Passage Match Success
Part One
Red light in the moonlight: Oli fits the port navigation light as we prepare to leave Stangate Creek and race Edith May to Harwich at 0130 on Saturday 26th June 2021. This informal event replaces the longstanding and popular Gravesend to Harwich Passage Match of 56 miles which used to bring barges based on the Thames down to the Orwell the week prior to the Pin Mill Match. Though popular it was no doubt an immense amount of work to organise and as entries dropped it was unsurprising the attraction of waiting all night on a cold Suffolk seawall for barges to rear over a dank horizon lost its appeal. Now Ed Gransden offers people the chance to sail in company from the Medway to Harwich and this year we took him up on the offer.
After getting the anchor on the last of the flood we came level with Edith May as she too got under way and both barges set their gear while crew peered to find the moored barge at Blackstakes against the bright lights of the Grain jetties behind. Couldn’t a massive amount of power be saved if all these flood lights up and down the country were arranged to switch on when needed? Maybe there are too many foxes and owls to allow the use of proximity lighting, but it would sure make night sailing easier. (more…)