A very busy morning!

I probably managed a couple of hours sleep altogether, divided up into half-hour stretches, eventually waking properly as daylight started to creep into the boat.
I first checked I was still in the same place, although I'd been doing that all night by GPS. I wouldn't have been too popular if I'd dragged onto the gas pipes coming ashore at Easington!
Happily I hadn't moved, even better, the wind had piped up from the west. This was about F3/4 and, if it continued, would get me safely across the Humber.

I got ready, not difficult as I was still fully dressed, and pulled up the anchor. The tide was in my favour, and with the wind being helpful I was soon heading towards the very busy mouth of the Humber.
Without an engine I'd have to judge it carefully, if things were going wrong I'd be able to head north again, but changing direction in that sort of way isn't recommended in front of a few thousand tons of tanker...

I'd put plenty of waypoints in the GPS, many of them were buoys marking the ship channels, so at least I knew where I was!
The river was as busy as usual as I made my approach, ships heading both into and out of the river, pilot boats, windfarm boats, fishing boats. The bum cheeks were firmly clenched...

As I neared the channel the flow of traffic out of the river eased, it was obvious that not much went against the river current. This made the job a little easier.
There was still plenty of metal heading into the river.
I had to sail around a while waiting for my gap to cross, by the time it came the wind had got up to F5, which would help.

I headed across the channel with bum cheeks still clenched, keeping an eye on the one ship heading in which, if it was going particularly quickly, could spoil my day.
About halfway across the channel (so out of the inbound lane) it became clear that it was going particularly quickly! I was halfway across the outbound channel as it passed astern. Closer than I would have liked, but I don't think I upset anyone as the VHF stayed quiet!      
I was soon across and clear of the shipping channel, bum relaxed...

The only thing now between me and Saltfleet was the Donna Nook bombing range. This meant heading out to sea for about 4 miles, before coming back in just south of it. If the range was closed I could sail straight down the beach to Saltfleet. Then the VHF came to life. One of the windfarm boats was asking if the range was open. It wasn't. He headed out around it, I followed.
I did sneak inside the buoys marking the furthest corners of the range, I didn't expect bombs to rain down there, and it would save me a few minutes.

The problems began when I turned back to reach Saltfleet from near DZ4 buoy. The wind was still F5 from the west, which wasn't too much of a problem, but the tide was running strongly south. On the port tack I was making a little progress north, a little west. On starboard tack I was going south!
I tried for an hour, and made my way slowly to a point around halfway between DZ4 and DZ5, about half a mile. I had another 3 miles to go. At that rate I'd not make the channel at Saltfleet until after high tide if I made it at all.  
I phoned Billy, Commodore at Saltfleet to see if there was anyone around who could give me a tow. He said to give him a few minutes to see what he could do.

After a while I had a call on the VHF from the Coastguard. Billy had been in touch with them to explain my situation, he'd not been able to find me a tow without coming out in the RIB, which wouldn't have been a good plan in the current conditions.
The Coastguard had tasked the Mablethorpe lifeboat, which was already on it's way to me. They were soon in touch by VHF and astern of me within 15 minutes.
A crewman was put onto my boat and the tow was soon set up. Being towed at 6 knots through 4ft seas, I got wet. Very wet, but relaxed and very happy to have the help.

The lifeboat cox was having trouble finding the tidal height at Saltfleet and asked my advice. I'd been planning on heading into the river at around 11.00, and said that anything before 10.30 would be pushing our luck, so we waited for a while. Around 10.30 I rang Billy again, he said it would be OK to head in, and he'd meet us in the RIB, so our little convoy headed upriver, Billy in the RIB, the inshore lifeboat, then me on the end of a rope!
The lifeboat dropped me at the visitor's mooring, then left after a few laughs and many thanks. Billy took the engine off the RIB, I swapped it for the little Yamaha and headed up to my mooring, three weeks and a day since I'd left.

I was exhausted. The last couple of days had taken all I'd got left.
In the clubhouse, Billy made the tea and we had a chat for a while before he drove me back to his place where I'd left my car. He said he'd got jump leads if it wouldn't start after being sat for so long. After all the engine trouble I'd had I wouldn't have been surprised to have more....
It started as though I'd only been gone an hour!