Tuesday May 28th

Brancaster Bay to Wells-next-the-sea
(Click on the pictures to enlarge them)


Raising the anchor is VERY
HARD WORK.....

... especially with everyone else
watching and offering advice......


.... but eventually it comes up and
we can get on our way!


Audrey under sail -
time to relax!

Most of us slept like logs all night, rocked by the gentle motion of the waves, although Betty was finding the cabins somewhat claustrophobic and ended up sleeping on the settee in the saloon.

After a breakfast of home-made bread, croissants and pain-au-chocolat, all freshly baked on board Audrey - definitely a first! - we went on deck ready to set sail again. Today the wind WAS in the right direction, so we were promised a good day's sailing. First, however, we had to raise the anchor. By hand - NOT an easy task! With two at a time on the windlass, working in shifts, we eventually cranked up the 25 metres of chain and got the anchor safely stowed and sailed away.

The wind was fresh and we were able to run out the bowsprit and haul up the staysail and jib as well as the mainsail; at this point we also noticed that Audrey was minus her topmast (so no topsail) - apparently the topmast just "came down" the previous week (fortunately when the passengers were down below, having lunch!) A new mast is already being made, and by the time this hits the Internet Audrey will be returned to her former glory and will be able to be seen under full sail once more.

Once the hard work of setting the sails was over, we could sit back and relax on deck ....this was the point at which Doreen took over the wheel........


...hard work, this sailing lark!

Doreen taking a turn
at the wheel

"Ever been to Denmark?" seemed an odd question. "Fancying going there, are you?" This SHOULD have indicated to us that we were "wandering" a bit quite early on. But no, we sat around, enjoying the sensation of sailing (SO much more pleasant than the previous day's motoring) and left the driving to Doreen, who was enjoying herself immensely. Every so often she "tacked" a bit, to get us more or less on course, and eventually Paul went below to plot our course on the chart.

He seemed highly amused when he came back on deck and took the wheel - "One mile forward, and four miles further out to sea!" he announced, "so it's time we got back on course!"

We spent the rest of the day sailing up and down the coast until it was time to make for Wells-next-the-sea. The tide was still out when we got to the entrance of the creek leading to Wells, and we were amazed to see the huge buoys which would eventually mark the channel sitting high and dry on the sand! We lowered the sails and dropped anchor to wait for the tide, until there was enough depth of water for us to make our way slowly inland.

Wells-next-the-sea is not exactly NEXT to the sea, but a little way inland and not actually visible from the sea, and we wound our way carefully up the shallow estuary, past rows of brightly-painted bathing huts and round a corner to the outer yacht basin. Although this was wide, it was obviously very shallow, and the channel wound its way back and forth across the full width, round and in between anchored yachts and dinghies, until we eventually came to the harbour itself and tied up for the night.


"Audrey" finally tied up in the harbour at Wells-next-the-Sea

Amanda, Lucy and Shirley were cooking us a special "banquet" so the rest of us were dismissed to the pub (SUCH a hardship) where we met up with an old sailing comrade (for Kath and me, anyway) - Tony, who'd sailed with us and the Rangers to Bridlington and Scarborough a couple of years ago.

We went back to Audrey at 9, as instructed, only to find our meal wasn't quite ready and were sent back to the pub (again!) for another half hour. Having invited Tony and his wife to join us, we returned to our meal at the allotted time to find a five-course meal laid on! There was a slight problem with Amanda's chicken course, but we can attribute that to an unfamiliar cooker, and the whole meal was delicious.

Sadly, Betty had decided that she couldn't stay any longer, she wasn't well and found the close confines below deck just too claustrophobic, so she telephoned her husband to come and collect her. It's a long way from Wakefield to Norfolk, so it was late and quite dark when he eventually arrived, and the tide had dropped ... leaving Audrey below the quayside ... which meant a ladder ... but with a bit of help and a lot of encouragement, Betty and all her possessions reached terra firma safely. We were all on deck to see her off and waved her out of sight, then everyone went below and to bed (apart from the washers-up, who had a mammoth task in front of them....)

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