Dover - and more incredible people!

It’s a bit of a weird feeling, but the first leg is over… Everyone has left the boat, and here I am, contemplating it all. All I can say is – ‘Wow’. It was a bit sad today, saying good bye to all my new found friends.
As you may have heard, we had quite a windy trip to Dover. It was one of those tricky decisions, where the forecast was that the wind should decrease throughout the day, and in order for us to get to Dover on a favourable tide we had to leave Eastleigh in the morning. As Ellen quite rightly told me today – better to 5kts more wind but with wind and tide in the same direction (and thankfully the same direction we were going) than to have less wind but then have to deal with wind against tide. It did make for a rather fun trip down, even though we only sailed with a headsail up, we were still cruising along at between 8 and 10kts. There were unfortunately a couple queasy tummies, and unfortunately our timing of arriving at Dover was perfectly timed for a couple cruise ships leaving port, so we had to wait outside the Western Entrance to the Port, in some rather uncomfortable lumpy seas. We did finally manage to get all the crew wet, with a couple waves sending spray over the boat, and over us! It just wouldn’t be right to go on a Trust trip and not get drenched in water at least once (although, it usually happens by means of water bombs and water pistols – not quite from the sea state!). But, everyone was very happy to get to Dover, and I am so proud of all my crew for doing so well. Jack definitely gets the perseverance award, as always, within 10mins of arriving in Dover, he was up and about and jumping around again. We celebrated our efforts with hard earned fish and chips in the park.
SERIOUSLY – WELL DONE CHLOE, RACHEL, HATTY, JO AND JACK – you guys are legends!! Good Luck for all the exams coming up (and thanks for taking time out to come sailing with us).
Today was another incredible day – after sadly saying goodbye, Simon collected me and took me off to see Ellen’s talk. I met another very inspirational woman today – Hilary Lister. She sailed into the record books in 2005 by being the first ever quadriplegic to sail solo across the English Channel, in a tiny little boat using a special ‘sip and puff’ system of straws to control the sails. She came to Ellen’s talk with her team and of course Lottie – her beautiful chocolate Labrador. She is also on a Round Britain dream, and is about to continue her challenge from where she left off. She is going the other way round however, so hopefully we will get a chance to see her again somewhere else on this beautiful coast. I always knew this was a big challenge for her, but it wasn’t until I saw her boat in the Marina that I realised how incredible her journey really is. Good Luck Hilary – we will be thinking of you and wishing you every success (and fair weather) on your Round Britain Dream! www.hilarylister.com.
So back on the boat, as always needing care and attention and back into grease mode I went. I was very kindly helped out by Shawn and Mic of the Dover Harbor Patrol (and I managed to get a little ride across the marina in the Pilot Launch – serious piece of boating machinery that is!). Shawn dove into the depths of our lazarette to help me with a rather stubborn bolt, but all good now and getting ready for the next adventure. Thank you Dover Harbour Patrol!!!