John Dyckhoff

Left Woodbridge under engine about 1 1/2 before HW wind ENE F4/5 Unsure about exit from Deben in those conditions- managed to speak to Felixstowe Ferry harbourmaster as we approached he said we would have enough water but it would be “Lumpy” Decided to go as could not get back into Tide Mill and weather looked worst for Friday. We had arrived the day before in calm conditions and luckily had ECP’s latest chart let for the Deben entrance as the buoyed entrance this year has been shifted northwards and is now totally wrong on Navionics and UKHO via AnglelNav see photos As we were passing the Deben and Knoll Spit buoys we encountered two fleets of racing dinghies returning- it was a difficult job for JD on the helm to avoid them in the large swell and stay in the channel but his skills saw us through the narrows and out into the N Sea We had thought (wrongly) that as we got into slightly deeper water wave conditions would improve this wasn’t to be and we had wind against tide with 1-2 m swell from the NE which made turning S somewhat hazardous as we would get side on to the rollers We continued to motor NE into the waves hoping that conditions would improve but the wind increased with gusts at 23kn (F6) We decided to wait for a calmer patch to make our turn southwards which again JD accomplished then we had a couple of hours surfing downwind with JD doing his best not to let the confused conditions get us on the beam. We debated getting some sail up I thought the main which is in mast reefed was out of the question as with the wind behind it would need to be out almost to the spreaders and if we broached the boom could go into the sea. The other option was the foresail which is a 150% Genoa on a furler. Whilst I thought if we set a little Genoa It might stabilise us a bit I was concerned that it may be difficult to control, or could become more unfurled than we wanted and did not want to make the helms job any harder than it was so we decided to roll on as we were. It took a couple of hours to reach the main Harwich shipping channel and even then it was not until we were in the Lee of Felixstowe dock did the roller’s abate. I would invite your comments as to how we could have handled this situation better and should we have used our sails ? Since returning one of my main thoughts has been would we have found calmer sea conditions by heading further out from Felixstowe ledge into the North Channel before heading S ?