Day Four… Wednesday 30th May, 2019.

A very wet night with a light north easterly wind rattling a few main halyards on the many masts around us. Up at 6am … low tide, very still, and…. quiet and peaceful. Amazing sea bird shrills…making a change from the incessant wood pigeon coo’s back home! We are berthed very close to a large nature reserve with views across to Yarmouth on the Isle of Wight.

Leaden sky with more rain to come later. We held a passage planning meeting after coming back from The Ship Inn in Lymington ….today we are sailing from this marina in Lymington  to Poole and have a few serious tidal constraints to ponder. Wind and tide are the most important factors in sail boat passage planning.

We were leaving at 8am this morning but after realising that the sail would be against a very strong tide coming up the West Solent… we changed the departure time to 11am when the tide should have changed. And if the forecast north easterly had materialised we would be heading into a wind over tide scenario… which is very uncomfortable sailing. So let’s get ready for 11am departure and let the outgoing tide sweep us down past the famous Needles lighthouse and into the English Channel.