Hi! My name is Abi Hart. It all began when I stepped aboard my first boat, Queen Galadriel, with no sailing experience whatsoever and fell in love instantly- the skipper told me “Abi, you have caught the bug!” From then things seemed to spiral out of control, I started some volunteer work with the wonderful Britannia crew in Winkleigh, miles and miles away from the sea in every direction.
Sam and Vicki, who know Dom and Barbara and own Britannia took me under their wings and helped me develop my passion, the boat shed was my favourite place to be. That’s where Vicki told me about this amazing opportunity to take part in a seafarer trainee course with Dom and Barbara on the Lynher Barge - I snatched it up straight away and sent my application in on my lunch break that very same day.
Sadly, I didn’t get the position when I first applied, but I didn’t forget about Lynher and I did get to join Dom and crew to sail on her for a weekend in June and fell in love with yet another boat. Fast forward to September and I’m up in the East coast doing some boat deliveries with Cirdan Trust when I get a phone call from Barbara “The opportunity to come and work with us is available again, would you like to take it??” You wouldn’t believe how happy I was, I spent the next few weeks talking nonstop about Lynher and how excited I was, it truly felt like everything had fallen into place and my best life was about to begin.
I got home at the end of September, told my boss in the village I would be gone for 3 months, said goodbye to all of my friends in the boat shed (over a pint or two in the pub…) packed up my stuff and by the beginning of October I had temporarily moved my life to Millbrook, Cornwall. On my first day Dom showed me around the area, I was so blown away(and still am) by how beautiful this place is, the perfect combination of countryside and seaside villages- my new home away from home and I couldn’t be happier about it, the community here is so nice too and I fell into place straight away. Things were incredibly busy when I first arrived and I got to learn how boating life truly is, not just the sailing side of things - coming at the end of the sailing season has opened my eyes to the reality of it and call me crazy but despite all of the heavy lifting and coming home from work stinking, covered in paint, mud and who knows what else I still love it more than anything.
During the first week here we had to work on getting Ibis, another boat taken on by Lynher CIC, stabilised and ready for her restoration, upon first seeing her it was difficult to imagine her sailing ever again but the dedication and enthusiasm that everybody has tells a lot otherwise and I often have dreams now of being on her cutting the waves once again. Then we were able to shift our focus to preparing Lynher, not just for the winter, but to become home for Dom, Barbara and their family. On her pontoon mooring in the middle of Hamoaze river I got to spend some one to one time with her sanding, scraping and painting her deck. Although pretty tiresome and grubby work it gave me the chance to really get to know her from a different perspective and I loved it, it was especially fun because the only way I could get ashore was when Dom came and picked me up in the tender so you felt truly alone on the water.
At the end of October it was time to move Lynher to her winter mooring at Inswoke Mill which took weeks of pre planning. Lynher is a 50 tonne boat with a draft of only 4 feet so she can be quite difficult to manoeuvre, especially with the wind in the area averaging force 4-6 at the time, If anything had gone wrong we had no room to make an escape and would’ve ended up in some sort of collision, there was just so much to consider. When Lynher worked as a cargo boat she would usually have up to 20 tonnes of cargo on board at a time, this meant she had a much bigger draft and gave her a lot more grip in the water and made her much easier to control. I remember one evening we stood on Lynher for about an hour contemplating if we should leave - we didn’t but we did get to watch the sunset so it wasn’t all for nothing.
The morning she came into the mill we had arranged a later start so I was lounging around at home drinking tea and having my breakfast when I had an urgent call from Barbara who explained they had abandoned their pot of coffee and breakfast at home and raced down to Lynher to move her- they had realised it would be the perfect moment and didn’t want to pass it up. I needed to get down to the mill to throw some mooring lines across to them, and fast! I threw my clothes on, also abandoned my breakfast, and ran all the way to the mill, wearing my steel toe boots! I arrived, out of breath, just as they were coming around the corner. It couldn’t be more perfect timing and the landing couldn’t of been smoother, we were all so relieved and what a weight lifted from our shoulders it was.
Now with her being at the mill we could begin the de rigging process, we were lucky enough to have some great weather and a few pairs of helping hands- it took 4 of us to flake and carry the mainsail and it was still a struggle. I even got to use my fancy new rigging tools to take down the headsails. Dom spent the next couple of weeks showing me how to service the rigging. I started with the blocks , it was a pretty therapeutic bit of work actually and its fascinating learning how everything actually works, all stuff that I’ve always taken for granted. I also replaced a couple of her halyards by measuring the rope against the old lines, putting a hard splice in one end and whipping the loose end, I have developed a new found love for rigging work- although you still won’t catch me at the top of the mast anytime soon!!
As part of my placement I’ve been able to take part in some courses as well. This month I went and spent some time in Southampton where I got to sail on board Jolie Brise, a French Pilot cutter, which will probably be my last sail of the season and it was definitely one to remember. I also completed my dinghy sailing course, which turned into more of a ‘how to recover from capsizing’ course, a VHF radio course and Powerboat Level 2 - where I got to make use of my new radio license when coming into Port Hamble marina. I’ve never been so excited to use a radio!
I’m back in Millbrook now, sat in the gymnasium on the sofa, Tazio asleep by my feet, cup of tea in hand, warmed up nicely by the heater and Dom and Barbara are busy working around me. It makes me realise just how lucky I am and writing up this blog is a real good reflection for me.
I’ve only a month left here now and I’ll miss it tremendously. It’s been the best learning experience of my life and it has been so raw and so real, I have learnt so much and I look forward to learning so much more. I have so much more I could say and so many experiences to share, but for now I’ll leave it at the ones that have stood out the most, maybe come the end of my placement I could write more but I think this sums things up nicely.
Thank you Dom and Barbara for taking me on and being the best teachers I could ask for, it’s a pleasure to be apart of the Lynher family.
