Poole Anchorage Meet
Tony Firth (Amoret)
An anchorage for early May bank holiday sounded idyllic to the programme planners in the depth of winter. It seemed a bit less delightful when May arrived with wintry chill and northerly winds. However, Bathia, Somerled and Amoret agreed to leave on Friday and make VHF contact next day. Winds of at least F6 were forecast, so going round the back of the Island sounded a bit rugged. All of us opted to go down the Solent.
After a headsail-only dash to Cowes, Amoret spent the night on the Folly mid-river pontoon (cooking, eating and sleeping off chicken and aubergine curry). Next morning felt a bit nippy as we motored to windward down the river and got the main up in a F 5 headwind, but we were fired with competitive zeal by a VHF call from Somerled telling us that she were passing Cowes. Sails up, engine off and we sped in pursuit. They opted for the Needles channel and the direct route to the S end of Poole Channel, while we went round N Head buoy and across Christchurch Ledge, hoping that the inshore passage to Poole entrance would still have enough water for us. Another chat with Somerled was immediately followed by a call from Bathia who was just a few cables behind us. As they stuck to the same course as us, we figured that they had worked out the tides and shared our view that we might get away with the inshore route.
The sailing was superb. Both boats had double-reefed main and well-reefed genoa and were making seven to eight knots through the water for the whole trip – double figures if you add in the fair tide. Being well up on our planned time, we had more than half a metre of water under our keels in the inshore passage. Sails down, we caught our breath and motored into the alarmingly shallow entrance to South Deep. Only a few minutes apart, we dropped our hooks just N of the winding channel in the South Deep anchorage and drank an “arrival beer”, then made a bacon, tomato and mushroom sauce for the evening linguini. 
Somerled seemed to be taking her time, but all became clear when Cliff called to say that he had towed a small boat with power problems through the entrance and then had grounded just E of Blood Alley. Despite, or because of, the inept efforts of a dinghy safety RIB to pull them off, they were firmly stuck. As low water approached we could clearly see that Somerled was heeled to an impressive angle and was therefore likely to miss cocktails in Amoret at 1800. They finally got off and picked up a well-sheltered swinging mooring neat Brownsea Island. Rob and Katie rowed over from Bathia to join us for drinks and small eats. During the craic they told us that they had never before done the inshore passage or been to South Deep. This put a slightly different aspect on the confidence with which they had followed us, though nobody mentioned the blind leading the blind!
After the morning fry-up we headed out of Poole to drop a lunch hook in Studland Bay, which had originally been the destination until we realised that it would be fairly uncomfortable in a fresh Northerly. Now it was completely calm in a light breeze with lots of others enjoying themselves. Somerled called to advise us that she had left early to catch the morning tide into the Solent and would spend the night at Berthon’s at Lymington. Marina fleshpots sounded good, so we left after lunch and had a windward sail against the tide, tacking S of the Needles and just laying the gap between the SW Shingles and Bridge buoys. Berthon’s arrived in time for a mercy dash with wine and crisps to Somerled, where Cliff, Flicky and their guests provided hot canapés (pizza and fish fingers – oops – I mean goujons) and one person from each boat provided guitar accompaniment to the feast.
As Wallace and Gromit would say: a good long weekend out.