Day 24-11th June Bangor

I had a list of stuff I needed to do today, which meant staying put in Bangor. The Coastguard had been reporting that my radio was crackly when I sought a radio check, so I needed to sort out the problem. I phoned an electronics engineer, who was at the other end of the country, and he said it sounded as if my mike was faulty but it was unlikely I'd be able to get a replacement for such an old unit.He said I'd probably spend more trying to get it fixed than buying a new one.Recent marine radios have various new features, but the main one is that they allow a distress message to be sent which gives your position either using an inbuilt GPS or with one plugged in.

There was a chandlers across the road and I was amazed at how cheap these DSC radios had become, so I bought one. The day has been spent largely with me installing it and sorting out the wiring on the boat so it connects with my GPS. The spaghetti that is my wiring system involves me crawling into a very small space, which is the foot well of one of the berths, I have to lie on my back and put any tools I'm likely to need on my stomach. Its dark in there so i need to wear a head torch. I started tagging the asorted wires so i knew where they had come from

The boat was in chaos as I needed about every lool I had to do the job and nothing could be put away until I'd finshed,

My GPS has always worked faultlessly in the 12 years I've had it.It was my leaving present from my work mates at Worcester.However I have never managed to make it communicate with the auto helm so I had doubts about it ever talking to the radio. A perusal of the Internet revealed that others had had the same problem and an answer was provided which resolved my difficulty. I gave a yelp of satisfaction when my latitude and longitude coordinates came up on the radio screen. I needed to register with the radio Agency to get an MMSI number and so I won't be fully opeartional until I get it, but its a real step forward.

One of the things I needed to do was phone my Mum because it was her birthday. She'd taken herself off to a gardening event in her home town of ledbury, so I didn't feel so bad at not being able to meet up with her this year.Make sure you're back for my next one she said!

I got through most of the things on my list and treated myself to fish and chips.The chippie is next to a club and various hen parties were beginning to assemble. One group in fluffy pink costumes looked worthy of a photo but I chickened out for fear of getting stilettoed. I also chose not to go to the live wrestling which was going on in town this evening, though today's blog might have been more interesting if I'd have gone.

The forecast is for some very strong winds to blow through tonight and tomorrow. As I sit here looking up at the moon on totally clear sky its hard to believe. One more stop up the coast will provide my stepping off point for the Western Isles of Scotland.We'll see what tomorrow brings.