A new winter home

A new winter home

After being afflicted, yet again, with engine problems, which meant that Goshawk would only go backwards(!) I took the decision to over winter Goshawk at Mistley Marine rather than our usual spot, Titchmarsh Marina. I called David, the owner, and ascertained that he had space in his yard, and arranged our arrival date and time.

On the day we had a lovely, fresh sail up the Stour – although we did, unfortunately, encounter issues with a sticky self-tailing winch, which is on the maintenance list for this winter. Once we arrived at Mistley, we dropped the sails and motored (in reverse, of course…) up to the pontoon. We didn’t do too badly, just gently nudging the boat behind us to stop the boat. (It is actually very hard, nay, impossible, to stop a boat with any certainty without a fully functioning engine).

David kindly met us on the pontoon, a sprightly, cheerful soul in a red boiler suit. He explained that unlike at Titchmarsh and other marinas, Mistley was more of a “do it yourself” type of place, and we would have to assist with craning Goshawk out. No problem – always happy to learn something new! He advised as we arranged the straps around Goshawk’s hull, eased off the backstay, and prepared to crane her onto the hardstanding. Unfortunately David couldn’t get his crane engine to start due to a flat battery, so he said that we could leave Goshawk on the pontoon overnight and he would lift her out in the morning.

We’ve not been to see the boat a great deal over winter, but Mistley has proven a great place to be. The yard itself is in a beautiful location, and it’s always a pleasant place to be, especially when the sun is shining and the tide is high. It’s also much easier (for us) to get to – it’s just a short trip from Wrabness by river or road, indeed, it wouldn’t take too long to walk the short distance. Mistley Marine is also quite close to Mistley station, with trains to Wrabness, and even London, so if any of my friends (I’m thinking particularly of Stephen!) wanted to come to help with maintenance, or assist with sailing, Goshawk is much more accessible.

Probably the best thing about Mistley, however, is Paul. I don’t know much more than his name, that he drives a van, has worked as an engineer and teacher, and has spent time in Africa. It is fair to say, however, that Paul has been an absolute godsend to us. We first encountered Paul when I was chatting to David about Goshawk’s engine issues, and he said, “ah, you need to get Paul onto that. I’ll ask him to take a look.” Perfect – I had been wondering how I was going to get the engine fixed, as despite all I have said about the accessibility of Mistley, it does feel somewhat isolated compared to the busy yard of a typical east coast marina.

So Paul duly had a look at the engine, and would you believe it, fixed it for me. His rates were somewhat lower than those I had been subjected to at Titchmarsh, and unlike the engineers there, he didn’t sink my boat…

Since then, Paul had taken it upon himself to do a whole range of other tasks on the boat, without me asking him to, which needed doing. He removed Goshawk’s very tired spraydeck, cleaned it, and passed it to one of his friends who makes lorry covers to fit new windows. He’s installed two new locks. He’s repaired our dodgy throttle unit. He’s thoroughly cleaned and jet washed the entire boat, and anti-fouled her. He’s cleaned up the teak. He’s dismantled the self-tailing winches to repair them. He’s looked at, serviced and repaired the seacocks. He’s screwed down the teak in the cockpit where it was lifting. He’s worked out what the random bit of broken off stainless steel was, and is arranging for someone to fix this.

I think that it’s fair to say that Goshawk will be better prepared for the season than at any previous time in our ownership and it’s all down to Paul!

Pretty much all that was left for us to do was varnish our washboards!

We are tremendously grateful to Paul for all he has done for us.

Should we decide to return to Mistley Marine at the end of this season, it will be in no small part due to Paul. (I hope that David is paying him a retainer!).

Incidentally, Mistley Marina is currently up for sale should you wish to buy yourself a rather lovely little boatyard! I’ve grabbed the particulars for future reference: