Wind & Tide

These are two great masters in nature so powerful that no boat can ignore, wind and tide. Even one of the most gigantic container ships on earth, the Ever Given fell foul of master wind!

Wind – you could be forgiven for assuming that power could overcome something as simple as wind, until that day not long ago. The news was splashed everywhere that this gigantic ship was blown aground , blocking the Suez Canal, stopping the flow of goods around the world that most of us take for granted. The Ever Given is 400m (1,312ft) long, and was carrying 18,300 containers of stuff for the world. It took 6 days for the salvage operation to get it afloat and moving again!

Every floating thing from the smallest kayak to this monster of transportation is at the mercy of the wind. We feel it too when taking Hoogtij out for a cruise. We consider the wind before even choosing to untie the ropes. Out on the calm rivers of Norfolk, you feel that force of nature on the steering, compensate for it as you guide the steering wheel. Every manoeuvre can be sabotaged by those gusts of air. We might be trying to moor up and a strong wind could blow you off the mooring, making it doubly difficult to get your 37 tons into position. So, if you are clever, you always try to have the wind working in your favour, if you choose to go out in any wind at all!

Tide – This movement of water is controlled by the moon and sun. Our orbiting moon almost magnetically pulls the earths water to create low and high tides twice a day. Sometimes the effect is more pronounced creating ‘springs’ and when less so ‘neaps’. This gravitational pull has everything on the water moving unless you are tied up. I stopped typing for a moment to look outside, and sure enough it is one of the highest tides I have seen in Norfolk so far. The water is only a few centimetres from flooding the pontoon, and still coming in! I have my yellow wellies to hand so I’m not too worried. Hoogtij is much slower travelling against the tide and faster going with it. If going with the tide, a boat cannot stop moving so we would never try to moor up unless you are going against the flow of water to slow you down. We either have to calculate for mooring at destinations going in one direction or know that the river is wide enough to turn around to face into the tide to stop. Tide is a force that has to be respected and understood.

From Hoogtij’s stern deck we have watched helplessly as hire boats approach the St Olaves bridge, which is often too low for them, unable to reverse as the tide is behind them. They flounder, lose control and the boat turns sideways and before they know it the tide has pushed them into the bridge. Crunches ensue as windscreens are torn off and shattered and sometimes they are forced under the bridge or just end up wedged for hours dying of embarrassment.

So with wind and tide in mind and having a large heavy steel ship amid delicate plastic Tupperware we took our old girl out for a spin on our new waters. Just us, Hoogtij and Zeeshan Khan for the first time. We planned our trip from a Wednesday morning however it just wasn’t meant to be… rest assured dear reader that these early trips taking your floating home on a voyage are terrifying. Our first challenge was to turn Hoogtij around 180 degrees as we are mostly unable to pass under the bridge ahead of us. We had been used to a vast wide river for 8 years not one that looks barely wide enough for us and with a beautiful classic Dutch Tjalk on the opposite side that we didn’t want to bump into! We had been out once already on the river with friends and that time used the tide to turn ourselves around but it was running too fast and wanting to re-moor the opposite way round we couldn’t stop Hoogtij crushing a mooring post. That trauma being in the back of our minds, we wanted to be extra careful with this particular trick. The timing was wrong for turning so we delayed a day, besides our stomachs were in knots and our brains were going into overdrive calculating how Hoogtij would turn and on which rope, tied how and where. Fresh the morning after and determined we were going to get the hang of this, we did it! We swung Hoogtij round from the stern perfectly using the tide, and set off up the river, triumphant, heart pounding, ready for adventure!

The tide has now flooded the pontoon by several centimetres and still has a couple of hours to carry on rising! We are surrounded by rising waters!