Swanwick Dinghy Dash (15 - 17 Aug 2023)
Published 12:34 on 26 Aug 2023
There was a very good turn-out for this event which took place from 15 17 August this year with 8 boats booked and 26 attendees on the list to enjoy a weekend of fun, food and fraternity!
(Although at the last minute Ian & Sharon MacGregor due to unforeseen circumstances were unfortunately unable to join in with the fun).
After a very disappointing July weatherwise and only a promise from the weather men of 'good weather from mid August' we all set off for the Hamble with high hopes of a sunny weekend.
We were all booked in at Premier Universal Marina on the Hamble river from the Tuesday until Thursday and with two bookings at local riverside pubs made and a pontoon party with everyone contributing their favourite foods we knew we wouldn't be going hungry on this trip.
Premier Marina has excellent facilities with the marina office on top of some truly plush showering cubicles, a restaurant and fuel station.
But our focus was on our own planned events for the next few days.
We kicked off on a sunny Tuesday evening with a pontoon party adjacent to Misty Moon Brian and Hilary's yacht where we met up with most participants. Some of us brought family e.g. Dennis and Paula Pearce brought Paula's sister Pam and her husband Brian and Mike and Ann Sword-Daniels included Ann's sister Ashley in the two-day festivities, although both Mike and Ashley couldn't join us for the first day at the Jolly Sailor, a lovely old 18th C grade 2 listed pub in Old Bursledon with a landing pontoon and a warm atmosphere.
It was a short dinghy trip over the river to the Jolly Sailor pub where we were served with our choices of e.g. Fish & Chips, Lemon Posset, Butternut Squash Ravioli and Chocolate Mousse to name just a couple of the delicious offerings on the menu.
Wednesday
Next day, another bright and sunny day with our party numbers completed with the arrival of Mike Sword-Daniels and his sister-in-law Ashley, we set off up river around 11.30 with tide in our favour. Jem and his wife Ann started a little earlier as they were bravely kayaking the, not inconsiderable distance, up stream to Curbridge where lunch had been arranged for all 24 of us at the Horse & Jockey Pub . Brian Masters Event organiser with Jem Nicholls, told us that the trip by dinghy might take up to 1.5 hours .
We had our misgivings about the size of our dinghy and rather ancient outboard which, although reliable, had never been used for such a lengthy trip before, but we set off with all 4 of us aboard keeping an optimistic attitude in mind but, as we approached the M27 bridge we realised that all was not well with our little outboard which was coughing and smoking and clearly objecting to its load. So, we decided it would be prudent to offload one of our guests to Brian and Hilary Masters who also threw us a tow line and we continued our journey safe in the knowledge that we will eventually get there for lunch!
We did and were delighted to notice how busy with other boaters, kayakers, swimmers and paddle boarders this lovely, sunny trip up the Hamble river was.
Lunch at the Horse & Jockey was, again, a very nice meal with plenty of choices taken in the large temporary 'conservatory' in the pub grounds, after which we all set off with the tide downriver, this time with just two of us aboard our dinghy and, after topping our little outboard up with fuel, we roared off downstream making the journey back to Premier Marina in under an hour.
The planned shared 'pic-nic' meal for the pontoon party on Wednesday evening proved to be a great success with sumptuous home-bakes such as quiche, canapes of smoked salmon pate, coleslaw, spinach and ricotta frittata, tuna/potato salad, cheese & Biscuits and some delicious desserts of crumble and mango and passion fruit pavlova, all washed down with plenty of wine, beer and non-alcohol drinks as the sun went down on another Haslar Yacht Club successful event.
A big thank you to Brian & Jem for a great couple of days
More pictures can be found in the gallery.
Write up by
Paula Pearce
List of participants:
| Boat | Crew members |
| Alenka | Bernie Bellchambers, Ed Davies, Chris Deal, Lorraine Hawkins |
| Blue Moon of Haslar | Jonathan Clare, Celeste Warner, Ann Nicholls, Jeremy Nicholls |
| Dreamcatcher of Hamble | Dennis Pearce, Paula Pearce, Brian Hampson, Pamela Hampson |
| Forget Me Knot | Ken Ryan, Mary Ryan |
| Fruitbat | Ian MacGregor, Sharon MacGregor |
| Kraken | Lynda Holliman, Steve Holliman |
| Misty Moon | Brian Masters, Hilary Masters |
| Morning Mist | Michael Sword-Daniels, Anne Sword-Daniels, Ashley Casson |
| Gay Sutherland, Julia Sutherland, Nicky Grimshaw |
Related
- Swanwick Dinghy Dash (15 - 17 August 2023)
Last updated 13:22 on 25 October 2023