I'm still recovering from Granny's awesome trip across the Wash yesterday, and Granny wants to loiter in Boston until the weekend. Let her. She's earned her rest.
(Incidentally, is it 'The Wash', or 'the Wash'? How many Washes are there?)
Fellow-traveller Charles Lyne has kindly sent over a preliminary track of our route, using a magic wand which he stuck to the roof of Granny B and attached to something installed by Lord Voldemort inside the boat.
I'd appreciate knowing what equivalent magic exists for the iPhone, since the only application I found was Fire Pin, but when I clicked on the 'start' button I didn't know what to do afterwards. And besides, Fire Pin works on Google Maps, and one really needs the magic of Ordnance Survey maps in navigating coastal waters.
Charlie also send over the picture, below, which he took from NB Barnaby. It shows Granny Buttons at sea, where it was being helmed by the pilot, Daryl Hill. Mercifully I was below at the time. I think this was taken looking eastwards, as we turned away from Hunstanton.
I'll certainly recommend Daryl. He was calm and responsible, as well as being friendly and light-hearted, and never commented once on my cold, unsweetened coffee or cold toast. And he was very happy steering for long periods. See the little kink in the route, just below the 'A' of 'Wash'? That's where I took over when he went to the loo!
By the way, don't be mizzled by that thin red line into assuming that it's all the detail you need to make the crossing sans pilot. It's where Granny Buttons and Barnaby went, but time, tide and circumstance will vary the route - or indeed, whether to go at all - and the devil is, as they say, in the detail.
Bones, I wish I'd known you wanted to come! I'd gladly have shared the
£400+ cost with you :-)
(£180 Nene licence, £30 insurance supplement, £150 pilotage, etc etc..)
Posted by: Andrew Denny | Friday, 21 August 2009 at 12:51 PM
That looks GREAT!!! I wanna go....
Posted by: mort bones | Friday, 21 August 2009 at 10:55 AM
Steve,
Granny was fine - perhaps even better than on the river - but did have a
tendency to heel over in the wind - which was a moderate Force 3-4.
She also ran very hot, but then we were running the engine fast for several
hours at a stretch, in water that was quite warm and summery. Didn't
overheat into steam, thoug.
In short, it was all fine.
Andrew
Posted by: Andrew Denny | Thursday, 20 August 2009 at 12:51 AM
That photo really is quite something.
RouteBuddy Atlas (http://www.routebuddy.com/atlas/index.html) does track logging and OS maps on iPhone, but I don't think that it can export tracks on maps directly for web use if that's what you're after. The authors do seem quite responsive to requests though so it might be worth contacting them. There are a number of other apps about for doing track logging but I don't think any of them use OS maps.
You could always go for the Navionics Marine Charts for iPhone if you're going to try any more coastal passages!
Posted by: Ben Jameson | Wednesday, 19 August 2009 at 10:29 AM
Well done Andrew, its one of those things that we've talked about but never had the nerve, or the time to do. That photo looks amazing.
Mintball always handles differently on deep open water like rivers, how did Granny B handle out in the open sea?
Posted by: Steve | Tuesday, 18 August 2009 at 07:34 PM