Being a weekend warrior is crap really, so getting an opportunity to go in the week when it's blowing is great. Took off down to Hayling, determined to sail off the front rather than stupid
Poo Bay, with low tide around 10, so should be ok.
Arrived at the Inn-on-the-Beach, windy but not spectacularly so, from the SW, and sun - really bright and lovely. Shorebreak pretty threatening, but then it always is when it's not exactly low tide and there's any wind! A couple of people were rigging and heading out, so I rigged up the 5.5 and 91l JP, and headed out, falling off after a good start, but recovering ok.
Had a few good runs, about twenty minutes worth, and blimey - my gybes are definitely improving, with a real feel for what's happening. It's all starting to slow down, which is a good sign, and I can feel the balance and stuff happening under my feet, and understanding the forces in the sail. The key thing is SPEED - this makes it easier to cut big arcs, and significantly lessens the weight of the sail when flipping it. Also tracked a few smaller waves, starting to understand this too.
Then it got really dark, with obvious rain coming in, so I went upwind and beached upwind of the Inn. This perhaps wasn't too smart, but didn't want to mess about in the shorebreak if I could help it. Of course, I got stuck in it, insufficiently aggressive, and fairly munched, but nothing seemed to break. The squall went through with me standing on the beach, then time to go back out. I got about 100 yards off the beach, right in front of the van, and then had a mysterious catapult, involving not getting the feet in the footstraps and a wave and stuff. When I tried to recover the rig, it was completely floppy, an empty crisp packet. The damn head cap had slipped off the top of the mast! Boring indeed. Fortunately I was only 100 yards offshore, with the wind and tide in my favour, but still a long paddle.
Great. Went ashore, rigged the 4.7 since the wind was coming up, with lots of stupid mistakes owing to tired and cold - some athlete here!! - and went out again. However, the wind had really picked up, and after getting out and falling 50 yards from shore, decided discretion was the better part of valour and headed back. Packed up, headed homewards, somewhat depressed - after all, it had only been 20 minutes, crap, right?
On reflection no. Gybing had been good, and starting to see waves as friends not enemies, especially in the gybing process. And just time on the water, TOTW.
Went along to Andy Biggs and handed in my 5.5m to have the webbing for the top cap replaced. Another conversation with a graduate on the subject of the difficult of getting jobs, and confirmation of the meaninglessness of tests. Can't remember much after that - drove back, it was dark, ate something, how mundane is life that isn't windsurfing (and love!).
