A night to remember

We went to Porlock Weir from Cardiff in October; it was a first time visit. The plan was to anchor off and I had phoned the very helpful harbour master for local knowledge on anchoring locations. But there were two minor incidents that make me question the manners and competence of other people who were also anchoring there.

We were edging in perpendicular to the shore to the recommended location, monitoring the depth as it reduced. We were probably 300m from shore and 100m from the spot where we planned to anchor.

A yacht of around 40ft had been following us and steamed close past us at about 7 knots under engine and promptly dropped anchor directly in front of us. He obviously knew that we were just about to anchor in his favourite spot and decided to go all out to sneak in first.

As we altered course around him he shouted something about the holding being good here, totally oblivious to his bad behaviour.

The only redeeming bit of the incident was that I kept my promise to my wife that I would control my tendency to lose my temper and confront people like that somewhat forcefully.

The holding ground at Porlock is somewhat suspect and about midnight the wind picked up to 20-25 knots and stayed roughly that way until morning.

Two other boats who had arrived after us: a new looking 35ft powerboat and another new looking 40ft sailing boat.

I’d set an anchor alarm and it went off at about 0200. I ran on deck and saw two sets of steaming lights (red, green and white above) about 200m and 300m away respectively, heading straight for us. I was in a bleary state, and it was a very frightening sight.

I grabbed a high powered torch and shone it on the nearest boat and thankfully could see no bow wave. In fact both boats had anchored with full steaming navigation lights on.

My question: how can people with enough money and experience to buy a £100,000 plus boat be so incompetent?

Peter Clelland