OUT OF MY DEPTH

Last night a friend offered me the chance to go sailing out of Itchenor Harbour, near Chichester. I used to sail small dinghies when I was younger and thought it would be a fun evening out.

On arrival at the very exclusive Itchenor Sailing Club I realised I was entering another world. Everyone had all the right clothing, expensive cars and talked with Eton accents. I was also one of the youngest there by a few decades! I then discovered it wasn't just sailing, but racing and I would be on a crew with Gayle (who had just spent the week at Cowes and won something) and my friend Caroline who used to sail dinghies for England and now is on the committee for the club.

As soon as we got on the boat (26' Sunbeam, 80 years old and been in Gayle's family since birth) I realised that this racing was taken very seriously indeed. We may have just been racing for a bottle of wine, but we had stopwatches at the ready and practising manoeuvres and I realised that the only use I would be was as some kind of ballast...

Still it was a good night out and we ended up winning the race (although I think it had little to do with me). Picture above is of the boat that came in second place.

We then all trooped to the members dining room for Cottage Pie and Bread and Butter pudding followed by speeches (honest!). When you made a speech you had to stand up and then at the end everyone would "guffaw" with delight - whatever you said. We were presented with a bottle of wine from Alan Stannah (yes that's right the Stannah Stairlift guy - apparently only worth £118m - Alan not the bottle!!!!).

Lovely people, but...