150 Miles in a 9m Ribcraft....

[HoveRuss]

Had a great day yesterday with Jon Brooks in his 9m Ribcraft Micki Dee Bee. Jon had been chartered for the day by a guy from London, and myself and Nelson Wood from the Ramsgate RNLI crew offered to go along for a journey there as crew

The four of us set out from Ramsgate at 7.45am, up came the sun, tho it got a bit grey later on, fantatsic crusing on calm seas. Took in the wind farms and Montgomery (which chose not to explode once again) and we were moored up at Tower Bridge inside three hours, a journey of 72 miles. Never done the Thames under th dartford bridge before. Grim isn't it!

We buzzed around for a few hours, taking in the sites. Got a tug from the River Police under Blackfriars bridge, a real pompous Dimbleby that "Didn't recognise the vessel sah, and seeing the fuel cans, what with you heading for parliament and all, decided we had best investigate. The world having changed sah, can't be too patronising - sorry, careful, can we now sah?" Nob.

Grabbed some lunch, left around 3pm, but even with the spare fuel we had aboard had to stop in at out fuel dump at Whistable... the beasty consumed around £450 fuel there and back.....<gulp!>

Arrived back in Ramsgate after a great run totallying 150 miles, the last hour or so being in compelte darkness - easy work with a 12" Standard Horizon plotter! The boats a gem, brides beautifully, very stable and dry.

Few pictures from a superb day out - thanks Jon!

[HoveRuss]

Few more

[jyasaki]

"Didn't recognize the craft" with the big-ass lettering on the tubes?

Your cop must have gone to the same academy as ours...


jky

[DM]

Why's everyone wearing those Kru lifejackets?

They're crap.

[Polwart]

Originally Posted by HoveRuss

We buzzed around for a few hours, taking in the sites. Got a tug from the River Police under Blackfriars bridge, a real pompous Dimbleby that "Didn't recognise the vessel sah, and seeing the fuel cans, what with you heading for parliament and all, decided we had best investigate. The world having changed sah, can't be too patronising - sorry, careful, can we now sah?" Nob.

It didn't have anything to do with someone wearing a phacesaver terrorist mask did it

[Jon Brooks]

Originally Posted by davidmanning

Why's everyone wearing those Kru lifejackets?

They're crap.

What makes you say that Dave?

Thought you pix would be better than mine Russ!! You should think about taking pix for a livin!

Whilst it was a pain and the guy could not have been more of a pompus arse if he had tried it is good to see that the boys in blue were on the ball.
My concern would be that we had got all the way to Big Ben before being stopped and the poor Targa only caught us up cos we spotted them and slowed down!!!
Someone on the our boat said "its ok we could have smoked them they would never have caught us up" I did point out that we were heading in the wrong direction i.e. up stream and to get away we would have to pass the Marine Units HQ!

On the way up we were at 4K (30 kts approx) and 3K (20 kts) on the way home

As Russ said it was a great day, well worth a trip up if you ever get the chance.

[codprawn]

Looks like a great trip - I am hoping to do similar next year. I would have loved to have been around when the cops pulled you - the World a different place? Yes there's more idiots like him in it............

[Hightower]

Looks like a good day out.

I like the second to last photo, looks like Jons got his hand on a tiller

[richardjawilson]

I have been stopped 3 times in London over the last 2 years all under the stop and search Terrorism Act 2001 I think. As they 'know my boat' now they are friendly enough. I once called them to assist when I had a fuel problem. They towed me to a jetty and we traced the problem to a trapped fuel pipe, so they not all that bad!

But unlike the road its nice to overtake them legally............

[HoveRuss]

Originally Posted by Polwart

It didn't have anything to do with someone wearing a phacesaver terrorist mask did it

Probably would have done but Jon made me take it off.

I wanted to just stand there in it, saying nothing....