Zen Again 8

 

The smouldering embers, of sunset, crown a wave-washed, whistle-wind day. Above Ramsgate harbour's sparsely populated pontoons.

Stargazer's shortened sail had arrived at 09.30. After overnight surgery, by Alan and Sarah. By 10.00 we were in Chatham lock. By 10.15, beating purposefully down the Medway.

We catch the turn of the tide, at Garrison Point. Stargazer powering through the wind over tide swell. Her sights set on the North Foreland.

The breeze may be icy, under today's steely skies, but it is out of the north east. Blowing twenty to twenty four knots.

Giving us a ground speed of seven to eight knots. And, enabling Stargazer to thread the Copperas Channel, to lay the Foreland, in one, day-long, board.

We turn south, off North Foreland. Putting the wind astern. As Stargazer flattens, and her motion eases, I bolt below, to boil the kettle, for a warming pot of coffee, and gobble a sustaining hot crossed bun.

Less than an hour later, our lines are taken, by the crew of Bon Vent, out of Blankenberge. Stargazer lies snug beneath the granite walls of Ramsgate harbour. Watching windswept walkers scurry by, above. Savouring a passage well made. On the last of the fair wind and tide combinations, of this lunar cycle.