Big boats but very little wind

The dominant high pressure may be bringing us hot, dry weather but it also means that there is precious little wind to be found just at the moment. However, we've just had a lovely long weekend aboard Maunie and a few vessels that we met certainly made things interesting, even if the sailing was pretty tame.

This was the view on the River Dart on Thursday evening - a fleet of 'traditional' superyachts anchored after the first leg of a race series called the Richard Mille Cup. Richard Mille (I had to look this up) is a brand of designer watches for people who think it's socially acceptable casually to strap a timepiece that costs more than a boat to their wrists. More than a very flash boat, actually; the cheapest model comes in at a mere $84,000 and most sell for about $200,000.

Anyway, forgetting the social injustices of superyachts and their owners for a moment; the star of the show was Adix, a 286 footer built in 1984, currently valued at about $25M and owned by a Spanish Billionaire Jaime Botin, Chairman of Groupo Santander. Senor Botin is clearly a man of taste to buy such a yacht but in 2020 he was charged and sentenced to 18 months in jail after attempting to smuggle a Picasso painting out of Spain aboard the boat. Sorry, I forgot to forget the social injustices of superyachts and their owners for a moment there. Anyway this is a photo from Superyacht Times of Adix, enjoying more wind that she did this week.

Back aboard the more modestly priced Maunie, we had a motor passage in calm waters west past Salcombe then a lovely couple of hours with the Parasailor flying.

We arrived at the River Yealm mid-afternoon and enjoyed a relaxed night on the visitors' pontoon, chatting to the crews of neighbouring yachts. As the light was beginning to fail, a charter yacht with a father and his two teenage kids aboard rafted alongside us; unfortunately when they left at 08.00 the following morning the fast-running current got the better of their inexperience and they nearly wrapped their boat around Maunie's stern. Thankfully there was no damage, apart from their pride, but it very nearly went very wrong indeed.

We waited for favourable tide to help us back towards Dartmouth so spend the rest of the morning relaxing and doing a few little jobs that we somehow never seem to get around to. Vital things, like relabelling the halyard clutches so that crews unfamiliar with the boat can find the right rope easily.

Nautical terms that all mean something important!

Unfortunately our return passage was all under engine as the wind never rose more than about 4 knots. At least we had about 2 knots of favourable tide scooting us around Start Point and, as we headed in towards the Dart, we had another Big and Expensive Vessel encounter:

This is a ship called The World where wealthy folk who don't buy superyachts instead buy a suite on board and then join the ship wherever, and for as long, as they fancy. We first saw her in Sydney Harbour and then again in Falmouth where she was temporarily laid up during the Covid crisis.

Overall, a very pleasant weekend on the water - just hope for some wind next time!