RIB cruise to the Baltic

Andre · 07 July 2004, 14:21

Rib cruise to the Baltic

Well with RIBEX and SEAWORK now well behind us it is now time to plan the return of our Parker 900 Baltic cabin rib back to Poland. From day one I had in mind that the return would be under its own “steam” and now I can confirm that the planning in nicely coming together. The rib is now on dry land and is being attended by a Mercruiser service dealer to ensure that it will be in top form for the voyage ahead.

There will be four of us on this trip three from the UK ie; David B, Dog Phillips, myself and Chris from Poland (Chris joined me on the St.Malo cruise in 2002 and is an experienced ribster)
David B is responsible for the route planning and hopefully he will contribute to this thread. Subject to weather conditions we hope to depart from Sheerness on the early morning of Monday 19th July and head straight for Amsterdam where we plan to refuel and stay the night. Then up the Dutch and German coast to the Kiel Canal. Our first plan was to go around Denmark but the time factor is unfortunately against us. Leaving the Kiel Canal we will head for the Baltic Sea towards the Polish Port of Swinoujscie . We will then make a short visit to Szczecin and return to Swinoujscie to complete the final leg to the Port of Gdansk hopefully in time for the Big Powerboat Picnic which has been organized for 24/25 July by the Polish Powerboat Magazine “Przeglad Motorowodny” (www.motorowodny.com.pl)

This timetable is subject to weather conditions and availability of a certain part which is required to complete the service of the engines

I will be sending daily reports to Kevin (AY) so he can post our progress.

Daniel TD5 · 07 July 2004, 14:33

andre

i would have though you would have sold it at one of the shows

its one of the best looking cabin ribs i have ever seen

shame it has to be returned

dan

Andre · 07 July 2004, 14:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by Daniel TD5

andre

i would have though you would have sold it at one of the shows

its one of the best looking cabin ribs i have ever seen

shame it has to be returned

dan

Thanks Dan. Well we had two very good shows and the rib has been very well received and performed first class specially during SEAWORK when David and Paul had to cross the Solent to Cowes twice daily and you may recall that 80 mile/h winds were then around with very deep seas
Taking it back to Poland by sea will confirm its sea capability and no doubt sooner or later a buyer will come along. This is also a good test for our new Baltic hull which so far has come thumbs up

Louise · 07 July 2004, 15:15

Looking forward to reading the progress reports of your trip, Andre. Good luck!

Andre · 13 July 2004, 19:29

Well we had planned to depart on Monday 19th but the part which is required to complete the engine service has still not arrived so unfortunately the departure has been postponed
Will advise of new date once the part is fitted (the part in question is the heat exchanger support bracket on the port engine)
I understand that this is not a ready available component hence the delay.

very annoying cos will now miss the powerboat weekend in Gdansk on 24/25 July

David B · 14 July 2004, 10:40

Sorry for the late arrival at this thread. Have been rather busy delivering various Boats etc.

I hope to have some data on the proposed route and will post here in the near future. The craft is fitted with the latest electronics from Raymarine with a combined Radar , plotter , sounder etc all to one screen, Its a very complex piece of equipment but however once mastered one wonders how you can go without !

As Andre has already said this will give us a chance to fully evalutate the sea keeping qualitys of the craft , but form a personal point of View in the conditions we had at the sea work show commuting to Cowes each evening we were hit by quite heavey weather ( storm force ) and she coped extremely well which is more than we can say for the Red funnel ferry ! who had to run up the solent to come back down as she could not take the beam seas !!!!!!!!

Posting coming soon

David B

batfalcon · 14 July 2004, 11:11

WE ALL WILL BE LOOKING FORWARD TO READ THE PROGRESS POSTS

Andre · 14 July 2004, 11:33

Just been advised that the long awaited part will be with our service man on Friday so the work should be completed by Monday 19th.

We will now be aiming for departure Monday 26th - pending weather of course cos like I said earlier this is to be a pleasant trip a nice relaxing cruise (wishfull thinking

and not a body punishing sea voyage

As a matter of interest the toll for the Kiel Canal is only 12 Euro

jwalker · 14 July 2004, 11:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by Louise

Looking forward to reading the progress reports of your trip, Andre. Good luck!

Yes, same here.

Andre · 16 July 2004, 15:18

Well another departure date change

and this time probably the last one. We are now aiming to depart from Sheerness on Friday 30 July

in the early hours of the morning heading for Amsterdam (weather permitting) This change is now due to the fact that the dates ie a week from home had to suite all involved so plans had to be changed accordingly

the route from Amsterdam should take us up along the coast of Holland and Germany to the Kiel Canal. Here we would appreciate any local knowledge from forum members who are from that region, fuelling , accomodation, what to lookout for, ect
From the Kiel Kanal we will head towards the batic and make our way down to the Polish Port of Swinoujscie

David and I will make a trial run by taking the SPIRIT OF POLAND from Littlehampton to Sheerness on Tuesday 21 July. This will give us a better idea as to the fuel consumption ect.
Today I took delivery of a liferaft a 6 man RFD Seasava plus and hopefully we will never have to use it but better safe then sorry.

Andre · 19 July 2004, 22:51

Well the first leg of the journey is now set for Wednesday 21 July .
and we will set out from Littlehampton at about 12 noon heading for Sheerness.

The rib now displays new graphics and will fly the Polish flag

Louise · 19 July 2004, 22:53

Best wishes for a safe crossing.

BTW, what's the Polish equivalent of 'Bon Voyage'?

Looking forward to seeing you soon (but sad that it won't be with the cabin RIB

).

Andre · 19 July 2004, 23:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by Louise

Best wishes for a safe crossing.

BTW, what's the Polish equivalent of 'Bon Voyage'?

Looking forward to seeing you soon (but sad that it won't be with the cabin RIB

).

Thanks Louise, you can say
"Szczesliwej podrozy"

yes a pity cos it has been on dry land since Seawork awaiting a support bracket . Now the rib is ready to go just we have had to adjust our timetables for the cruise.

Louise · 19 July 2004, 23:05

We saw her on the hard at Southampton and she looked awesome.

Szczesliwej podrozy!! (I'm glad I only had to type that and not attempt to pronounce it

).

David B · 20 July 2004, 11:58

After Andre and myself bring the Rib back to MDL marina on the Medway. We will start to work on our check list of vital/ essential items for the trip. In the interim period we will evaluate the functionality of the electronic package we have .Our Raymarine multi data system is capable of overlaying Radar on to our charts and whilst at chatham for the next few days we will be looking at every function of this set in order to glean its full benefits and features.We will conduct a full machinary inspection and asses the best possible layouts and storage for essential items.Whilst not an epic voyage its still a good challenge to take a Rib up as Far as Poland and we look forward to the challenges its sure to bring. During the trip we intend to keep a photo diary and will post on this site for all to see. On a seperate note this Sunday we hope to venture down to garrison point to evaluate the Radars capabilities if your out there give us a wave !

Rene · 20 July 2004, 12:01

Hi Andre

Do you have any idea, of when you will be comming out of the Kiel channel ?

Just to see if I could make the trip down there to wave to you

Rene

Andre · 20 July 2004, 12:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rene

Hi Andre

Do you have any idea, of when you will be comming out of the Kiel channel ?

Just to see if I could make the trip down there to wave to you

Rene

Hi Rene

Have not got a clue cos weather will dictate. Please PM me your mobile phone number and will call you once we enter the Kiel canal. It would be nice to meet up with you.

Andre · 23 July 2004, 22:30

[B]The adventure has begun

By 7 PM this evening the "Pride of Poland" was ready to complete the first leg of the planned voyage to the Baltic

David B and his collegue Roger are at this moment somewhere near Dover on route to Sheerness . I will let David himself tell us about this leg.

The departure from Sheerness is still set for Friday 30 July

Andre

Andre · 26 July 2004, 22:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by Andre

[B]The adventure has begun

By 7 PM this evening the "Pride of Poland" was ready to complete the first leg of the planned voyage to the Baltic

David B and his collegue Roger are at this moment somewhere near Dover on route to Sheerness . I will let David himself tell us about this leg.

The departure from Sheerness is still set for Friday 30 July

Andre

Just spotted that I got the craft's name wrong

It should read "Spirit of Poland"

no change to our departure date.

Our return has been arranged for Monday 9th August a direct flight from Gdansk to Stanstead.

David B · 27 July 2004, 10:30

We left Littlehampton approx 20:00 hrs with our final destination Chatham Maritime on the River Medway.

Nice evening for the passage with the only slight seas. The majority of the passage was done in darkness allowing us to utilise the new Raymarine C120 radar Chartplotter.

On approaching Dover we started to utilise more of its advanced features by plotting multiple targets ( Large shipping ) and there relative headings and speed etc.With an average speed of 30 knts from us and large craft approaching at speeds of up to 26knts it was very useful to see and allowed us to maintain these speeds through what was a densly populated shipping lane at midnight in very dark conditions indeed. Further more we decided to run through the Goodwin sands at speed at low water ( yeeks I here you cry ) but knowing the area really well combined with the excellent cartography from Navionics it proved to be a breeze.

We have just had the counter rotation installed on the drives and this has totally changed the handling of the craft.She is now precise and tracks true with little need to correct the helm even in strong beam seas.

Our objective over the next two days is to prepare the craft for its journey to Poland firstly by installing the relavant safety equipment and a final and thorough check of all eqpt etc.

" Spirit of Polands" sea capability is second to none , and whilst being the Uk dealer for Parker I would not post a comment like this unless I meant so. There are areas interally we will improve upon such as seat adjustment etc but these are minor irritations and do not detract from the crafts awsome ability.

We are looking forward to the journey and hope to share with yourselves pictures and passage details upon our return..............and who knows what else we may have planned or are planning !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.