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© 2008 Tedwill
Sailing is the easy and environmentaly friendly way to travel. I learned to sail with the sea scouts, my first ever trip was as ballast in the front of the boat where I nearly fell asleep on a warm sunny day with the gentle lap lap lap of the small waves against the hull as it moved through the water. I was about 12 then and we were in a whaler sailing at Kingston On Thames. The next time I went out was at the same place and I got to pull on a rope and control a sail. NOW I loved every minute.
My sailing career became a passion when we started sailing on the Thames in the centre of London and on the river Medway when we were at HMS Arethusa and St Mary's Island in Chatham dockyard. We sailed whalers nearly all the time. Usually there was a crew of about 5 or 6, but it is possible to sail them single handed.
The whaler is a two masted yawl with three sails. Sailing is one of the most peaceful ways of travel, when it is not cold, wet or very windy. One of my first trips out from HMS Discovery moored in central London at the time was to Greenhythe about 6 hours down stream towards the sea. It was cold and drizzly and was nearly my very last trip too. The wind was light, I was a spare crew member, so I was making a cup of tea in the bows using a primus stove. The river bends quite a lot around Wapping and there were about 30 Sun Tugs moored out from the bank towards the centre of the river.
We got caught in the current and were being swept onto the bows of these tugs. There was an almighty crunch and the hot water I had just boiled went everywhere. I had turned the primus off when we saw the danger. We did not have time to get the oars out to row out of the way. The boat was really bent by the thump and was then held against the tugs by the flow of the Thames. This presents a problem, because the river was pushing us hard against them and we were all boys, so not very strong, and we had to push ourselves off the tugs. It took us about half an hour to do it and we were knackered as we slipped past them. If we had not got ourselves off the tugs we would eventually have been carried under them by the tide. The boat would have broken up and would have sunk with us in it. Well after that we were extra careful and we finally got to Greenhythe. We then had to turn around and sail back and it started to get dark. We found some lightermens barges and moored at the tail end of them. By mooring there we would swing when the tide turned and we would not be trapped between them, if we had moored alongside, we did not know which way the barges would swing, and being alongside we could have been trapped between two barges. Not a good place to be in. The following day very early when we set off with the tide towards London. That was my first adventure under sail with a mission, there were many more to come.
We made many more trips up and down the Thames and out onto the Medway. On the Medway we had races and that was fun, we won a few times. Eventually, I became skilled enough to skipper the boats myself and then there was no holding me back. I also sailed at Longridge (the campsite where I did service crew work in Berkshire) and on smaller boats at Ham (near Teddington)on a little lake and eventually became an instructor.
When I was 18 I was asked if I wanted to go Ocean sailing, it did not take me long to give a positive answer. So we arranged for me to be picked up the following weekend so we could travel down to Cowes on the Isle of Wight. Moored in a shipyard were three ships, Billy Bray and ex shrimper, Duet a bermudan rigged ketch and Theodora a Bristol channel cutter. The longest was 60 ft and the shortest was about 40 ft. We went on board Billy Bray and stowed our gear and met the rest of the crew. 5 out of the 8 were novices, me included. We were shown round the rigging and where everything was and we were ready to go. We spent the night on board and set sail at around 5 am the next morning. We sailed out into the Solent and turned west, that was a bad choice bearing in mind 5 of us had never been ocean sailing before. The problem was that there was a following sea, that is the waves were catching up to the stern of the ship and over taking her. That lifted the stern (back) first and then the bow. This is an un-natural movement and it caused 7 of us to be vilolently sea sick within about 20 minutes, good bye breakfast.
We sailed like that for a few hours and then turned south round the island and it was much calmer. We were able to eat and drink and learn all about life on the seas. We were shown everything a crew member should know and then something of navigation and listening to the weather forecast. Around dusk we saw an oil tanker blazing away on the horizon. It was a serious fire and lasted a few days. We were warned to stay away, which we did and we anchopred off Shanklin on the east of the Island. We could watch the ship burn on the horizon while we had supper and turned in to sleep. We kept an anchor watch to make sure we were not drifting.
Next morning we set sail again to complete our trip round the island. We moored the ship and made her ready for the next outing and then went home. On the way we had a chinese meal, my first! I had now become a member of the Ocean Youth Club.
Over the next two years I made as many trips as I could afford, plus all the maintenance weekends. We sailed along to Poole and Swanage to the west and towards Bognor in the east. We made a few trips across to Cherbourg in France and the channel island of Alderney. We often sailed into the centre of the english channel for navigation exercises. I loved ocean sailing.
I decided, when I had enough sea hours, to go for my mates certificate. I went on a number of courses but unfortunatly I stopped sailing before I could complete it. I sailed on Duet and Theodora as well.
I made sure I went ocean sailing as much as my pay allowed me, I would rush from work, by this time was at Charing Cross Hospital, to Waterloo Station to catch a train down to Southampton and then a ferry across to Cowes and be there for about 8 pm in the evening so if we were to set sail that night I was ready. I went out on two weekend trips in 1966 and then an offer came to bring a Theodora back from Copenhagen after the Tall Ships race. I love travelling. So I signed on and eventually found myself at Liverpool Street Station ready for the train trip to Copenhagen via the Hook of Holland. The trip took a whole day and when we arrived the first thing was to claim a bunk and have dinner. The crew should have been 12 persons, but we ended up with 7 of us including the skipper. I was appointed the Bosun (man of lines, halyards and all repairs). We spent the evening in Tivoli Gardens and touring the harbour. (saw the Little Mermaid).
The next day we set sail into the Baltic sea to sail towards Germany. We took two days over that leg of the trip and stopped off at an island I cant remember the name of. We had to sail in 'Nimedri' channels because most of the Baltic was alive with mines left over from the last war. We spent all day looking for the next Nimedri Buoy to guide us until we arrived at Kiel. We entered the Kiel Kanal and motored through it stopping at Rendsburg for the night. At Rendsburg there is a transported bridge, that was fascinating to see, I had never seen one before and that one is BIG. I have since found there are 2 in the UK. It was the day of the world cup when England finally beat Germany in Mexico and all of the German ships passing us told us the score and cheered. What amazed me was there are traffic lights on the canal and we missed one set and continued. This is in the middle of nowhere, not a ship or building to see and fields all round, and all of a sudden the 'Voice of God' shouted at us 'Achtung, Achtung', and in German, turn round and return to the previous traffic lights' Well I did not understand any German then, but it was very loud and very clear that we had broken some rule. We turned and waited for two hours before a ship appeared in front of us. Apparently it was a one way system.
We eventually arrived at Cuxhaven. We stayed in the harbour overnight because there was a severe gale warning. On all our sailing trips we had to get the shipping forecast every 2 hours so we know when to run and shelter. We waited till the next high tide the next day and set off in calm weather into the river Elbe to sail down to the North Sea. At one point there was a magnetic anomaly, that caused the compass needle to spin round and round. We eventually arrived in open sea and the intention was to sail straight across to Harwich in England. Well that was not to be, as the day wore on the shipping forecast told us there was a severe storm warning in the North Sea, right where we were. We battened down the hatches and reduced sail and went into the night. At about 2100 hours the out rig on the bowsprit failed and we could not control our foresail. We were in serious trouble and about 80 miles from land. The skipper asked if anyone could do a wire eye splice, I will see if i can find a picture, I said I had never done one but i could splice most things. Splicing is a way of stopping a rope or line from fraying and making it usable and it usually involves three strands of rope. A wire splice is the same thing but with 7 strands of wire. Theodora was bouncing up and down in the storm waves which were about 30 feet high. The bowsprit was diving into the next wave before waving in the air. It was very dangerous and it was dark. I put on a safety harness and so did my assistant. I tied everything to me and crawled onto the bowsprit and caught the damaged wire. All the time I was dragged down under the water as far as my chest with my legs wrapped round the bowsprit so I did not get washed away. My assistant held a good torch and was similarly dunked at every wave. It took me two hours to make that wire splice and I was frozen and soaked completely and totally worn out. We both went below and got changed into dry clothing and went to sleep. The remainder of the crew stayed on watch to sail the ship.
An hour later, the gaff jaw shattered with a loud crack. The gaff jaw is required to hold the gaff, the wooden spare that holds the sail up and against the mast. Now we could not sail at all. All hands on deck! We pulled down all the sails and stowed them below decks and motored towards land, the Friesian Islands. We had found a German Navel base on Borkum and headed for there. We arrived at 06:30 in the morning and it was as calm as a spring day. I sent a telegram to my mum to say I was ok but shipwrecked and would be home in a week. We negotiated with the German Navy to get the gaff jaw re-welded so we could use it to sail home. That took about 4 hours, then I had to put a leather cover on the gaff jaws to prevent the mast being damaged by the metal. I had been a leather worker for 4 years by then and I was the only one experienced in stitching leather, so I got the job, lucky me. It took another day to to do that and to re-rig Theodora so we could sail.
We set off and aimed for Harwich again and we had a good stiff breeze blowing about a force 6 on the Beaufort scale. We were about 60 miles off Den Helder (Holland), when disaster struck again. This time one of the seams on the main sail tore its full length. The winds and storms had weakened the stitching. Guess what, I got to stay up 17 hours re-stitching the sail. The seam was 30 foot long. I eventually finished it and we bent the sail back onto the gaff and boom and set sail again. By this time we were 90 miles from Holland. Well within 2 hours another seam failed and we had another torn sail, not the one I had repaired. That was enough, we almost gave up. We motored back to Holland and Ijmuiden and the North Sea canal, boy did that place stink of rotten fish. We made enquiries and found a sail maker in Volendam, the other side of Amsterdam. We motored up the North Sea canal to Amsterdam and moored up while two of the crew took the sail to the sail maker. He took a day to repair it and after I had slept and had a tour round Amsterdam, we set off back to sea. This time. we made it back to UK, but we went to Ipswich which was closer. That two week trip took three to complete and was one of the most exhilarating three weeks in the whole of my life. I would do it again right now. Except I might reconsider the job of Bosun.
I sailed with the sea scouts and became an instructor on board HMS Discovery where we ran training courses unitl it was sent up north for repair. Then sailing stopped because i did not have any further opportunities.