Sunday 23rd August - Windsurf ** - River Orwell at Levington Marina – sunny periods.

Exocet RF 91 AST with Slingshot Hover Glide 76 with Tushingham Lightning 7m.

Foil – 17.70 knot max, 14.72 knot ave., 4.66 knot hour, 10.26 knot mile, 17.75 km., 10.23 knot alpha.

After a pretty full on week for windsurfing I was looking for a restful day off as I was off to Ipswich to visit my Dad who is sadly in hospital. I had to pass on Andy Mexomes plan to make the most of a good west (off shore) breeze for a long-distance cruise, he made it to the wind farm off Clacton-on-Sea in the end on his foil, nearly 20 miles, I am up for his next adventure. With late high waters I realised I could get a foil in this after so got Mag to book me into the hospital for midday, I then made a sandwich hitched my trailer and left Felixstowe around 11.15 leaving Mag to do her garden, hopefully we would meet up later when she was going to bike over to Levington. First, I dropped my trailer off at the marina, went to Screwfix to pick up something and then went to visit my Dad. It is sad to see him in there, it is hard to believe he was out painting and decorating just before lockdown! But after all he is 90. He is in a room by himself and is bored and very feed up that he has just lost his driving licence:( Still I had a nice visit and headed over to the marina to find Chris Stephens rigging up for a fin sail, there was plenty of water but the wind looked patchy at best! Again, the big crane was blocking access to our parking area so you had to carry your kit a bit further:( With the wind a fraction cross off it was very hard to judge what sail to rig so in the end I went for 7m and soon found whatever I rigged would not have been right today! I set off for a trip to Felixstowe docks but the wind was patchy, some good flying gusts followed by slogging which pretty well summed up the session. I reached the docks, dropped my rig and took some pics of the old sailing boats and container ships before heading back and got a good flying run back. With the wind easing and the tide about to turn I beat up past the launching beach where I managed a few good runs as the tide turned and the wind dropped! Time to call it a day and head for the top showers we can now use before packing up. I had a message to say Mag was on her way so I waited for her on the bench by the marina entrance. When she turned up, we had a nice chat before having a cuppa in the van and then headed home for a video chat with the Grandson Arlo:)

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http://mkwindsurfing.co.uk/booms/

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