First sail out of the River Medway

Between buying Mischief in August 2017 and returning from the Azores in 2020 I am at the half way point in my preparations. It seemed appropriate to try a sail out of the River Medway so I set off for the Red Sands forts. This was hopefully going to be a good practice run for the club race at the end of April. After loading up a bit more kit at the club dock I set off just after high tide. With a southerly F1 to 2, I had a gentle sail to Garrison Point and then set off alongside the deep water channel out into the Thames Estuary. I met a couple of chums from the club who were out fishing. Visibility was about 2 miles and I reached Red Sands forts after 5 hours sailing. The boat was behaving very well and I managed to install my AIS and VHF units on the chart table.

On the way back I finished off the wiring and then I came across my chums again. They were going into Queenborough for the evening so I decided to join them.

After a fun evening in Queenborough and an excellent breakfast on PeeGee I had a great sail back to Hoo and managed to moor up under sail. Mischief behaves very well and the sails balance nicely allowing quite long periods free of steering. The conditions weren't too demanding but it was a great sail.