Preparations

It's paradoxical that the part which causes most grief on a sailing boat is the engine. You have to have one nowadays. Harbours are designed on the assumption that you arrive and leave under power. These unregarded lumps of metal suffer more from disuse than anything else. They moulder away in their damp salty cupboards week after a week until one day they are needed urgently, a desperate skipper twists the key and nothing happens.
Mine is an ancient BMC thornycroft 4 cylinder diesel and forunately is of a vintage when durability was more important than power output. Nevertheless I always say a little prayer when I twist the key. It never has failed to start and I remind myself of that each time. The trouble is of course that there is no AA service at sea. If something goes wrong, you can't pull comfortably onto the hard shoulder and wait for that helpful mechanic. You have either to rediscover the skills of sailing into harbours which the old sailormen considered normal or declare an emergency and call the RNLI.
All this is why I spent the morning giving some TLC to my mill. Before I venture the 15 miles down the river to the sea. Another day I will run it for 2 or 3 hours to be sure there are no problems.
I am a terrible worrier. I wonder if all singlehanded sailors are? I imagine vividly all the things which can go wrong and wake in the night sweating over them. So today I spent another £70 odd on some new flares and smoke canisters. When I got the old ones out, I found they were dated 1994. (They are normally expired after 3 years). I have only ever used one once. What do you do with the old ones? They are quite dangerous. The parachute flares go off with a hell of a bang. You used to be able to dispose of them via the coastguard, but they have stopped that now. There was a time when sailing clubs let them off on bonfire night. That doesn't seem a very good idea now either. I have a large carrier bag full. Perhaps I could hand them over to the Fire Service?