Up Channel 2

Out with copper-headed Rusty and in with Black Bart. Glinting like a pirate's ebony peg-leg. The tiller-pilot drive ram, out in all weathers, extra-hard worked on this cruise, seemed the most likely point of failure (see En France 92 & Up Channel 1). Because the header unit is reading and responding correctly. And the below-decks black-box brain has all its LED's lit. 

So it proves. Simple to slot in, Bart starts work immediately. His polarity (sense of port and starboard) the same as Rusty's. Stargazer has her silent crew member back on board. Her skipper relieved forthwith of helming duties. The better to navigate, trim sails, cook, eat, take photographs, visit the heads and all manner of sundry tasks. Taken for granted, until they can no longer be carried out . RIP, Rusty-the-reliable. Pictured here 'in happier times,' off Honfleur. Long live buccaneering Bart!

"I get all the news I need on the weather report," has been as true for me, this summer, as it was for Paul Simon's 'Only Living Boy in New York.' Listening to the BBC, I discover that, whilst Stargazer has been at sea, change has been afoot at home : A king has been crowned ; A clown evicted, from Downing Street ; And the currency crashed, to fund tax cuts for fat cats. Which are then cancelled.

 Meanwhile the redoubtable Ukranians are rolling back the tanks, of the robber-baron from Russia . Stargazer still wears their yellow and blue colours, in solidarity.

Stargazer may be in a UK port, but she is not home yet. Weather watching is therefore still high on our priorities. Autumn has definitely come early, this season. The low pressure systems racing through. Bringing with them a choice of wind directions and strengths.

Thirty five knots, out of the southwest, would make for a lumpy ride off Dungeness, today. That will be followed by a light westerly and a passage making southerly. The tides also turning fair, for the weekend.