Libertad "ready for the off"?

---

Hi to all following our blog
Libertad is straining at her moorings ,desperate to set her sails and head west and south ,since my last entry we have completed some sea trials .It was intended to sail to Dieppe, but the French fishermen had other ideas, blockading every French port from Dunkirk to Cherbourg, protesting about the cost of fuel the price of Gitanes and the plaugue of English tourist infesting their beaches. So we decided to visit the Solent once again.Leaving Sovereign Harbour just an hour before the top of the tide with a fresh 3/4 easterly, it was kite up all the way to the Looe channel.Arriving a little late for fine dining in Gosport, we ate dinner from the dog bowls! (dehydrated Curry at least 10 years old) underway.Arriving at Gosport Marina in time for a quick pint in the pub and a nightcap back on board( thats enough Godfrey).The following tide,wind and sea on the trip down were ideal conditions to test out the new Hydrovane self steering which prove powerfull and easy to use. The following day our crew of Mark(skid) Guy (ruff stuff), Bob(the builder) and Godfrey(Mr Chips) wanted to practice some M.O.B having been caught unawares on the trip down( that B------d Paul, chucking fenders overboard again,) . Godfrey and I felt he could do with some practice prior to the intended Atlantic crossing.( he might need to come and get me) We headed for the Beaulieu river .When we had lost most of the fenders to MOB drills we worked out some secondary port tides, this showed we had just an hour and a half to get to Bucklers Hard and back out into the Solent on the same tide.
Emerging from the narrow entrance of the Beaulieu river with the wind still easterly force 5/6, we had a close reach to Cowes I.O.W and a berth in Cowes Yacht Haven for the night.
Having suffered my dehydrated curry the first night out the crew mutinied and forced me to eat ashore at the Red Duster we had the "full monty"Best restaurant in Cowes.
The next day as usual, the tides were all wrong . We needed to be away by 05:00am at the latest to make the Looe channel and pick up the first of the flood.The wind had let us down, although still in the east it was light force1/2 .Libertad needs at least 4/5 to get her going, so it was the Volvo( iron donkey) all the way home arriving at Sovereign harbour mid afternoon we refueled 150 lts and put her to bed.
The list of jobs to do before the planned departure on the 20th July seemed to be growing despite spending every spare minute working on her, but I are now down to the last few jobs.
The crew will be joining Libertad on Sat 19th July for familiariation and safety briefings . We hope to depart on Sunday morning with a crew of five ,Bob,Martin,Phil,Jake and myself.
We should be changing to a new blog site soon as the iridium phone will soon be live. I will keep you posted

Best wishes Paul

---

Comments

[Paul Huntley]

Change of blog
As of today we are live on Iridium voice and data onboard Libertad. our new blog addess is http://blog.mailasail.com/libertad On this site you will find our latest entry and details of our position e.g. Lat/Long. You may also add your comments to this site for a particular crew member or the crew in general but, remember it will be published for all to see! You can also e-mail direct to the boat but please do not place our e-mail address in the text as this will attract spam. Also sending pictures is very expensive as are long ammounts of text so please keep your messages short. Our e-mail is( libertad at mailasail dot com ) I am sure you can deduce the encrypting . Best wishes and see you on Mailasail Paul