Fog and busy shipping channel

Joanna Spencer-Smith

8am sails up and off we go. Wind from the west, 15kn overcast. Put in one reef. Good boat speed over 7kt. 10:20 approaching shipping lane. Fog rolled in. Changed bearing from 350 to 300 to try and avoid traffic Joanna tried to be helpful by getting the handheld radio out of its holster to change settings so we could monitor shipping lane traffic ch13 but Somehow accidentally set off the distress call and was unable to cancel it. Paul had to duck inside and call coastguard and various boats offering help and sort it all out. Meanwhile jo stressing at the helm heading back to France… Ben and his calming aura came to the rescue and jo demoted to look out. Later given horn responsibilities, but never actually deployed them. Having finally cleared the shipping lanes at 1:30 we reset course to 5 degree and shook out the reefs. Wind now 12-13kt SW tide 2 knot westbound. boat speed just over 6kt. Still foggy. Fog finally lifted about 2pm. 15 mins later it was time to put the reef back in as wind now up to 20kt. Starting to catch up we Aurora who left before us. Oh no - someone who will have heard all the shenanigans on the radio earlier! Somewhere around half two, land became visible. Ben spent some time in the helm I’m banned from touching anything ever again… Had to ring border force to get permission to stop at Studland bay instead of going back to lymington. Anchor dropped by 4 pm. Picky bits, rehydration and view of Harry’s rocks to follow.