Most of us met in Devizes to join the minibus for our drive down to Portsmouth, but we also picked up some people en route. The journey was uneventful. Rachel didn’t crash the bus and most of us were playing on our phones before they ran out of battery!

We got to Portsmouth and couldn’t find a space in the car park. Rachel nearly got the bus stuck as lots of people had parked badly, so the minibus wouldn’t fit through the gaps left. But Sharon nearly had a cry because it was so near. She wasn’t even driving, but we didn’t scrape the bus on any walls or cars.

We then had to carry our bags to the boat. My bag was very light, but others didn’t pack as well, so they struggled with their bags (we are looking at you, Ellie). Sharon didn’t like to carry her bag, as she always gets it carried for her. Such a princess!

At the marina entrance, we met Adam. He is the skipper, he is in charge of the boat, he is cool and we like him, so far!

We got to Challenger 4 (our home for the week), walking past Challenger 3 and 5, who also had groups joining. This is when we met Martha (Mate), Liz and Sean (Watch Leaders), who helped us get all our bags on board without any of them going swimming.

After we ate our lunch, we got a tour of the boat, showing us where the safety equipment is (life rafts, fire extinguishers, life jackets), how to use the heads (toilets) and names of parts of the boat (like the ropes are called lines or sheets).

We then got the boat ready to leave the pontoon, putting on our lifejackets, untying lines, moving fenders and then we slipped the lines and we were off into the channel and out of Portsmouth Harbour.

On our sail to Cowes, we were taught how to load and unload the winches, which led into hoisting the staysail. This required us all to work together to get it up. It wasn’t too bad, but we are told the mainsail is much harder.

Adam then threw us into a lesson in tacking and gybing, which went well, but we didn’t have much wind, which apparently makes it easier.

In no time, we were outside Cowes and we then had to sort the mooring lines out and put the fenders in the right place. It turned out very smoothly. Then half of us (Port Watch) put the boat to bed and the rest of us (Starboard Watch) cooked dinner, which was chicken fajitas.

It was very tasty and some of us had thirds. We managed this with minimal mess, which pleased Rachel, and she was very complimentary of our preparation, specifically our chopping skills.

After dinner, we had some lovely warm showers and then returned for a quick lesson on the points of sail (including beam reach, attack, close reach and dead run) and a game of Uno Flip before bed. Kit won.

Everyone was awoken a bit earlier than planned this morning, about 6:30am, because Rachel was looking for socks (so she could go and shower). This meant that Ellie realised she was cold, so Kit tried to close the window and accidentally woke Myla up with a “gentle punch”. This woke everyone else up, so we all got up and started to cook breakfast, which today was bacon baps.

These were delicious. Port Watch (mostly Ellie on the bacon, with everyone else buttering the baps) should be commended for it.

We were allowed some free time on shore, so we all had a wander around all the local shops where lots of people bought many sweets and drinks, with a highlight for some being a drink in Costa Coffee. Lots of people got rock, trying new random flavours like Jaffa Cake, bubble gum and Coca-Cola.

Once back at the boat, we got the sails and lines prepared before we headed out of Cowes Harbour. A short way outside of Cowes, we got the mainsail up. This was much harder than the staysail from yesterday as it’s significantly larger and heavier.

En route to Southampton Water, we added the staysail and the Yankee as well, so all three were up. Kit led the hoisting of the Yankee sail and wants it known that they didn’t get much time to prepare, but felt it went really well.

It was then nearly lunchtime, so Liz and Starboard Watch cooked hot dogs while we sailed. This was harder than cooking dinner, so the galley kept messing up everyone’s orders, but everyone got fed in the end, so it’s all OK.

Then it was T time. Ellie got everyone’s hot drink order, made them, got them on deck (up the stairs single-handed) and gave them to everyone without spilling them.

We kept sailing up Southampton Water and practised how to tack the boat and keep control of the sail. Everyone had a go at helming the boat at some point, making sure that they stayed in the channel with the buoys in the right place at all times.

Martha made the foredeck a classroom and gave us a lesson about “rules of the road” and collision avoidance. Ellie insisted that this was changed to “rules of the water” as there are no roads at sea. She has a good point.

Sean gave us a knot-tying lesson, teaching us bowline, reef knot, clove hitch, figure of eight and a couple of other ones too. We even practised the clove hitch on the fenders and lines in the sail locker.

When it was Ellie’s turn on the helm, she did some donuts, turning the boat in circles, something her Dad would enjoy. Daniel spent a lot of time looking out to sea, enjoying the view, finding it very peaceful and relaxing.

We then spent the afternoon sailing down Southampton Water and out into the Solent. We saw a sunken yacht (that’s apparently been there for a year) with its mast still poking up out the water.

Outside Lymington, we then took the staysail and Yankee sail down, before taking the mainsail down. This was much easier than putting them up, but it did mean we had to learn how to flake the mainsail. This took some time, but we managed to get it neatly on the boom. Sean was very impressed with how good it looked.

We moored up in Lymington on the Dan Bran pontoon, skilfully parked by Martha. Our new neighbours helped catch our lines.

Then it was dinner preparation (chicken curry) and showers before we all sat down to eat together. Sharon and Adam were arguing over how much rice we needed and both think they won when it came to how much was left.

We have enjoyed some time on deck looking at the stars before Adam reads us chapter two of his bedtime story, “Jonothan Livingstone Sea Gul”. We may need him to repeat chapter one as we were mostly asleep for it last night.

We started the day with bagels for breakfast, and we managed to have smoked salmon and cream cheese on them. This made Myla ecstatic as there are no carbs in smoked salmon, so she didn’t have to inject more insulin for it.

Sharon was shocked that we got smoked salmon, but was equally very pleased about this. Lewis was chief toaster and put all 32 bagels through the toaster, only burning two of them.

After eating, Starboard Watch prepped the deck, getting the boat ready to leave Lymington. Myla worked at the bow, getting the fore sails ready to depart. Then we attempted a quick loo break (we were told not to run down the pontoon, so we power-walked), which took ages as the loos were miles away.

We left Lymington and headed out into the Solent so we could catch the tide, where it was very flat and chilled. We sat at the bow, told stories and moaned about life till it was time to put the sails up.

We worked in pairs to get the main up. It took ages, but we got it nearly to the top before they had to winch in the last bit. The Yankee and staysail followed soon after that, and we then headed out past Hurst Castle and towards the Needles.

It was then that Adam decided to tell us what to do should someone fall overboard. He then threw Gerald the fender and Dan the Dan buoy off the boat as a drill. In Sharon’s words, it was “rubbish” (we like Sharon as she doesn’t sugar-coat things), but Adam said it was “a bit slow”, so he made us do it again.

We did much better the second time and both of our (clumsy) honorary crewmembers were recovered much quicker, so Gerald was allowed to go back to the sail locker and didn’t have to go swimming for a third time. It did make lots of pretty circles on the chart plotter, though, and smoking the sails to get them down quickly was the best bit.

The boat did a lot of tilting today. The leaning over was thrilling when we were on deck, but not so much when we were trying to cook lunch downstairs. So while some of us enjoyed putting our legs over the side (the water kept getting further away as we tilted more), the others tried not to feel sick while cooking quesadillas.

They did very well and everyone had one individually made with their choice of fillings. Once most of the cooking had been done, Adam remembered we could heave to and basically park in the sea so the boat flattened out and being downstairs wasn’t nauseating. So once we had eaten, washing up was much easier.

When we got near Old Harry Rocks, we then had to take all the sails down, starting with the Yankee and staysail, both of these were led by Kit as they wanted to step up and take some leadership responsibility.

Once all the sails were down, we then had to pack them away. We were slightly better about putting the main away this time as we had done it yesterday. We then motored into Poole Harbour, past the chain ferry and Brownsea Castle, looking at all the expensive houses.

Martha parked the boat in a very small space between the harbour wall and the marina pontoon. We were all very quiet, but she did amazing and was very pleased with her parking.

Before dinner, we did some mast climbing and most people had a go, and of those, most made it to the top. Those that didn’t climb even helped sweat the others to the top, so we all had to work together to get them up there.

Dinner was fish and chips, with the chips coming from the local fish and chip shop. Which meant that tidying up was really easy as there were only a couple of trays from cooking the fish. Then it was bedtime and we had another chapter of the seagull book. We still don’t know what’s going on!

We had a later start this morning as we weren’t leaving till 11am, so after we had croissants and pain au chocolat for breakfast, we were challenged to find the best souvenir for £2.

Port Watch bought a candle and an egg timer, with Starboard Watch buying a purse and getting a free doll. We also had to come up with a story to go with our souvenir so that Adam and the other leaders could choose a winner.

Starboard Watch told a “true story” about how the doll and the purse were collected from a local lady who had a massive collection. Port Watch wrote a poem to explain their souvenir. This is it.

The boat rocks, a gentle sway,

Our sailing trip, some have to say,

Is nearing its end, a chapter closed,

For others, a new path is proposed.

This week, a burst of joy so bright,

New memories made, bathed in sunlight.

Laughter echoed, but tears did fall,

Together we stood, answering the call.

We drilled and pulled, sweated and strained,

Led each other through sun obtained,

The sand timer, a slow, steady flow,

Of moments we’d never known.

The candle flickers, a salty gleam,

Reminding us of ocean’s dream.

Its flame burns low, a gentle art,

Tying a knot, to keep in our heart.

A bowline tight, a fond farewell,

To times we shared, stories to tell.

By Kit Hopkins

The leaders then went off to make a decision and we feel that Starboard were robbed as our doll was truly scary, but they liked Port Watch’s poem more, so they won the Halloween stickers that Sharon and Rachel had got as prizes.

Before we left, Daisy and Lewis did an engine check. Daisy was looking forward to this as she has worked on some car engines recently, so got to try something bigger.

We then waved Poole goodbye and headed out through the harbour, round Brownsea Island, past the chain ferry and out towards Old Harry Rocks so we could put the sails up.

Once they were up, we headed towards the Needles, but hove to before we started sorting out lunch (so no one would be sick). As it was sandwiches, we only had to be downstairs for a short amount of time to make our food.

Martha was given her present by Sharon and Rachel of some new fishing line and some lures. She set up the new line immediately and tried to catch some mackerel. Unfortunately, the fish weren’t biting, so she didn’t catch us anything for dinner.

We followed Challenger 5 towards the Isle of Wight but didn’t go down the main channel, instead heading towards the north channel.

We spent a lot of time in the sun, chatting and enjoying the weather as we sailed across the bay. Before long, we were sailing past Cowes and heading towards Osborne Bay, where we anchored up and Sharon and Rachel cooked dinner (spaghetti bolognese and garlic bread) so we could plan our night navigation exercise.

As soon as we had eaten and washed up, we put all of our clothes on (which we hadn’t needed at any point up before, as the temperature was so warm) and got on deck as it was dark enough to work in our watches to navigate the routes we had just planned.

We had to look out for the different buoys and their coloured lights and how often they flashed. We also had to make sure we didn’t hit any other boats, and there were some very large ones out there.

But we made it without crashing and were rewarded by going back to Portsmouth and docking up just before midnight, so we could have a flat night’s sleep.