Photograph by Martin Hansen

Towed Off

A kind Irishman shouted across, "You are not the first. Most, with less draught, get a bit further and hit the groyne". Half an hour later, the tide had indeed risen and he returned in his fishing boat to pull me off. In the interim I had studied the chart and realised what had gone wrong; I'd come down a spur off the main channel that terminated in the small harbour I'd had all too long to admire the prettyness of.