Southwold → Woodbridge → Southwold

70 nautical mile round trip in the freezing cold aboard my 20 foot trailer sailer.

An Idea in the Pub

About 6 weeks ago my friend Danny and I were in the pub and I was giving it large about how we should do a trip. We looked at tides and 16th December was perfect for a 35Nm each way trip from Southwold to Woodbridge and back. Over loaded with enthusiasm after 2 beers we were already talking about planning. We then didn’t see each other for some time and realistically it was a ridiculous idea. Low and behold the week commencing the pencilled in date, Danny messaged me expressing his excitement having booked the time off work. I checked the forecast and it was looking perfect. In fact, the wind was due to be with us on the way, and swing round to the South over night meaning wind behind us for the return. The temperature forecast was seriously cold, -6 in places. With no excuse not to go we started to prepare ourselves and Elise.

Outbound to the Deben

We loaded up the icy boat and set off on the morning 16/12/22 at 10:00. We requested permission to vacate the harbour, the harbour master refused and advised Libby was on her way down with my phone charger!! Classic. Once the final vital bit of kit had arrived we left our mooring and hit the ocean.

Conditions were perfect with about 12 knots off the land and a beam reach all the way to the river Deben entrance, surprisingly we were very warm and only cracked out the hot water bottles after about 2 hours in. My new jet boil was an absolute dream in topping up the water bottles and making cuppa soups. Beef and tomato being my fav.

Any way we entered the Deben and motor’d the length of the river to Tide Mill in Woodbridge due to head wind. This was planned and the tide was under us so we were doing about 5.5knots. The sun set and the temperature dropped further and we begun to feel the cold in our toes even more.

A Night at Tide Mill

We arrived after just over 6.5 hours. Hot shower and hit the town for beers and a decent meal. We got back on board and every thing was really icy, as the temperature plummeted under clear skies, there was ice every where. so after getting into our sleeping bags (3 each) pre loaded with hot water bottles every thing was absolutely amazing! Until……… Danny started snoring!

After some sleep we were up at 4:30 am. Abandoning our super cosy sleeping bags was difficult to do. But tide and time………

The Deben Ice Breaker

30mins later we were finally dressed. Our breath had formed a layer of ice on the inside of the cabin, and the entire boat was thick with ice, as I scrambled out of the cabin and onto the icy cockpit floor, I saw the marina was frozen over, regardless I fired up the motor and we broke our way out in darkness.

Navigating under moon light, we could just make out the trot mooring buoys and I already had a few tracks on my plotter from previous trips. Then we had the most surreal experience, there were sheets of ice in the channel so we were literally ice breaking, at a steady 2 knots, we were now the Deben Ice breaker!!! Danny was inside the cabin and heard all the graunching sounds as the ice scraped past the water line of Elise. Our small wake rippling through these sheets of ice made the most unbelievable noise as we made our way seaward In darkness and with a crackling noise over both shoulders!

Eventually after a few cappuccinos, a hot water bottle, and some time we popped out of the Deben to a rather gentle but icy SW headwind and still in darkness. Any one who knows the Deben ( and it’s recent channel marker Buoy doing a runner to Belgium), knows what was going through our minds upon exiting. Luckily I’ve got a few decent tracks from this season and we sounded the inbound journey with 1.6m under us at half tide. As long as I stayed on the track then we shouldn’t run aground! The sails went up as did the sun; and the lights twinkled at Felixstowe like a Christmas tree.

Surfing Home at 10 Knots

We had a cup of soup as we settled into our passage home. The wind was right on the stern so we goose winged it and headed out to sea as to stay outside the banks. We then had an amazing broad reach back to Southwold. The wind picked up as per forecast, with 24 knot gusts true, and full main and Genoa up. My previous record of 9.7 knots was smashed as we surfed wave after wave hitting over 10 knots SOG time and time again. We even got her planing when we got in the groove of a wave set, one wave lead us into another and the wake separated from the stern into a little rooster tail. The tiller pilot is next to useless in these conditions so hand steering took all my concentration as Danny looked after me and made good use of the new amazing Jetboil. The donuts came out for breakfast as I kept my sticky hands on the tiller whilst surfing on a dead run.

One of the Most Memorable Trips Ever

We finally got back to our berth at 11:30 am. So…In about 25.5 hours, we sailed 70 nautical miles, had a night on the sauce and dinner out, listened to Danny snoring, used Elise as an ice breaker, had probably the best 25 mile downwind sail, we stayed warm and most importantly had one of the most memorable trips ever. Oh and we didn’t see a single leisure boat any where!!!😂 we tried to take some decent footage on the way back but unfortunately the best wave sets came when we weren’t filming.

What did I learn? you can have the best sailing in winter and next time I’ll get heated insoles. For me it was the best way to round this year off as I’ve Clocked over 600 nautical miles in Elise this season.

It was a totally worth while adventure and so happy that Danny was the one who made sure it happened with his positive energy. It was Danny’s 2nd time sailing Elise and his 3rd time sailing altogether. So a huge achievement for him. I think we both enjoyed a nice hot bath when we got home but there is one thing that’s certain…. We were definitely boated out!!!

Thanks for reading about our awesome adventure and if you enjoyed it please follow me. I have lots planned for 2023.

If you have any questions about our trip please do drop me a message, it would be great to hear from you. Otherwise if you would like to read about when we crossed the North Sea you can do so by clicking here. It was awesome!

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