Plymouth – and not to Guernsey

On Thursday 5 September Alice headed home, via taxi, train and flight from Exeter to Edinburgh, taking my grateful thanks. I walked up to the viewpoint in Mount Wise Park to look at the view before the rain set in. After lunch I had a visit from Bob Walker, who is currently vice-commodore of the Westerly Owners Association, keeps his Centaur in Mayflower and lives only 10 minutes' drive away. We nattered on the boat for a while, then he very kindly took me to Lidl to stock up on heavy groceries, and we had a coffee and a cake at Jolly Jacks. It was a good way to fill a very wet afternoon.

By evening as the rain continued I was feeling very miserable about everything. I had really hoped to sail Kalessin to Guernsey where Sam wanted his ashes scattered, but with, once again, unsettled weather, it was almost impossible to make a sensible decision. It was also a logistical challenge: my younger son Ben and his partner Anne wanted to fly out to Guernsey and then go on to Cornwall to see my aunt; my older son Guy was joining Kalessin by train on Saturday but had to be back in Suffolk for an unbreakable commitment on Monday 16th; and my sister Lucilla and her husband Mark were due to join me for the next leg, also on the 16th. Fortunately my stepsons live on the island! All in all we could have invested a lot of money in Aurigny flights which were not used. The best weather to sail out would have been Friday 6th, but Guy couldn't reach me until the evening of Saturday 7th. For a while it looked as though there might be a window on Sunday, or even leaving straight away when Guy arrived on Saturday evening. But that was very uncertain and eventually all the weather models converged to show very strong winds around the Channel Islands on Sunday morning. The WindGuru chartlet, using the GFS model, was particularly clear:

Belatedly I realised that the other reason for my depression was that Sam died exactly a year ago, just before 10am on 6 September. Strangely it made me feel better to know there was a specific reason for my misery. Friday 6th was a much nicer day after the previous day's solid rain. I wanted to get off the boat but really couldn't face a run, so I walked into the city, which I haven't really explored properly before. It was lovely to stroll along the Hoe, explore the many marinas on the eastern side of the city, and visit the Force 4 chandlery to buy a chart of Guernsey just in case it was needed. The weather was warm and I felt slightly feverish and very sweaty, sitting down for a break every 10 minutes or so. But there was plenty to see as I headed into the modern and slightly tatty shopping areas, buying two pairs of earrings at TKMaxx in Sam's honour, and heading back to the boat via the route Lucilla and I discovered three years ago, which is parkland almost all the way from the railway station to Mayflower. By the time I got back I was exhausted but felt a bit better about things. I put on a load of washing and went and had a bath. When Sam died after six days in hospital, the main thing I wanted to do was get home and have a bath, so that seemed commemorative too.

Saturday was a day of tidying, shopping and sorting before Guy arrived. His train was cancelled but fortunately the next one arrived only 15 minutes later and he managed to get a seat. It was lovely to see him.