Sailtrain

18/11/2025

Why Pilotage plans are so important even in waters you know.

I recently arranged to meet a contractor who was going to do some work on our boat in Woodbridge Tide Mill marina, at the end of the River Deben on the East Coast. Woodbridge Tide Mill has a concrete sill at the entrance and at low tide the river just becomes a muddy ditch. As it would be a morning meeting I needed to be in the marina the night before.

HW was at 7.45pm so I drifted up the river as the sun set and took a waiting buoy outside of the marina. Waiting until I could get over the sill. I had calculated that I would just about have enough water at HW to get over.

However, when high tide arrived, I was surprised to see that the gauge showing the height didn’t show enough water was available but I tried anyway. Sure enough, I couldn’t get in. What I hadn’t taken into account was that the atmospheric pressure was very high (30 Millibars from the norm 1013 can make a foot difference) and the tide was 0.2 meters below forecast.

I was then the wrong side of the sill on a falling tide. This meant that within about an hour I was going to be aground and within 2 or 3 hours the boat would be laying on its side. Time was running out fast.

My only option was to return, in the pitch black, with no lit buoys, along a meandering river until I reached 24 hour water at the green No 7 buoy (see chart below). Without a pilotage plan it would be virtually impossible. Fortunately, although the river was well known to me, I still made regular pilotage hand drawn plans and was able to use one that I had prepared previously.

As anyone who knows the area will tell you the route was littered with moored boats that ground at low water and a lot of empty mooring that look like unlit buoys so identifying every buoy that I passed was crucial.

On a falling tide, I clearly didn’t want to go aground at any stage so armed with a strong light and my pilotage plan I was able to slowly navigate my way back.

26/09/2025

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Our Online theory courses are designed to help you understand both the traditional and modern methods of navigation, pilotage, passage planning and meteorology. Excellent as stand alone courses, they also add significantly to any practical course.

18/09/2025

Did you know that under SOLAS every journey requires pre planning. In fact a passage plan before you start your journey is mandatory.

Amongst other elements, tides, weather, the type of boat, the experience of the crew, etc. all play their part but the journey itself I like to split into 3 parts. The leaving, the passage and the arrival.

If I am new to the areas I will construct a pilotage plan for leaving my port of exit and another for my port of entry. Central to my pilotage plan I like to make a hand drawn chartlet of the relevant area and include the features that are important to my safe exit/entry.

It all looks so easy on the chart with all the different colours and symbols but when you exit the marina you are normally confronted with a very large, featureless, open sea of grey/blue and it can even be confusing as to what direction you should take.

I don't want to bring my charts upstairs with so much information on them that quick decisions are impossible or where they may blow away or get wet, so I take my small, manageable hand drawn chartlet and work from that.

18/05/2025

Calculating Leeway

All vessels tend to sideslip, or make leeway, except with the wind dead ahead or astern. High-freeboard power vessels make leeway at slower speeds when the wind strikes their sides. Sailing vessels make lots of leeway when hard on the wind and less leeway when well off the wind. Light airs and heavy winds have more impact than moderate breezes.

One method For Estimating Leeway

Keep a steady course. Take a bearing on your wake trail. Use your hand bearing compass to estimate leeway angle. Sight dead astern with your compass. Wait several minutes, then sight along the wake line to windward. The difference in the two angles gives you your leeway angle.

To correct for Leeway you will need to sail closer to the wind by the number of degrees calculated above but this change of course may also change the amount of leeway experienced. Its not an exact science. Trial and error and lots of practice will improve your results but as with helming, it will never be super precise. Its all about eliminating as many errors as possible.

24/03/2025

When plotting on a chart, if you’re having trouble remembering which way round you need to put Variation when going from True to Magnetic or Magnetic to True, try this little aide-mémoire.

“Variation West, Compass best, Variation East, Compass least”

If say, in order to obtain a Compass course, you want to apply a magnetic Variation of 7 degrees West to a course of 110 degrees True, then as the Variation is West the Compass course is best, so it has to be a bigger number than 110, the Variation would be added making 117 Degrees. If the Variation was East, the compass would be least so it would be 110 – 7 = 103 Degrees Compass

The same principle would apply to Deviation.

24/11/2024

Many years ago, when taking my Yachtmaster Instructors exam, it was a given that students could sail on to buoys in any condition. Wind over tide, wind with tide, light winds, strong winds etc. Invariably the chosen buoy had shallows immediately after their location and numerous hazards would abound. Other buoys, boats and the like. So, any failure to pick up first time would require a previous well thought out plan B and woe betide any student who didn’t have a plan B.

However, another little twist that the examiner would add, which I use to this day, was that when it was time to sail off the buoy the examiner would ask another student to select the number of Tacks and Gybe’s that the new helmsman should complete before picking up the buoy again. So, if the student selected say 1 Tack and 2 Gybes, the new helmsman had to provide exactly that number of Tacks and Gybes before picking the buoy up again. No more and no less.

What a great way to check how good your wind awareness is.

When out next, with friends or family, you may want to ask them to give you the same test with randomly selected numbers of Tacks and Gybes.

Its quite old now, and I certainly do not receive any commission from its sale, but I found this little book would also provide scenarios to practice.

22/08/2024

Just completed another brilliant trip to Holland.

15 hour crossing from Harwich to Vlissingen. Arrived 4 am at Jachthaven Schelde. Called Dutch immigration who were enroute to see a couple of other UK arrivals. Passports stamped within 10 minutes of their arrival.

Several fabulous days spent in Middleburg and on the islands of the Veerse Meer.

Back to Jachthaven Schelde. Booked an appointment with Dutch Immigration for 5pm the evening of our return. They duly arrived and restamped our passports.

Left early the next morning. 5 hours of motoring then a cracking 10-hour 15 knot Broad reach sail back to Harwich.

The UK immigration system was flawless. Upon arrival, called them and they responded that Harwich had cleared our paperwork and we were good to go. So down with the Yellow flag.

The Netherlands have got it right. Despite our decision to leave the EU they have tried very hard to encourage visitors from the UK and from what we saw of the increasing numbers of visiting UK boats they have succeeded. Wouldn’t hesitate to visit again. If you follow the rules, its seamless.

When we first started crossing many years ago, you could actually get lost. Now with numerous TSS’s and Wind Farms, its very difficult to get lost and in order to avoid the very busy shipping in the TSS’s, AIS is almost a must have.

02/08/2024

VHF Course and Exam.
Forgetting for a moment the legal requirement, Its never a problem until something happens. Hopefully, we will never need to use it in anger but amongst other things, the VHF radio is a piece of safety equipment. In a moment of crisis, I'd like to think that I knew how to use it fully and was confident in its use. It’s a 6 to 10 hour course, surely that tells us it’s not just a matter of plugging it in and using it.

15/03/2024

COURSE TO STEER OVERVIEW.

Assuming that a passage would take approximately one hour, to construct a course to steer you would take a line from the start (the Red buoy) through the destination and out the other side. The destination in this case is the small circle at the base of the North Cardinal buoy. This line would be your ground track or Course Over the Ground

As during your passage, Tide will be pushing you off course, you would then take account of the tide by putting the tide bearing and distance (represented by the line with 3 arrows) on at the start, in this case the Red buoy (170 degrees for 1.0 mile).

You would then set your dividers to the distance travelled in one hour, in this case 5 miles. You would place one point of your dividers on the end of the tide and arc the other end of the dividers where it intersects the ground track line. In this case that would be just in front of the Cardinal buoy. This line represents your course to steer.

Because the intersect is before the Cardinal buoy you will know the passage is going to take just over an hour. If the intersect was after the Cardinal buoy you would know that the passage would take less than an hour.

It’s all covered in great detail in this course: https://sailtrain.org.uk/product/day-skipper-online/

18/02/2024

Professional Practices and Responsibilities Course: https://sailtrain.org.uk/product/professional-practice-and-responsibility-course-rya-ppr-online-sailtrain/
A compulsory online course for new and revalidating RYA Commercial Endorsement holders. You can take this course anytime prior to your Commercial Endorsement application or renewal. Your PPR certificate will be valid either for your first Commercial Endorsement application or your next renewal: https://sailtrain.org.uk/commercial-endorsement/

12/07/2023

Schengen: On a recent trip to the Netherlands, we electronically posted our sPCR form to the UK authorities before leaving the UK. Which was quite straight forward.

Upon arrival in Vlissengen (Jachthaven Schelde) we made phone contact with the Dutch immigration service requesting clearance into the Netherlands. Their reply, a very helpful, “no problem we will come to you within 20 minutes” which they did. A quick check of our paperwork and our passports stamped then they were gone. Before leaving, they did suggest that we make an appointment when returning to the UK as we would then be guaranteed a time.

Several weeks later, whilst at Middleburg we phoned immigration and made an appointment for 10.30am the following morning. Bang on time Dutch immigration arrived at the boat checked paperwork and stamped our passport with exit stamps. By the time we transited the bridges and locks we were in the Westerschelde at 12.30pm on our way back to the UK. The service from the Dutch authorities was outstanding.

Having arrived in the UK at 3am the following morning, there was some confusion with the UK Border force on what paperwork should have been sent for arriving in the UK. Apparently, they expect you to file a new sPCR form before departing the Schengen area. We were given several conflicting solutions none of which were possible. As a result, we weren’t confident that those we spoke to actually new knew how the system worked. Which wasn’t very helpful at 3 am after a 16-hour passage.

After contacting the UK Yachtline service, we were told that as we had arrived before posting a sCRP it was no longer possible to post a sCRP electronically and that we should fill out the old Excel spread sheet as an annex to the sCRP. Fortunately, the lady at Yachtline completed the paperwork on our behalf and gave us clearance. We were then able to go to bed.

At no time did the UK authorities inspect our vessel, which seems to render obsolete the whole theory behind Brexit.

18/06/2023

Here is a little Aide memoir for remembering which way to go when converting a True course to a Compass course or visa versa – “Error West Compass best. Error East Compass least”.

In other words, generally, if the Variation is 7° West, the Compass bearing will be a bigger number than the True bearing. If the Variation was 7° East the Compass bearing will be a smaller number than the True bearing.

It’s all in the course here:

RYA Day Skipper Online theory course from Sailtrain covers Sail, Powerboat and Motorboat and is a full functioning learning programme.