The day started at 6am with the fisherman leaving the harbour for the day. We were to stay a few hours longer to wait for the tide to turn south. The plan for today was to make the long haul fifty-five miles down the coast to Amble.

Amble is accessible six hours in every twelve around high water so with the tides as they are at the moment this means arriving after dark and approaching the harbour mouth just before midnight. It was soon clear that the swell from the northeast was still running. With the tide low the swell was coming into the harbour mouth with a line of white water forming at least once a minute. After watching the heavy displacement fishing boats timing there exit to avoid these waves it seemed half tide would be the best time to leave.

The challenge on leaving the harbour is that ten metres on your left is a rocky beach with the exit channel at right angles on the right. So you find yourself turning through 90 degrees in the swell with it waves breaking on the rocks just over your shoulder! Once out through the harbours guarding rocks it was clear that the wind I had hope for was none existent. In any case the engine could do with a run and we were soon racing down the coast against the last of the north going tide. With the main sail up all was going well as I had my daily conversation with the coastguard. When I glanced back on deck I realised something was wrong, where there had been a view of the coast there was now a view of the sea. Instead of motoring down the coast Silverwind was motoring steadily at five knots straight for the rocks, five hundred metres inshore!

After some investigation and testing of the power supply it was clear that there was something wrong with the autohelm. I had planned for the possibility of a failing autohelm and brought two on the trip. Unfortunately this is already the spare as the first had died just outside Inverness – not having the best of luck! The autohelm is the electrically powered ram that is connected to a mini gyrocompass; this points Silverwind in the correct direction.

This you can imagine is quite important when you are sailing single-handed and at the very least it is a handicap not to have it working. The third back up (to the two autohelms) is a shockcord rope attached to the tiller to hold the rudder blade straight. The only problem with this is that it does not react to the boat moving off course when you move through the boat or as Silverwind hits a wave.

With the autohelm I have time to go below, navigate and adjust sails with ease. All you have to do is keep a lookout – but that is a basic rule of the sea in any case. Now it is all a little harder and it would not be a great idea to continue through the night to Amble as planned. With Eyemouth five miles down the coast this seemed like the best option for the night. Although this was the only sensible decision it felt like we were being held back from reaching England, which would be only a few miles south of us in Eyemouth. That would have to wait until another day.

The wind was still light but at least there was now enough to sail and with the distance to go reduced any previous rush to get down the coast was gone. With the wind increasing but from the southwest the sea was flat as we raced the last few miles before sailing slowly upwind towards the harbour entrance. After a quick phone call and starting the engine we were soon within the protection of the harbour. We were quickly directed to tie up alongside the new pontoon at the head of the southern basin. It was hard not to feel safe in Eyemouth. On the passage up the harbour we past two new Trent Lifeboats before mooring behind a Mersey!