What better way of spending a beautiful Spring day with a bit of breeze than to go off round the Bill and back? Between neaps and springs the tides work nicely to make a day out in West Bay a real treat, with the return flood in the late afternoon. What I like particularly is the big sea horizon compared with Weymouth Bay, and a new landscape to look at as well – Chesil, Moonfleet, Abbotsbury and the hills behind with old Admiral Hardy’s monument as a reminder of Dorset’s seagoing past…
Once you get inside a line from Golden Cap to the Bill you begin to realise what a trap West Bay must have been for ships finding themselves off the beach in bad weather and having to try to beat back out, only to end up ignominiously wrecked after the struggle, a process graphically described in John Meade Falkner’s novel of the area, ‘Moonfleet’.
By contrast, I spent a warm sunny afternoon drifting back down along the beach to Y mark to verify its presence and location, then crept back round the Bill with the beginning of the flood around 1600, using my usual marker for rounding (see photo) and sailed gently back to Weymouth. Thoroughly recommended as a day out with a difference – and you get to go round Portland Bill twice in one day! (I shot a video of the rounding coming back as it was quite calm and stress-free, which will be available when I’ve asked Iain Jones how to upload it).
Steve Fraser
Cruiser Class Captain
