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Good morning from a pre-dawn Gosport Marina where we are about to commence “Operation Oui Oui Baguette”: taking our boat, Scarlet, across the English Channel as the first part of our trip to Portugal. This is the second longest leg of the entire journey, and the first time I will have ever personally sailed out of the sight of land.

If you want to follow our progress, you can see us on Marine Traffic: marinetraffic.com/en/ais/detai…

Note, that relies on AIS signals being relayed to the internet. Commercial AIS is powerful enough to be picked up by satellite, but ours isn’t, so there will likely be a dead-zone in the middle where we don’t seem to update.

It’s going to take about 14 hours to make the crossing. There is no wind, so we will be using our engine.

reshared this

in reply to Sarah Brown

ideogram
ideogram
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Oh that is such an adventure! Good luck! I'll keep looking back to follow your progress.
in reply to Sarah Brown

Johan Diederik
Johan Diederik
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Have a nice sailing time, Sarah and stay safe! We’ve been to the south of England many times including Gosport. I’ll follow the Scarlet once in a while bc your trip to Portugal is an interesting one. We ourselves are on a sailing trip now from Zeeland, Netherlands to (we hope) Helsinki. De “Late Pluk” (Westerly Medway) crew (2) sends our love.
in reply to Johan Diederik

Sarah Brown
Sarah Brown
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@Johan Diederik Thanks! We will probably have to overwinter in La Rochelle and wait until the Iberian Orcas take their fun “sink the boat!” game south. We shall see. Currently they’re off the Setúbal peninsula on the west coast of Portugal.
@Johan Diederik
in reply to Sarah Brown

Johan Diederik
Johan Diederik
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Don’t be afraid Sarah. IF they arrive, put the motor in reverse and the rudder max to port or starboard and speed up. That’s quite dangerous for them and they are intellectual mammals so they will choose their battles. This is my theory.
in reply to Johan Diederik

Sarah Brown
Sarah Brown
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@Johan Diederik It doesn’t work. This was the first thing that people tried in the early days. It worked for about 3 months, then it didn’t.

They’ve also got incredibly good at it now. By the time you even realise they’re there, your rudder is gone.

The only safe thing to do is avoid being where they are.

@Johan Diederik
in reply to Sarah Brown

Johan Diederik
Johan Diederik
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O, really? i didn’t know. So I stop advising and hope with you they choose another area to bother sailors. Stay safe and above all, enjoy this voyage!🥳
in reply to Sarah Brown

Cyberspice
Cyberspice
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Safe journey. Being out of sight of land is no biggie. You have the tech.
in reply to Sarah Brown

Cyberspice
Cyberspice
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There used to be an annual long weekend in Calais from Thorpe Bay Yacht Club. Crossing the channel from Ramsgate. Even some of the sailing dingies would go (accompanied by the power/rescue boats). Now crossing in a 3 metre wooden open boat does sound exciting!
in reply to Sarah Brown

Alaric Snell-Pym
Alaric Snell-Pym
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have fun! The tracker seems to think you're headed for Australia, though. Now THAT would be an adventure...
in reply to Alaric Snell-Pym

Sarah Brown
Sarah Brown
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@Alaric Snell-Pym That’s a bug in Marine Traffic. You can’t actually set a destination with our unit.
@Alaric Snell-Pym

Alaric Snell-Pym reshared this.

in reply to Sarah Brown

Ed Davies
Ed Davies
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More of an adventure than you imply if MarineTraffic is right in assuming you're on your way to Brighton - the one near Adelaide on the south coast of Australia.
in reply to Sarah Brown

geekylou :transgender_flag:
geekylou :transgender_flag:
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have fun. We went under the channel a couple of days ago rather than over as we are land lovers.
in reply to Sarah Brown

will-h
will-h
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safe sailing! In 2017 we did Ramsgate -> Jersey - busy out there in the TSS!
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