Bonify at large

Back to real life with a jolt now the party's over – it's a grey rainy windy day, forecast no good for going anywhere and the talk is all of when might we be able to leave and where might we head to. We'd like to head straight back the 75 miles to Harwich from here but our course will be 310 degrees and that is pretty much where the winds are coming from – and with some force. Our Belgian gaffer friend Ed wants to get “Drum of Drake” back to home base at Nieuwpoort today despite the conditions so Howard volunteers and 3 of them head off into the cold wet blast. It's only 10 miles and they complete the trip in a rather bumpy 2 hours with winds of 30 knots and minimal sail. Drum of Drake ready to go with volunteer deckhand Howard and skipper Ed By early afternoon Howard is back (by car) but not before I have managed to commit us to hosting dinner for 11 on board Bonify. I'm not going to cook it as Sotra will be the kitchen vessel, but in this weath...

Couldn't see the band but that's better We finally managed to enjoy some of the live music sitting with a beer in the sunshine. Sunny again! Must be a record. A lot of sea shanties we know and a few we don't, and then we had good seats to watch the parade go by. We didn't see the marching band for the crowd in the way but had no trouble seeing what followed. Even taller The tallest chaps got onto their stilts via the harbour office window One hour before the festival was due to end the skies opened (my fault – I was wearing my Monsoon jacket again) and the public disappeared as if by magic. We lurked in a bar (hardship!) until there was a lull and then made it back to Bonify just in time to join in with the chorus of ship's whistles which closes the event. Dates of next year's Oostende voor Anker: 25 th to 28 th May.

Fish smoking on the quay A third sunny day so it's going well for the organisers. Hundreds of visitors milling round on the quay and on the pontoons; the food stalls and bars are doing a roaring trade and the live music is well attended. Exmouth Shanty Men in full swing Christophe, blacksmith with some artistic ideas We have a quiet time on Bonify as most visitors to our pontoon are more impressed with the “Mutin” opposite – she's a lovely huge old French sailing yawl of a type called a “Dundee” and she's run by the French Navy for cadet training. The boat is quite a draw, and the uniforms too. "Mutin" There's a 2 hour “Happy Hour” every evening for crews of participating boats on board the Hydrograaf – another lovely ship, once the royal yacht of the Dutch royal family. I'll spare blog readers my poor photos which don't do justice to the excellent meals we have shared on friends' boats and likewise the blu...

Ostend harbour entrance We have a bone to pick with Navionics. Ostend had some major construction work some years ago to create the 2 big new breakwaters in the picture above – the old pierhead is on the right. We have a paper chart (or as some might say a PROPER chart) dated February 2015 which shows this new configuration and the new buoyage but the update to our electronic charts, purchased at some expense only weeks ago, shows only the old twin piers. What other updates might be missing? Dare we assume this is the only error on our electronic chart? Ostend beach Castles in the sand There's the beach (above), and then there's special sand for sculpting – an exhibition is being prepared here but almost more interesting is to watch it taking shape. We glimpsed through the windows a busy sandy scene looking for all the world like something from Ancient Egypt. Some people never grow up The reason we are out here looking at th...

Bonify is in there somewhere - radar scanner showing on wooden mast to the right of the station roof No ramblings today, just Festival photos Sorry - it's Bonify in Mercator Dock, broken Rule No 1 Dutch flat-bottoms on show

Nieuwpoort to Ostend: 10.5 miles, sailed most of the way. Wierd Beard beers from England One particular Belgian gaffer friend has always complained that English beer is weak and boring – all it does is make you go to the toilet a lot, or so he says. So at the recent Harwich Ale Trail we made sure we found some good strong interesting English beer for him to try. Once safely tied up in the Mercator Dock ready for the Festival (which starts tomorrow) out came our contributions from the Wierd Beer Brewery :”Dark Side” at 9.2% is right up Dirk's street but he also enjoys the K*ntish Town Beard. Let the party begin! Dirk appreciating a GOOD STRONG English beer - 9.2%

He's been at my masking tape! It's a funny thing with boats that sometimes it seems easier to keep water from coming in below than from above. Howard had a go at curing a couple of our drips with Sikaflex. The mast step bolt leaks a drip into the footwell of our double berth and the ring for the starboard backstay drips onto what is known as Owyn's bunk. (A nicer name for it than “the after berth” I am sure you'll agree, though Howard's son Owyn himself is nowhere near and the current occupant is Keith). Howard's also tightened up the screws on one deck prism (drips onto the chart table seat) and the hatch in our berth which drips on Howard's side. It would be very cynical of me to suggest that had it been on my side of the bed this whole operation might have been delayed further. Only the next bumpy passage (or heavy rain shower) will tell what has worked and what hasn't – watch this space. We felt rather guilty sending Roland and ...

Jib sheets: some unravelling required Monday's two challenges were successfully tackled: provisions were lugged round the dock in Gravelines whilst Bonify was still aground on the mud and then once there was enough water we cast off and have left France's oil refinery strikers behind us. There's plenty of fuel available in Belgium and as they are notoriously particular about 'white diesel not red diesel' it could be useful to have a bona fide Belgian receipt for white diesel. We left at 12.30 with 4 other traditional boats from “Escale a Gravelines”, sailed most of the way in a fresh breeze from the north west under grey skies and arrived Nieuwpoort 17.30, so 5 hours for 24 nautical miles. "Zeezot" sailing with us - Built for fishing 1950s - Morbihan Our objective is to get to Ostend by Thursday to participate in Ostend at Anchor – a large public festival of traditional boats. We could have plugged on and got there if we'd neede...

Sunday is a pretty soggy day. Leave Ramsgate 5am in fine drizzle and motor sail south (what wind there is is bang on the nose) towards South Goodwin passing a sign of the times in the form of a large Border Patrol vessel anchored off the beach between Ramsgate and Deal. Her sister ship was in Ramsgate so they are pretty active in this area. Passing South Foreland we are called up by Dover Coastguard, showing off that they can see us on AIS, call sign and all (Bonify: Mike Papa Papa Tango Six), and asking our intentions. Well we are heading for France on a course appropriate for crossing the shipping lanes so it seems pretty obvious to us. Howard resists the temptation to reply “Purely honourable”, plays it dead straight and is rewarded by being wished “Good watch” as they sign off. We sail across the shipping lanes, apart from a short burst of motor to get us safely clear of one south bound ship, and by 9am we have logged 21nautical miles and are heading up the French coast, passi...

Bonify in Ramsgate Harbour  Rule number one of this new blog: We shall not post pictures of "Bonify in this harbour" as she always looks the same.  So all in all this is not really a great beginning, but perhaps we can get away with it just the once.  Photos are the hard part of a sailing blog because you can never get a picture of the thing you're supposed to be doing most of the time i.e. sailing along. You get views with bits of the boat in the way but that's the best you can do (see below). If anyone reading this should happen to see us on the water we'd be delighted to publish good sailing photos of Bonify - just please make sure that the bowsprit's out and the sails are perfectly set, ideally a nice bow wave, no forgotten fenders hanging out and of course it must also be a good hair day for Sue (Howard doesn't care - well actually, annoyingly, he doesn't seem to have bad hair days). Passing through the London Array, sun making an eff...