“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did. So throw off the bowline. Sail away from the safe harbour. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” Mark Twain
Weather permitting
I had pencilled-in today and tomorrow for a post-refit shake-down passage to Fowey and back – weather permitting.
The Sing of the Shore
I have been looking at a copy of A Glossary of Cornish Sea-Words, by R.Morton Nance, published by the Federation of Old Cornwall Societies in 1963.
It fell open . . .
Dowsing the foresail
Now the boat is back in the water, I can assess the changes made over the winter.
One of the tricks for a single-hander is to be able to lower the foresail and dowse it before the bulk of the sail slides under the lifelines and into the water. 99 times out of 100, there’s no problem. Occasionally everything goes wrong. It happened to me at the end of last year and it was time to do something about it.
Triumph in the sun
We walked all morning in the Corsican sun, enjoying a fresh breeze from the sea. The path was kind underfoot, changing from small stones to fine gravel and back again. We had reached that rhythm where you rely on instinct to look down at the path in front of you.
A praying mantis was on the path. I stopped to take a photograph.
River Exe – a low spring tide
As we waited, we wondered how often this happens. We hoped it wasn’t every spring tide.
Experience
“Experience is not what happens to you, it’s what you do with what happens to you.” Aldous Huxley
Reviewing the blog – a rough path to follow
In February I changed the WordPress theme for this site. This started as a cosmetic gesture – I wanted it to be easier to read and easier to search. However, in the process, it has opened up new possibilities. At the moment, these possibilities are inklings at the back of my aging mind. Discovering them means teasing them out, being honest with myself about what I think I am doing . . . and why. Therefore the aim of this post is to review what’s going on beneath the surface and reassemble the contents. I want to do this without losing the ‘Folksong’ and ’Maritime History’ elements that I started back in 2006. The path I am taking roughly follows this route:
- Visualising the current content
- Reviewing the motives for writing the blog
- Deciding the tools for learning ‘on the job’
- Considering the content and how it might develop
- Putting it all together
- The final tweak . . .
- . . . and Publish
Entering the Cattewater
It started to rain, the tide was high.
I leaned against the rail at Queen Anne Battery and watched a regular occurrence. Today, it was Hav Snapper turning into the Cattewater from the Sound.
Coming alive
Yesterday I experienced what everyone who has ever owned a boat must feel – that moment when the elaborate and expensive shed you have spent the winter accessing via a wobbly metal ladder reenters the water and comes alive. Continue reading
Beyond Steeple Point 