in 1985 I was tied to a pontoon at a Dartmouth boat yard

Phillips Yard actually, It was the same time exactly as the ill fated Fastnet race of that year, and I was eagerly waiting for the weather to reduce to force five, (as predicted by the even more innacurate than now, weather station forecast, that I could get by phone, at that time) so that I could depart for a trip that would end up being around ninety Nautical Miles in duration, to Guernsey in the Channel islands. The boat a Moody 29 sloop rigged sailing boat about three years old and my pride and joy. She was new to us and had just left Phillips workshop, having had all her skin fittings (through hulls ) checked and adjusted/sealed along with her drive shaft stuffing gland.

The wind had abated a little but the rain was torrential and the time was now fast approaching when the tide would be too foul for us to leave, it was still force five and so I took the descision to go, and we pushed off out into the river Dart and into the estaury and on into the early evening. I couldn`t see much and so relied heavily on my Decca, charts and compass and keeping my eyes open (not easy into the driving rain).

Throughout the night the long awaited reduction in the weather never came and the early high waves, expected to reduce, also never happened, as confused winds of force 9 were experienced as the unpredicted "pinch/squeeze" came northwoods through the Atlantic Ocean, extrene south easterly Irish sea, and the English Channel.

I knew nothing about the Fastnet race at the time, only that I had seen them a year previously, shaping up in the Solent prior to departing at around the same time of the year, the first I heard of their problems (many vessels were dismasted, capsized and lost, and several crew members never returned home) was after we had actually arrived at Guernsey, having spent Sixteen hours solid, at the tiller (no it wasn`t fear, I was far too busy trying to keep the vessel into the sea with as little or as much furling head-sail exposed (that would give me the drive I wanted) mostly minimum, and pick the best route through the largest seas that I had come across in my sailing career up until that time. As mentioned above, better found boats and more experienced racing crews abandoned their vessels in favour of their life rafts, during this storm, only to find that their vessel was not only still floating, had been rescued and salvaged too, after the storm passed. Simon-le-Bon a one time pop singer????? "Rio" springs to mind, was among the owners who spent some time under their boat when the keel detached and the boat capsized.


Five hours after our departure the winds started to climb dramatically instead of reduce, and now winds, in excess of fifty miles an hour, were recorded on our aneromenter, and the seas were periodically well on the way up to the cross trees on our mast! my crew who started to be sick about an hour from home had taken to the relative comfort ( compared with the exposed deck well) of the forward cabin, wedging themselves in with douvets and pillows and had "become comatose" (a regular sailing occurance brought about by a mixture of accepted fear and an indominatably strong constitution that would never allow them to quit, ever!) I periodically made contact but generally got on with my job! Which now included bailing the engine area as the newly checked "through hull" had, I suspect, been apparently loosened and cleaned out in preparation for addidtional sealant and never applied or tightened tightned as it was wriggling about, and was not even hand tight when I finally found it, with the engine bilge almost full to the water line (fortunately the dip stick kept the water out, but the drive plate, but, not the gearbox, suffered.

The regular amount of sea water that I removed from around the engine area, I estimate (pessimistically, maybe it just seemed like that) at about two gallons every ten minutes, often done in bucketfull "dashes" into the bilge with the electric pump, when I couldn`t keep up with the hand pump, or just with the hand pump alone! either way my hands were bloodied by the time we reached land.

During this time I had decided that I would be better off further away from land, rather that returning and trying to sail back into the Dart, I also considered Plymouth and Salcombe, even Brixham which could sometimes be Ideal would be a real fight to get into to, with the tide as it was, (wind over tide and hurricane force winds by now) so I made the descision to plough on (after all the weather was going to get better and it always gets worse before it gets better, doesn`t it?):o))

Still the wind grew stronger with gusts now up to and over eighty miles an hour ( my wind gauge went no higher) and the sea state got even more confused as the crutch of the "squeeze" came through. I was pretty much happy that I was in the position on the chart that I actually thought myself to be in, and I was now picking up mayday`s from channel island (Jersey) coastguard so knew we were getting into line of sight radio transmission on emergency channel 16. so we were closing.

later I found the RDF signal on the southeren point of guernsey, whose name evades me and we continued on towards that for a while passing the Hurd Deep to our port side.

We had been at sea by now for a little less that fifteen hours and the sea was only just starting to reduce. We got to a point where we could turn and run in behind guernsey and on to St peter port, so far we hadn`t seen another vessel all night,not that they weren`t there, I just hadn`t seen them due to the torrential rain etc.

As we turned on to a course that by skirting the coast of guernsey protected us a little for a while and give us eventual entry into St peter-port, I spotted a large dark hooked fin in amongst the wave fronts ( at that time following us ) as the sea rose and fell and the spray burst off the crest I spotted more fins, and then more, Initially I thought that I was Hallucinating and had to look more than twice to confirm that they were all around us. I roughly estimated around sixty Pilot whales in clumps of fifteen (NSEW of us) heading the same way as us, I guessed they were also taking refuge, When I first thought I saw them I reached to pull in the foresail but found that I was running at five knots on just no more than a stormsail/trisail already. I started to worry that I may hit one of these beautiful creatures as they swam along keeping up with us easily, periodically raising enough of their bodies out of the water so as to be able to look right at us.

Within five minutes they were gone I didn`t even see them go, all of a sudden they weren`t there anymore? it was as though they had always been there for us, and were now, perhaps happy that we were safe? ready at a given point, to move on? who knows? its a nice thought! It beats an incompitent skipper blundering into a pod of frightened pilot whales during a storm? eh?

I was captivated by them as I tried to weather the now calming storm and still confused but reducing sea, I called to the crew to come have a look as they "wouldn`t ever see a sight like this again in their life, if they didnt" They declined and continued to "heave" into a plastic supermarket bag, marked with safety advice about keeping it away from children, and of course, those "spewing up" at sea! although why it would want such safety advice is beyond me? as it had "anti kid" suffercation holes in the very bottom (Yup! sure, that was my pennance, clearing the forward berth out).


Needless to say we had an exciting ride into St Peters port, we knew nothing about all the mishaps of the Fastnet fleet and tied up, in the inner harbour about late midday. My crew slept on for a while and I did too, having tightened up fully, and sealed the skin fitting (which I could now do as the engine area was "still" and not suddenly becoming vertical to my horizontal) checking the oil in the engine and the gearbox as I went, which was OK and suffered no water ingress. The eventually evident rust around the drive plate was overcome in time, by a replacement DR plate, a year or so later.

In the evening we went to sample the fare at the local yacht club as invitees, and during a visit to the Ladies restroom my wife met some distant Lady members from My own yacht club (Brixham YC) who, complete with immaculate evening dresses, exquisitely dyed ( orange and blue, for want of better description) and couffered hair, asked her if she had also come across in the storm and hurricane weather this morning" to which, fully aware that she must have looked like a drowned rat that had been painted with "lippie and foundation" and had a broken bottle dragged through her hair, to tidy it (her words not mine) replied "Yes! wasn`t it really bad? marvelling that these ladies could suffer a violent storm at sea and still look "radiant" to which they replied laughing, "Don`t be so silly Dear, we don`t sail! we flew from Tourquay, this morning, and that was bad enough, the pilot had his own troubles trying to land". My wife has never felt inadequate in her sailing demeanour since. twenty year on, we now run a motor boat :o((