We decided a long time ago that we would try and get out in the boat as much as possible before the race as this is the closest to replicating the race you can get. Particularly when you train in the sea. Therefore we decided to row to the boat show.
We left on a sunny morning in early September starting our shift patterns. The sea for the first 24 hours was incredibly flat calm and so we managed to get to Start Point in 24 hrs (about 60 miles). We then had to decide whether to go straight across Lyme Bay or go the whole way around. We went for it! We thought as conditions were calm we should make it to Portland Bill within 24 hrs. 15 miles in and about 02:00am I came out of the cabin to see Jon was rowing straight into a headwind. After a debate we decided to drop the anchor. We only just made the bottom with 75 metres of rope and whilst on the anchor decided that being out this far against the tides and the wind might not work. We heaved the ancor in which took about half an hour and was bloody hard work. We then made a temporary drogue out of a couple of buckets which managed to keep us on course for Tor bay.
The next morning moral was a bit low but we continued to row the long way round, rowing past the MSC Napoli was interesting. The next day we decided to go for Portland Bill. We were warned that you had to have the tide and the wind with you and you had to be dead close to the shore or miles out. We were about 4 miles out. However I think we ended up right in the race as we were surfing 12 ft waves which were very frequent and often almost broaching the boat. It was about 18:00 and we came to the decision that we would have to get nearer land or the Northerlys were going to take us a long way out to sea. We both got on the oars for 5 hrs and managed to row across the waves and anchor off warborrow bay. We will never go round the Bill again!
After struggling to heave the anchor in again we set off for St Albans head. On the chart there was some messy stuff around here and we looked as though we had avoided it. We were rowing past the head, but in the distance out to sea we could see waves breaking. We thought nothing of it as they were 200 metres away. They got closer and closer and in the end we were surfing again, but this time these waves were breaking all around us. We had to row solidly together for an hour to get near the cliffs where remarkably it was calm. However we were rowing against a tide at about 2 nm's per hr with 2 on the oars for about 3 hours. We were knackered. Jon saw a speedboat cruise by and grabbed the vhf and asked for a quick tow into Swanage which was only a mile away. Thanks to thee owners of AVIDA. We were going a little fast at one point though as they were towing us through some severe awsh and the boat almost capsized, we were jumping from side to side to keep her upright. Still that was a buzz and we were glad to be in Swanage where the people were so nice. Thanks to Tom Greesty who lent us his moorings and tendor for the night.
After a few hours sleep we were determined to get to the boat show that day. We set off so the tide would be with us all the way unti we got into the Solent. We just made it into the Solent as the tide was turning. I watched Jon on the oars, his speed was rapidly decreasing. We were going round Hurst point and the tide ahd just changed. We both got on the oars again and beasted it for half an hour to get round hurst point which we did. We felt so good at that point as we knew we had pretty much made it.
We rowed against the tide with little progress for most of the day but when the tide turned and we were both on the oars we managed 7 knots. By the time we got into Southampton water it was getting dark. We had decide whether to dodge ships in the dark and get there that night or moor up and wait another day. We went for it, with 1 man on watch at all times. We were about 100 metres from the boat show and things had gone okay when a red funnel ferry rounded the corner and steamed towards us. We didn't hang around.
We made it onto our berth at about 22:00 that night, 4.5 days after setting off from Fowey. This was a really great learning curve and were glad we had done it.
