Old Warships

Bonita stayed in Gosport today and as it was my birthday the twins and I took the ferry to Portsmouth. We saw the Mary Rose (better preserved than when I last saw her), HMS Victory (worse, but some work is in progress) and HMS Warrior which I had not seen before. The Warrior, launched in 1861, is a very impressive demonstration of mid Victorian naval power with many fascinating points of detail. We were interested that there is a demand to book her for wedding receptions and parties; a little odd since she is the mid-nineteenth century equivalent of a weapon of mass destruction. It seems very different from getting married in church.

The photo above shows Emma at the helm of the Warrior.  In spite of her revolutionary design, in service the ship was very hard to steer and erratic to maneuver. There are facilities for up to 24 men to steer at once using linked wheels on three decks. One reason for this is that she did not have a balanced rudder. A balanced rudder has up to a quarter of the rudder blade extending forward of the rudder post, and it greatly reduces the effort required to steer powered ships that have a propeller directly in front of the rudder. The etching on the left shows the stern of Warrior under construction at Thames Ironworks. The two-bladed propeller was located in front of the rudder post and could be retracted up into the hull when the ship was under sail.

In the evening D and Sarah joined us to see something of Portsmouth after dark.

Portsmouth Harbour

Bonita from Brighton's Palace Pier by Nic Compton

We woke in Newhaven to a brisk NE breeze and a cloudy sky. Nic had taken lots of pictures aboard yesterday but had none of Bonita sailing. We eventually agreed that he would take the bus to Brighton and get out on the end of pier: we would take the boat down there and sail past a couple of times as close to the pier as we could.  This is one of his pictures. It was quite a blustery morning with gusts coming off the land which is why we have a couple of reefs in the mainsail, but the sea looks fairly calm. There are some more of Nic's lovely photos posted on Facebook.

After this excitement was over we settled down to a fair weather sail past Selsey Bill and into Portsmouth harbour. We took a berth on Gosport marina where there are several huge racing boats being prepared for a 2013/14 circumnavigation (of the world).

We admired the boats but were not sure we envied the crews who seem to have a fairly spartan life centred around getting the best performance out of their boat. That sort of thing wouldn't appeal to everyone..

Newhaven

Nic at work!

Yesterday evening we were joined in Ramsgate by Nic Compton who is a journalist. He is interested in Bonita's circumnavigation and is going to spend a couple of days with us as we head down Channel.

We locked out of the inner harbour about 10.30pm and immediately it seemed like a bad idea. There was a heavy swell rolling into the outer harbour and we had an uncomfortable and noisy night on the pontoon which we shared with the wind farm service boats. It also soon became clear that theirs is a 24 hour operation. We woke up, or at least got up, at 4.30am to find a NW wind so we left immediately and had a fine sail with good wind and fair tide until we were past Dungeness. The breeze then died away as we neared Beachy Head so we motored the last few miles to Newhaven. 

Sunset over Seven Sisters

Nic took more photos in one day than we have taken in the last 3 months and is interested in all aspects of the trip and Bonita's history. He also knows Newhaven harbour well which was useful when entering in the dark.  We had a moment's excitement when entering Newhaven when both Bonita's port and starboard navigation lights failed, presumably due to an electrical fault. There was no time to fix it and it's not really a good idea to enter a ferry port without lights. Luckily we have a spare battery powered set aboard (never before used) so everything was OK.

I thought it was too late to be worth radioing the marina, but as we approached we were met by two very helpful members of staff who had seen us approaching on AIS. The AIS tracking system has been used by large ships for several years but is a new toy for us this season and I have been impressed by how quickly it is being adopted by yachts and its many uses.

Tale of two tugs

Today we were forecast strong SW winds with a change to N winds on Tuesday so unsurprisingly most of the gaffers chose to have a rest day in port.  There are two old steam tugs in Ramsgate undergoing restoration which illustrate the difficulties inherent in preserving old boats, particularly large ones. 

Portwey is a twin screw coal fired steam tug built in Glasgow in 1927. She is the last of her type in the UK and one of very few in the world. She is being restored with lottery money and is on the slipway with new patches welded onto the dodgy bits of the hull, paint being applied and other purposeful activity going on.

Cervia is a 1,000 horsepower steam tug built in 1946. There is a tragic story attached to her early years: she was attending a large ship in the London docks when she was rolled over and sunk, drowning her crew of five. She was raised a few days later and eventually put back into service. Being 'girt' by the towline and capsized is a well recognised danger for tugs when turning or slowing a large ship if the towing hawser takes load at right angles to the  long axis of the tug. With the tug being towed sideways by the ship there is not much the tug skipper can do to get out of the situation except by releasing the towline. Today this can be done remotely from the bridge but in Cervia's day it could only be done by a crew member striking the release lever on the tow hook with a sledge hammer; difficult to do with the tug being towed sideways and heeled over at an angle.

Cervia has more flags but rather less new paint than Portwey. She is being worked on intermittently by a small but dedicated band of volunteers. Sadly Cervia gives the impression that, despite their hard work, she may well be deteriorating more quickly than she is being restored, and unless she can get a heritage lottery grant it's difficult to see much of a future for her. 

How many vintage steam tugs are needed - even in a country which is sympathetic to both steam power and picturesque old boats?  Restoring these tired old workhorses to a safe condition costs a lot and their ability to earn money through tourism and film work must be limited.

On a more positive note, our plans today are to lock out of the inner harbour around midnight with a hope of an early start with a fair tide tomorrow.

Parade of Sail

Robinetta

This morning we had a Parade of Sail which involved about half the gaffers locking out of Ramsgate inner harbour, sailing up and down off the beach for a couple of hours, and then locking back in again. It was a pleasant sail on a warm bright day with light winds: one of those days when it is more comfortable to be on the water.  

Bonita's crew see old boats sailing everyday of course, but I later heard that quite a lot of people were enjoying watching the event from the beach.

The picture shows Robinetta in the parade of sail. She was built in 1937 and  the noted yachting journalist Maurice Griffiths called her 'a saucy little tub'.

In the evening we enjoyed a meal in the Oak Hotel by the waterfront. 

We have seen many changes in Ramsgate over the years, many for the better. One thing I don't remember from previous visits is the large commercial aircraft coming in low over the town centre to land at Manston airport. There are not at present very many of them, at least by Heathrow or Gatwick standards. However if no clear decision is made on airport expansion in the South East and there is just some increased activity all round, then more traffic at Manston might well have a detrimental effect on this relatively unspoilt part of Kent. It could be argued that one advantage of the Goodwin Sands airport proposal is that this air traffic would be moved offshore ending these low level flights over Ramsgate and enabling Manston to be returned to being part of rural England. 

Bonita lovely but blurry

Strong SW winds are forecast for tomorrow but we will decide in the morning whether to choose the discomforts of the sea or the attractions of Ramsgate.