoke, picked up Dick who was fresh from the Southampton Boatshow. Straight down the motorway to Milford Haven. A little walk around and then in a taxi to the ferry port. The overnight ferry took us to Rosslare. Where we had to leg it to the train, just in time as it was the only train that day. We arrived in Waterford mid morning on Saturday.
A quick walk around the town to stock up on provisions and food for a good old fried breakfast, then we were off down the river to wait for the morning tide out of Dunmore East.

The forecast was looking very dodgy with possible 6's and 7's, but it turned out nice again.

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we filled our stomachs with irish fish and chips before we set off at 3.30am from Dunmore East, southern Ireland, bound for Milford Haven in Wales.

this is Kieran the captain and skipper of Cleaver II
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the dolphins are a bugger to photograph. meat torpedoes flying out of the water every second, but I couldnt seem to catch them on camera. Still, it was a beautiful sunrise.
cleaver 2

not the best point of sail, but gull winging all the way, Cleaver II was very well behaved.
cleaver 2

we intercepted a massive pod of dolphins who swam with us for hours and Dick had a better go than me at photographing them.
cleaver 2

tea break. biscuits are a must if I am to stay sane at sea.
sailing,Irish Sea

Kieran is a most splendid cook and prepared us a fantastic Irish beef stew for the journey to Wales.

kieran Flatt

a rough trip guide.
scrappy map

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