best time to go out (tide wise)

[driftdaddy]

evening all. i was wondering when is the optimum time to head out for it to be as smooth as possible?

i.e, when the tide is on the drop or on the way in etc..... as i live in swansea and its very tidal here and wasted an hour of my time taking the boat out of the marina to go out for ten minutes.............get soaked.... then returened


cheers fellas

[FourWheelDrift]

Slack water - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slack_water

[Rum Runner]

Wind direction is major factor...wind with tide smooth sea

[jep]

Yes, getting out of the marina there can be quite choppy, especially if the wind and tide are running against each other. Slack water as has been said is best.

[driftdaddy]

cheers fellas i allways used to aim for high tide anyway guess its more luck of the draw then

[Simpo Two]

Thanks for reminding me why I stick to Inland!

[NDA]

Slack water, but of course the tide will then be about to turn - so it depends how long you want to go out for.

The wind is the major contributor to sea state, check here for a moderately accurate forecast:

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/weather/marine/inshore...

[happygoron]

Wind against tide makes getting out of Swansea Marnia a bit of a bh, avoid that and the bay will be pretty calm in anthing under a force 5 assuming it's not blowing from the NE/E. If it is stay at home!

In term of tide, asumming wind conditions are alright, it depends where you want to go. If you are staying in Swansea Bay the rule of thumb is the tide always swings around from swansea to mumbles (counterclockwise). If you are going up/down channel it makes it a lot easier if you go with the tide each way if possible, though if you have a powerboat this isn't so much of a worry.

[driftdaddy]

@nda, cheers for the link its now saved to my favorites


@happygoron , thanks for the info, we normally head over to oxwich or pwll ddu for a ski/wakeboard

[NDA]

driftdaddy said:

@nda, cheers for the link its now saved to my favorites

No worries, just make sure you click on the correct area of the map to get the forecast - it's easy to end up in the wrong area!

This one is quite good too, although it doesn't give you the sea state:

http://www.yr.no/place/United_Kingdom/England/Isle...

[happygoron]

Some other good links (taken from http://www.mumblesyachtclub.co.uk ):

http://xcweather.co.uk/ - XCWeather - Current weather, the mumbles head readings are taken from the coastguard station.

http://www.windguru.cz/int/index.php?sc=47856 - WindGuru for Swansea - My forcast of choice, has been pretty good this year.

http://www.pol.ac.uk/ntslf/tides/?port=0932 - Mumbles Tides - Tide times for Mumbles, don't forget to take BST into account!

http://www.swanseamarina.org.uk/index.cfm?articlei... - Swansea Marina Lock Details - The lock keepers are usually pretty helpful if you contact them.

http://www.mcga.gov.uk/c4mca/mcga07-home/aboutus/c... - Mumbles Coastguard Station details - Pretty helpful if you give them a call, they've got a nice window to look out of to give you an idea of the current conditions!

All of the above I use when going/teaching sailing in the bay (bar the lockkeeper!). To be honest though if you wanna ski and wakeboard you want it pretty flat calm anyway, so in those conditions just head out on the first lock on a rising tide to give yourself as long as possible! Not like today, good force 6 and pretty messy out there!

Edited by happygoron on Sunday 5th September 17:58

Edited by happygoron on Sunday 5th September 17:59

Edited by happygoron on Sunday 5th September 17:59