Knot

My normal sleep is, to death,
as blinking is to staring.
These hot nights
my thrashing is to repose,
as drowning is to yoga.
Curse the sun,
unwelcome herald.
I am not yet rested.

That old saw

I stop sawing a while; let the perspiration do its work. The English summer is here and its sounds are familiar.

Traffic, always some somewhere, but not obtrusive and the thing that makes me listen is not any one noise, but the soft mixture of them all. In no particular order:

• Small dog yapping, in play I feel.
• Large dog woofing, in greeting I like to think.
• Seagulls.
• Distant DIY.
• A large white butterfly comes close enough to reveal the sound of its wings, a fast beating flutter.
• A bird (I didn't look up) has a softer, slower sound to its flight, only beating twice when in audible range.
• A wasp rasps fibres from an old wooden crate for the new extension.
• Happy children noises.
• The sun creaks the garage roof.
• My stomach calls out for another drink; coffee is made.

Too hot now for the lawnmowers' mating calls; too calm for sirens wail. No car alarms since the traditional one I heard as the Lymington to Yarmouth ferry passed my mooring yesterday afternoon. Summer.

growing tips

The wild verges and hedgerows that have been pushing onto the quieter roads of the Forest have reached a pause where the attrition caused by passing traffic has matched their verdure. Although the warmth of the weather still encourages growth, the rate of rainfall has abated somewhat and so these swelling green borders have been both slowed and also now thinly coated in dust. Summer, already a month and a half old, is beginning to look tired.

Above the traffic level, all is well and green. Huge crops of seeds and fruit are ripening and, in some places, falling. Beech mast paving is a thing. Driving across the Forest this morning my eye was drawn from the road edges to the variety of standard trees I pass. The rowans were glowing with jewelled fruits and on counting them I found eight examples where I would have guessed maybe three previously.

Foals are looking less spindly, although their appearance is still dominated by limbs and joints. Young birds are foraging for themselves and growing into their full-size plumage. Adult birds are giving up their territorial squabbles and returning to fighting over simpler disagreements, such as food items.

Hambling around

Yarmouth to Hamble and back on Saturday. We slipped our schedule gently through the day until we were forced to find Yarmouth again on our return because our own mooring would have been too shallow by the time we got back there. The sloth started in the morning, getting up and out of harbour late. Once in the flood we motored far enough outside that the tide would take us without sweeping us back onto the North shore of the Island. There was no wind.

Other than the 3 knot tide, everything was still. Raising the genoa, it filled from the Eastern side purely because of the apparent wind of the tidal embrace. I hung out a fishing line and, after a few tens of minutes, nothing had taken the bait but the line, at last, indicated that the boat was moving under sail. This breeze increased to about force 2 by the time we passed the East Lepe buoy and the limit of our previous sailing from the West to this point. Sailing round to Calshott was novel and, thanks to this being the first day of Cowes week, interesting. Small and large fleets of racing classes were following each other out from Cowes (where the race starts had been delayed by the calm).

We crossed the main shipping channel at the latitude of the Hill Head buoy and gybed near there up the North side of the North channel, staying in the relative shallows up Southampton Water with the wind increasing to force 3 and finally a flourish of force 4 that encouraged a reduction in sail area while we eyeballed the busy Hamble entrance. Past the starboard sign the wind reduced again and we took to engine to make a safer and swifter passage. Being unfamiliar with Hamble Point Marina entrance we had to turn in the channel and make our way back a few yards before finding our allotted short-stay mooring. Registering in the marina office I noted a familiar line of small shops and concessions across the car-park and this started the dawning realisation that we had been to the same marina from the land side about seven years earlier. The view from the restaurant confirmed the impression, from where we could see the branch of Force-4 that had brought us there on that occasion, as well as the tall dry-stacks.

Lunch took us a good hour beyond our schedule, but was well worth the time. Leaving the mooring and rejoining the river was uneventful. Just past the starboard mark where we had dropped sail on the way in, we raised sail again and so began the relentless process of tacking up-wind in a force 4; avoiding the commercial vessels in the main channel (fortunately rather few), timing our turns to keep out of the racing fleets and shallows. It was a relief some 3.5 hours later to find sanctuary back in Yarmouth harbour. We were however, not alone; being used to the typical off-season business of the harbour we found ourselves rafted out four deep and rather fortunate to be within the harbour at all.

After stowing and tidying and writing logs we only just made it to the pier ice-cream shop as it was closing. It was only by pleading and mentioning the name of the person in the harbour office who had recommended them to us that we were served (by the daughter of the same). The night was quiet after dark and we had time to find coffee for breakfast before a new and slow walk round a field boundary and back to Mill Copse and the dis-used railway route back to town. The forecast wind was blowing as we set out back to our deepening mooring, but blowing with the tidal flood it gave us a smooth ride. Entry to the river required steering around 40 degrees away from the starting-platform, due to the tide. As we crossed beyond the swiftest flow the necessary angle slowly decreased until at the river mouth it was less than 20 degrees. A fleet of tall (approx 50 foot) boats crossed the river mouth as we approached, their port tacks taking them to the edge of the shelving shore line there and away on starboard before we arrived. Our own port tack took us up-river to our lake. The narrowness of the lake at this state of tide necessitated a quick burst of engine after a gybe to reduce the turning circle onto the buoy, which we picked up second attempt.