Day 141, Sunday 14th October 2018….today we reached Ramsgate…one more day to go until the Circumnavigation is done! Hopefully home to Eastbourne tomorrow Monday!!

Poli Poli departed Saint Katharine’s Dock next to Tower Bridge in London at exactly 6am this morning (Sunday).

It was dark!! Also chilly and within minutes of starting the engine…guess what? It started pouring down with rain…so full sets of oilies were donned.

We were followed into the lock by a motorboat called “Huntress”…we had seen it arrive the previous day. Margaret had spotted “Tarbet” and “Loch Fyne” on her stern…a Scottish boat we wondered?

As we left the lock to go into the River Thames…it had just turned High Water…so that meant at least six hours of Thames ebb tide behind us..and boy did we use that to our full advantage.

We reached Sheerness in the Thames estuary in 4 hours …never did our speed fall below 8 knots!

Once out of London and heading towards the North Kent coast and North Foreland…the opposite happened…when Low Water Sheerness occurred the tide came in and turned against us ..and it was a strong head tide then all the way to Ramsgate.

So 4 hours to do 40 n. miles out of London….and 6 hours to do 30 n. miles from Sheerness to Ramsgate against a strong head tide. But in ten hours the max you will ever get in your favour is six hours. Hey ho that’s Sailing for you!

We berthed in an empty visitors section of the tidal part of the Royal Harbour Marina, Ramsgate…apart from one other boat …. Huntress . They had arrived 10 minutes before us having overtaken Poli Poli in the River Thames after passing through the Thames Barrier.

We dined in the new Wetherspoons pub in Ramsgate … a fully refurbished type Opera house building. On our travels we have noted how Wetherspoons reclaim old dilapidated buildings and a very good job of restoring them…. and the beer is cheap too!!

This evening it is raining here in Ramsgate. We shall go to bed early …tired after a ten hour journey… gird our loins for the morrow…the final 60 or so n. miles to Eastbourne and home. Only one more passage plan to write…now…before bed.

Hope to see some of you…family, friends and followers tomorrow…late afternoon any time after 4pm.

Mileage for the day: 73.4 n. miles.

Total Mileage from Eastbourne since 27th May: 2,683.7 n. miles.