Plymouth

Hi everyone,
We are now anchored off Keyhaven in the Solent.  We'll describe the passage from Plymouth in the next post but here's what we were up to during our week in Plymouth.

We spent only one night at Barn Pool before heading up the Tamar River.  We anchored just short of the two Tamar Bridges and off the Tamar River Sailing Club (web site here).  Motoring up the river was interesting, not least because the adjacent countryside is quite similar to that along the Tamar River in Tasmania.  Very green when the sun came out!

Passing the Royal Navy base at Devonport

Torpoint Ferries

We remained at anchor from Sunday until Thursday.  Then we moved alongside TRSC's pontoon at their invitation.  TSMC made is very welcome throughout our stay.  Amazingly the first people we met there were OCC members Dick and Mary of sv Alacazam who we met in the Caribbean.  It really is a small world.  They made us very welcome and arranged a key fob so we could access the club and its showers at any time.

Anchored off TRSC

Zen Again on the Tamar

View across the river to Saltash

During the week we met with two of my cousins - Janice and Julie.  We hadn't seen each-other for decades.  It was great to see them, meet their husbands and catch up on their family news.  We walked around the sea-front and across the Hoe before having a very nice dinner in town.

We also met our friends Malcolm and Ingrid who live in Luxembourg but were in the UK on holiday. Malcolm designed our previous boat Degrees of Freedom.  Twas nice to meet Malcolm's father again too.  We had a nice dinner together at the excellent Ferry Inn close to the TRSC.

During the week we took the bus into Plymouth several times to get various things done:

• Took iPhone to Apple Store for free check - declared dead so bought a cheap (dumb) phone
• Took Macbook Air to Apple Store for free check - repairable and we'll get that done sometime
• Laundry - three weeks worth
• Food shopping  - groceries in the UK seems to be about half the cost in Perth

We also dinghied across the river to explore the Cornish town of Saltash.  Nice little town where I had a long overdue hair cut, we posted a letter and did some food shopping.  The bridges over the river were opened a century apart in time - Brunel's railway bridge in 1859 and the road bridge in 1961.  Prior to the bridges Cornwall was almost an island due to the river and the moors to the north.

On Friday evening we joined the TRSC's social evening and met many club members.  We traded a FSC Cruising Section burgee for a TRSC burgee.  The FSC burgee is now front & centre above the bar.

On Saturday morning we had breakfast at Dick and Mary's before meeting our friends Kim and Annette who are in the UK on holiday.  It was great to see them too - amazing that so many people were in the area at the same time as us.

Keeping the boat in the Plymouth area cost us exactly nothing.  Both anchoring in the Tamar and alongside at TRSC's jetty for a short stay were free.  TRSC is a very nice club and makes visitors very welcome.

At midday we cast off from TRSC and headed down river on the ebb tide, bound towards the Solent.