A forecast of sunshine, hot weather and moderate southerlies is too good to miss. So I managed to persuade First-Mate to take Thursday and Friday off and spend a few days sailing the bits of the Oosterschelde still unknown to Mekicevica and crew. To make the proposition more attractive, I even offered to bring the boat to Stavenisse on Wednesday, so that the boring bit of passing the Grevelingen lock and motor down the Keteen looking-out for shipping would be done before she came aboard.
Except for the part when I just missed one opening of the lock and had a long wait, it was not boring at all. Once in the lock, I tried to be creative in finding ways to tie-up single-handed and ended-up making a mess. Anyway the lock was nearly empty, and I used an old skipper's trick: when a manoeuvre goes wrong, keep a straight face and pretend that was exactly how you wanted to do it.
Adding excitement to the day, Yoyo-Ma the Outboard Engine has a range of only about four miles and I was planning to do about seven. Running out of fuel in front of a container ship was not an attractive proposition, neither was stopping to tank in the choppy waters created by a southwesterly blowing right up the Keteen against an ebbing tide. So I had to plan fuelling stops carefully. For the first stop I briefly took shelter in the Bruinisse "vluchthaven" (shelter harbour). After that it got really choppy. I had to admire the couple in a Waarschip 700 valiantly beating in these conditions.
I did a second, last stop by heading a bit up the Krabbenkreek. After that the tide turned and, although we were then going against wind and tide, the water was much smoother and we made much better progress.
The entrance to Stavenisse harbour is not easy to spot, and only one hour after low water it looked so narrow and shallow I had to keep telling myself that I did get the calculations right and there was about 1.2m of water.
First-Mate joined shortly after I had tied-up at the visitor's pontoon and we had dinner al-fresco getting ready for a few days of sailing.
Thusrday 1st of August: Easy Sailing to Burghsluis
We woke-up under a bright blue sky and light southeasterly wind. Moreover low water will be around 6pm, so that with a leisurely start we will have wind and tide with us on our planned tour to Burghsluis.
Out of the Stavenisse harbour canal, we briefly needed Yoyo-Ma's help to get us out of the way of the shipping and then it was all plain sailing.
We passed under the Zeeland bridge, than in front of Zierikzee and goose-winged into the channel north of the Roggenplaat that leads to Burghsluis. I was told that this northern bit of the Oosterschelde is normally very quiet, but due to the favourable combination of wind and tide it was busier than normal. In the Burghsluis marina the volunteers of the sailing club were doing a great job in coping with the extra number of visiting yachts, and found us a nice, sheltered place rafting along a 22-footer.
After a refreshing plunge in the very clean water of the marina, shopping and shower we headed to Burgh-Hamstede on rented bikes for sight-seeing and dinner.
Friday 2nd of August: Across the Roompot
The wind, weather and tide fairies are being really nice to us: the wind veered to the SW. Without rush in the morning we could leave Burghsluis on a goose-winged run in light wind and with the second half of a flooding tide. It was so quiet we even heard a dolphin before seeing it. Eventually we did have to turn south, but it did not take more than a couple of easy tacks with the tide helping us and we were on the wide part of the Oosterschelde. By then the tide was turning, again helping us towards Roompot marina. The only trouble was that the wind took a lunch break, and we had to resort to other methods of propulsion. We tried motoring but the noise and vibrations were too irritating. Drifting is OK for awhile, but eventually we need to control our course. So I resorted to the paddles I keep in the bottom of the starboard locker for just such occasions. This caused great amusement to the crew of a passing yacht and a seal that observed us with a puzzled look.
Soon the sea-wind started kicking-up and we approached Roompot marina close-hauled.
The visit to the beach was also a bit disappointing. Or maybe we got spoiled by the Adriatic coast. On the Oosterschelde, before it is deep enough to swim you have to wade for ever in murky water feeling all sorts of shells, algae and other critters under your toes.
But the beach bar was OK! After a beer and shower we prepared dinner on board and went to sleep.
Saturday 3rd of August: Fast Run to Colijnsplaat
From the weather forecast, we knew that the worse weather would be on Saturday. Therefore we planned a short, five-mile hop along the coast to Colijnsplaat.
The announced storms turned out to be no more that a few drops of rain, but the wind was stronger than expected: WSW 5Bf, at times 6Bf. Not too bad since we are heading East, but we must make it before the tide starts ebbing around 2pm. After that the strong wind against the tide will turn the otherwise peaceful Oosterschelde into a witch's cauldron.
We still had plenty of time for breakfast and coffee, and were out of the harbour under sail before 10am. It was windy, but Mekicevica and crew are getting used to these situations. Under reefed main only we made good progress. My usual tactic is to avoid the straight downwind course and potential crash gybes. The few gybes we had to do required careful handling of the course and main-sheet; even then, Mekicevica and crew were thrown around a bit. Finally we approached the harbour entrance on a reach, doused sails and were settled before 1pm, with plenty of time to spare. The display of the sophisticated weather station on the wall of yacht club confirmed that we had been sailing in 6 Bf wind.
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| View across the Oosterschelde in the late afternoon. |
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| Eating herring the traditional way in Colijnsplaat. |
Sunday was a bit cooler. The wind was forecast to remain from the SW, which was great news for us. The bad news was that there was not much of it. Out of the harbour with full main and Big Jenny the genoa, we drifted more than sailed towards the Zeeland bridge. Yoyo-Ma again had to be started to give us some sort of steerage passing under the bridge. On the other side, with no shipping in sight, we resumed the slow game of partly sailing, mostly drifting in the right direction. When we got to the shipping lane, First-Mate attentive look-out and Yoyo-Ma saved us from drifting right into the path of a huge ship. By then we were getting short of fuel, so we made a stop at Stavenisse to get some. As we came out again, we found that there was some wind, so we managed to have a couple of hours of relaxed sailing, including another encounter with a dolphin.
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| This beautiful ship was beating down the Keteen. |
