Years ago, when I worked for the Daily Mail, I used to be the “Captain Calamity Correspondent”.

Captain Calamity appeared most summers – in the “silly season” when there wasn’t much news about and anything at all could get most of a page – lost exotic animals, the weather (of course) – and amateur sailors (usually elderly) navigating some  home-made and essentially unseaworthy craft, very often with the help of the AA map. Of course it all ended happily with the lifeboat going out to rescue him – and then explaining that they did not have the power to stop him setting out again.

… which, of course, he did … only to be rescued by the next lifeboat station down the coast.

Since it was known that I was a sailor, I used to be asked to cover Captain Calamity and I must say I milked him for for every cheap laugh I could think of. The way I saw it, daft old fools like that deserved everything they got.

Now, of course, the tables are turned and I am the daft old fool – or at least that is  the way it appears to me.

For instance, in my last post, I celebrated the delights of being at anchor. What I didn’t mention is that I am at anchor on the River Orwell which is lined, on both sides of the channel, with moorings – as close together as they can get them. Of course, at this time of year, most them are empty. I did consider borrowing one – but you take  a risk when you do that – how do you know the reason it’s empty isn’t because it needs some work… and what about the owner returning in the middle of the night…

But I did find a spot of deep water not far away. When Samsara dropped back at the end of her chain, her stern was nicely between two empty buoys.

However, when I returned from the charcoal expedition (see previous), I was concerned to find that she had now dropped further back – and was now through the line of moorings.

That was not good news. That is how you get your chain wrapped around a buoy. I did it once anchoring outside Torquay (should have paid the marina charges). But in the West Country you can see the bottom and work out how to undo the tangle. On the muddy East coast, there isn’t a hope.

I tried motoring around the buoy and even launched the dinghy and tried dragging the end of the chain round and round. Nothing worked. I shall have to get a diver down – more expense!

The answer is, I should have been more careful. I should have thought it through. Maybe I’m just out of practice.

I certainly hope so. This can’t go on…

After two days in an expensive marina, it’s good to be out at anchor again – for one thing we’re pointing into the wind – all day it’s been blowing a gale with driving rain (somebody got washed into the sea at Ramsgate and drowned). For me it just meant I had to stuff the cracks in the companionway with a towel – except, of course, when Art the electrician arrived for his second (was it third?) attempt to find out why the windlass works or not according to an agenda that it seems to be keeping to itself.

I thought I had fixed it when I discovered a rusty connection but today Art discovered an isolating switch in the engine space which I knew nothing about. Removing both that and an ancient trip switch and replacing them with a fuse seems to have solved the problem for the moment but there will have to be another (fourth?) visit to fit a new trip switch.

Of course, all of this would be unnecessary if only I had any expertise in electrical engineering. But, no, I’m marginally less expert in this area than I am with engines.

One thing I can do is turn this boat round in small spaces. With the wind still blowing 25kts, I took Samsara out of her marina berth, spun her on a sixpence and we are now anchored a couple of hundred yards away. The reason for this is that tomorrow is May 1^st but the forecast is still for night time temperatures of only 3^oC and there is only about third of a bag of charcoal left – enough to keep my cosy for this evening but tomorrow,  I will have to take the bike ashore and pedal five miles to a garage which sells bags of charcoal.

This was written a few days ago…

I don’t suppose it would suit everybody but for the first time, I feel I really can say I am Living the Dream. This is what it is like to do exactly as you please…

Samsara is anchored off Stone Point in the Walton Backwaters – that maze of creeks and mud made famous in Swallows and Amazons. In fact it was here, more than sixty years ago that I first went sailing and began to become fanciful about living on a boat.

We are here because I have to paint the decks so I need somewhere quiet not too far away from a water tap (have to wash off the degreasing agent). I arrived a couple of days ago. It’s perfectly sheltered and there is just one other boat here – an old wooden yacht with the bluff bow you see on Dutch classics and a bowsprit almost half as long again. To begin with I thought there was no-one aboard (although there was an ancient dinghy alongside).

Admittedly I had anchored at such a respectful distance that I was looking at her through binoculars – and then today I saw the skipper. A man of about my age – although with more hair. He came out, did something on deck and disappeared without looking my way. But then, why should he. I was watching him through the window.

Today was not a day to go out – bright sunshine but a strong and bitterly cold wind. For the first half hour, I fretted about this. It will probably take me a whole day to clean the decks to standard required by the paint manufacturer… but then, what’s the hurry. My next appointment is for renewing my long-lapsed radio licence on the 29^th.  I can please myself until then.

And pleasing yourself is one of the most wonderful – and yet one of the rarest-  opportunities we have in this life.  In fact, looking back, how much of our lives do we spend “pleasing ourselves”. If you live with other people, you have a whole separate agenda to consider – and who wants to be inconsiderate.

But if it’s just you – and nobody knows or cares what you will be doing today – that means you can, for once, please yourself.

I do know that I didn’t get up particularly early – I think it was about eight O’clock. I lingered over breakfast and pulled my one non-navigational book out of the bookcase (it’s all right, the rest are on Kindle but this one has photographs).

I do know that I had several phone conversations with people interested in Network Marketing (more about that on www.networkmarketingblog.org.uk) – a bit of work does have to intrude. There was a text from Tamsin asking whether I would be joining everyone for the annual bucket-and-spade holiday in Southwold but I should be on my way back from the Azores by then. However, it will all have to be paid for (hence the bit of work).

Interestingly, I didn’t resent this at all because it was on my terms. In fact, it was exciting to see that the plan seemed to working – although one conversation lasted for an hour and ten minutes. I’m not sure that’s  a good idea – but we talked about all sorts of things and I was in no hurry to say goodbye…

And so, the day slipped past. Lunch was an occasion. I’m getting a real taste for large mugs of sweet tea with condensed milk. Some time in the afternoon, I became so thrilleod with the way things were working out that I decided that tonight will be movie night. This will be a first: I have a dozen favourite DVDs which I will be quite happy to watch again and again (must have seen It’s a Wonderful Life 20 times already). The computer is charged up from carefully monitoring the solar panel and I’ve got a wire to plug in the little waterproof speaker.

It’s not really that cold but the charcoal stove makes the cabin so cosy that I’ll have that as well. In fact, time for dinner, I think…

There is really no point in writing this blog if I’m not honest with you. In fact, if you look up the symptoms of ADD, you will find that compulsive honesty is one of them (even though it might not be the best policy sometimes).

And there is something that I have to get off my chest. I’ve been keeping quiet about it for three months because I feel embarrassed and ashamed – but it would be worse if it were to come out and people thought I’d been hiding it.

In November I did something really, really stupid.

You may have been following my rather haphazard account of delivering Samsara from North Wales, via the South Coast to the River Deben in Suffolk. That’s where I live and although I don’t plan to keep her here (or come to that, anywhere in particular), the family did want to see the boat and I needed a destination (you do need a destination).

All had gone very well (bar the incident in Brighton when a motor cruiser hit me and cracked the brand new teak rail, carrying away a stanchion in the process). For 24 hours nobody knew who had done it. I had been ashore at the time but eventually the berthing manager spotted the culprit on the CCTV recording and he was quite happy to take responsibility. He had sent his son to check for damage and the lad reported all was well.

Anyway, the last leg was from Dover to Felixstowe – a wonderful trip because, if you time it right, you can carry the tide all the way for 12 hours. Better than that, on this occasion, I managed to get all the way there on one tack, only dropping the sails off the Landguard Buoy because by then it was pitch dark and the entrance buzzing with big ships pirouetting and pilot boats zipping between them at 24 knots.

The plan was to drop anchor somewhere up the Orwell for the night and then go round to catch the tide into the Deben the next day. Once past the glare of Felixstowe docks, the night was as black as can be – no moon and just the winking red and green lights marking the fairway. I brought my new torch on deck – high-tech and expensive with heaven knows how many lumens. I shone it out onto the water, the beam picking up the buoys as we passed. Meanwhile the plotter, dimmed as far as it would go, showed us progressing safely up the starboard side of the channel.

And this is where things went wrong. The phone rang. I remember the first time the phone rang on a boat. We were going up the Swinge off Alderney in the early 90’s. It was the weirdest sensation. But now people think nothing of the phone ringing in all sorts of place – and, of course, in cars. Now, in a car, you mustn’t touch the phone. But you can press a button on the steering wheel and have the call played through the speakers.

Well, Samsara isn’t geared up for that, but I did take it out of my pocket and start talking – after all, it wasn’t as if I was doing 70 miles an hour on a motorway. From time to time, as I chatted, I checked the plotter, shone the torch ahead, kept an eye on the buoys.

And it was during one of these checks that I was concerned to find I had wandered out of the channel to starboard. In fact, I was inshore of a line of moored boats.

“Hold on,” I said to my friend. “I’m out of the channel here. Let me get back…”

I slipped the phone into my pocket, shone the torch ahead, adjusted the course. Shone the torch again – no more moored boats – and resumed the call. Pretty straightforward, you might think. Nothing to worry about. I glanced at the plotter.

BANG!

In the glow of the steaming light, I could see a mast. I had hit a moored yacht almost head on. My bow was higher than hers and my anchor had smashed her pulpit and as, I continued down her port side, carried away two stanchions.

I won’t go into what my friend heard over the phone in the next few moments but about ten minutes later, when I went to call him back to explain, I discovered he had been holding on the whole time.

Anyway, I picked up a mooring nearby so I could inspect the damage in the morning. It was not as bad as it might have been if this had been a full T-bone collision. For my part, a weld on the pulpit had given way and there was some damage to the bow roller and anchor fixing. The anchor itself was unscathed.

Over dinner and recriminations, I considered what to write on the note I would leave on the other boat. But in the end, I called the adjacent marina and established that this was one of their moorings. They would pass on my details to the owner.

Pantaenius, who have insured my boats ever since the 1980’s, have been wonderful, of course. The owner of the boat I hit, has been very decent and thanked me for reporting the incident. Repairs are taking longer than I had hoped because of the cold weather (the engineer making a new bow roller has abandoned his workshop because it would cost more than he could make to heat it.)

Meanwhile, I have been berating myself about How Could This Happen?

First of all, there is no doubt – for me especially (see AADD above) – a mobile phone is a distraction. It’s not like talking to a crew in the cockpit. It takes you mind hundreds of miles away from where you are and even if you’re not doing 70 miles an hour on a motorway, that can have catastrophic consequences.

Even so, I knew there were moored boats around. Why didn’t I see this one? My first conclusion was that most boats have white hulls. This one was blue. The coachroof what white but – approaching from the bow – I would not have seen that. Even so, I was shining my new, high-intensity torch…

And it was only last week that I made a discovery about that torch. It has three settings: Very bright, quite bright and not-at-all bright. I would have known this if I was the sort of person who reads instructions – but what instructions do you need to operate a torch?

What I would have understood if I had read them is that the first time you switch it on, it is very bright. If you turn it off and on again, it will be quite bright. But if you are approaching a boat with a blue hull from head on and you switch on your torch when the sequence happens to have reached “Not Very Bright At All”, you might as well be without a torch at all.

This is not an excuse. It might be called a “contributory factor”. But the fault is nobody else’s but mine.

It was a salutary lesson and I promise you I shall learn from it. The main thing is that nobody got hurt and damage can be repaired.

Besides, guess what I got for Christmas: A night vision monocular.

The Old Man