I arrived at Holy Island, what a delightful place. Very, very pretty, but enough of that.

Unless you have a tender, there is no way of getting ashore, and I desperately needed to get food. My tender, if I haven’t already mentioned, was left in Wells accidentally.

Another boat came in to the anchorage at the same time as me, so I motored over to ask if they planned to go ashore “no, not really” they replied. “No problem” I said “I’ll swim”.

I think they took that statement with a pinch of salt. That is, until I had dropped Kudu’s anchor and appeared from the cabin in a wetsuit. “Unfortunately for me, I wasn’t joking” I shouted over to them.

Splash! In I went, and swam the hundred meters or so to the shore with a holdall above my head, containing shorts, t-shirt, and shoes.

I’m not sure if you’ve ever tried swimming against a current with one hand whilst trying to keep a bag dry above your head, but I can assure you it’s quite difficult.

I caught my breath, than had a chat with the vaguely surprised on lookers, before heading in to the village to search for the local shop. Items purchased, including a roll of bin liners to stuff everything into to keep it dry, I began my walk back. The walk back was rudely interuppted by the local real ale pub. Well, it’s just rude not to, isn’t it.

A pint of Bombardier later, I started to walk back to the beach, but changed my mind at the last minute and headed down to the Ouse, a bay where the fishing boats and local pleasure craft are moored.

A yacht was setting off from the Jetty, and I was about to ask him for a lift but changed my mind and decided not to interrupt his train of thought since he was obviously have trouble controlling his boat. I counted four bumps of the jetty wall, along with the eyes of a spooked horse from it’s skipper.

The I saw a chap on the other side of the bay rigging a dinghy. It’s worth a punt, I thought, so headed over.

“Hi there. Bit of a weird one, but any chance of a lift?”

I explained the situation and the guy was a bit unsure. There were two of them already, and the Fireball only takes two, add ot that the fact that the wind has built up quite a lot, his reluctance was understandable. I could sense it, so withdrew my request and insisted I’d swim back.  He then committed to giving it a go, to which I was thankful, a feeling followed  immediately by regret as I took note of the howling wind.

I was put at the front as jib man, and we set off with a whoosh. Those Fireballs are quick little things. Unfortunately my boat was anchored to windward, so off we went beating towards Kudu. As we put the last tack in, it was obvious that this boat wasn’t stopping. She screamed along on Starboard tack.

I timed the jump perfectly. Carefully waterproofed shopping in a holdall around my shoulder, I leapt off the Fireball and landed right next to Kudu. Hand up, grab stanchion, unclip the pelican clip that holds the cockpit guard wire on, then flopped myself back into the boat, with a somewhat surprised audience on the other boat sharing the anchorage.