Morgat, France to Ribadeo, Spain to Viveiro

 29 May 2012

Ola! 

Yes, we are in Spain and arrived in Ribadeo on Saturday.



We spent a couple of days anchored off Morgat.

It's a resort town with a beautiful semi-circular beach of the finest sand. 

We've often anchored here.

It's a steep walk up the hill to Cruzon - the nearest town with a shop. By luck, Wednesday was market day and we had a little wander, did our shopping and headed back.

The European markets have a way of displaying produce that makes it all looks oh so very desirable. 

Fruit and Veg Stand



Fishmonger



Cheese Stall



The most effective display of strawberries I have ever seen.

It is often very hard to remember that we only have a very small fridge.

On our way back from the shop the patisserie in Morgat was closed from 12.30 to 2.30 or some such. So after shopping, we had lunch on board and then I rowed the dinghy ashore in search of 'pain au raisin'. These are Tim's favourites and thus far we have not had any.

So this is our last chance - tomorrow we are heading for Spain!

Over I row and march up the only patisserie in the village to find it closed. Consternation. I check that time; it's about 4 o'clock. It should be open!

I check the sign again and notice down the at the bottom, 'Ferme a Vendredi.' Wah! I row back to the boat empty handed.

We left Morgat, Brittany on the Thursday the 24th at 0700.

It looked like we had three days of pretty much light winds.

Lots of things happened that I was going to mention at length like:



Our little visitor who hung around for hours, letting me setup not one but two little sanctuaries so that he could travel to Spain with us in comfort.



See? Next to the basil by the liferaft?



He got bolder and bolder before jumping ship. I wonder if he knew something that we didn't?



The low flying plane that suddenly appeared out of low cloud and quite illegally buzzed us. It would have been great to get a photo of it as it appeared behind us but I was too busying gaping with surprise to even think about the camera.

The bioluminescence that we saw at night generated by schools of fish. In the distance you'd see a huge glowing patch (the first time, I was all, 'WHAT THE HECK IS THAT?') and as Larus approached them you'd to see the individual fish zigzagging away through the water. They'd just scatter in tens of sparkly trails.

The sun at dawn, early Friday morning, which I thought at the time was strangely red, but didn't appreciate the significance.

But I think I'll just move on to part that I think of as: 'Seamanship 10/10, Meteorology 2/10'.

What can I say? We got it wrong and just before dusk on Friday the winds started to pick up. Before this we had been motor sailing as there was no wind at all, so we were quite pleased when we began to get some. When it reached 20 knots we dropped the main and continued under jib and mizzen, getting ourselves set for the night. It was a little early, but if the wind got stronger we were set and if it dropped we could always put the main up again. No problem.

So for pretty much all of Friday night and into Saturday morning, we found ourselves motor sailing under a heavily furled jib and mizzen in winds averaging from 30 to 45 knots.

I had hoped to see dolphins in the bioluminescence the previous night, and we didn't. Tonight however they were arrowing about the boat like missiles.

During the day you can generally only see what's happening above the water and maybe a little below; At night all we could see was their trail in the water, as the approached the boat, twisted and turned and vanished like a rocket. It really gave you an true picture of just how mobile they are.

The ride wasn't all that comfortable, but Larus was always perfectly in control. She felt solid in the water. There was no change to her motion or how she handled whether the wind was Force 6, 7, 8 or 9.

You really wouldn't have been aware of the wind speed increase above 35 knots except for the howling in the rigging. Not a pleasant sound.



This is one of the many squalls we saw but passed us by late Saturday morning.

Tim, I have to say did a fantastic job. I really am equally proud and impressed. He was completely unflappable and kept the boat sailing comfortably, safely and even making reasonable headway (sometime more, sometime less depending on the direction of the wind) to our destination.

When the wind finally dropped for good down to reasonable levels, it was on the nose and the sea state remained horrible and lumpy and we still had about 50 miles to go. That's about 10 hours at 5 knots and was probably the most discouraging part of the journey. We just wanted to get there and as Tim said, 'it felt like someone really didn't want us to arrive in Spain.'

I seconded that when we arrived just off Ribadeo to find a squall arriving at the entrance to the Ria just as we were. There were squall lines all along the coast and we suspected it was something just like that which had given us such an uncomfortable night. So we took down all the sail and just idled in place with the bow pointed into the wind. Only the edge of the squall passed over us and there a little rain and a whole lot of wind. It was into the 30's in minutes, jumped up 47, and then slowly petered out to a much more reasonable 15 knots of wind. We were very pleased to have waited.



We were very quickly ensconced in the Ribadeo Yacht Club, ate the dinner we didn't have the previous night and slept for 13 hours.

Not a lot of fun, but good experience and we're quite determined to brush up on our meteorology.

On Sunday, we wandered around the town in the morning.



This part of Spain, Galicia, is famous for it's octopus. 'Pulpo' in Spanish.



Shop window.



Mainstreet and glittery golden roof.



Backstreet on way back to harbour.

Then we spent the rest of the day housekeeping.



This is the bilge under the galley floor that often collects a bit of water when we've been heeled over and needs to be mopped out on occasion.



We made good use of the marina to water wash off the salt, and its pontoon to dry and organise stuff before restowing it on board.

Monday we motored around to Viveiro.



We did try to sail, practicing with the new 'sock' for our cruising chute, but the winds were too light.

So here we are anchored of the beach at Viveiro. Force 0 wind is forecast for tomorrow so we'll spend another day here before heading further west.

Tim intends to don a wetsuit tomorrow have a look our new ultra sonic speedo which isn't behaving at the moment. I'll let you know how it goes.

Bye for now!

Dartmouth to Cameret, North Brittany

18 May 2012 | Cameret Anchorage

The picture above is of the Cameret Marina and sea wall this morning. The day has perked up considerably and we now have bright sunshine. I think it's a couple degrees warmer than the UK, but that might be down to wishful thinking.

So...

We left Dartmouth mid-afternoon on the 15th and were royally escorted to the mouth of the Dart by...



Actually, I lie. Our escort was even better than that... 



Nick and Vanessa came to say good-bye, buzzed us and took some pictures as we left the Dart River.

The forecast was for Force 4 to 5, occasionally 6 with a slight to moderate sea and the winds would later drop down to light and variable 3 to 4, so we a bit surprised to have a Force 7, occasionally Gale 8, with moderate to rough seas, pushing us South at an average of 7 knots for about 10 hours.

We had our new smaller jib and the mizzen up, and Larus just belted along, rolling and recovering and barrelling onward. We even saw 8 on the speedo a couple of times.

It was exhilarating, but hard work hanging on with all the 'to and fro'ing and 'back and forth'ing. I was so stiff by yesterday evening, but am completely recovered today.

It was particularly nice not to have to worry about either putting a reef in the main or taking it down completely. We could have easily reduced sail on the jib but we were so well balanced even the autopilot was happy.

It was a great sail and boosted my confidence in Larus even more.

We'd hoped they'd be wrong about the light variable winds, but come 0400 the winds dropped completely. This left us wallowing in a large messy sea with the rig slamming back and forth, so we bit the bullet, hauled in the sails and turned on the engine until the wind came up again, from the North East this time, when we were at the Northerly end of the Chanel du Four.

We breezed along through the Chanel du Four and arrived at Cameret about 2100. We dropped anchor and called it a night.

We're now waiting for a nice big weather window to cross the Bay of Biscay. The next week doesn't look good - winds from the wrong direction - so we're going to head up to Chateaulin on the Aulne River. We've been there a couple of times before and it's a nice run up the river.

We'll head off at noon and get as far up the Aulne as we can on that tide. The next day we'll take the flood up to the lock and then continue the short journey to Chateaulin.

I've pictures of Cameret and Chateaulin from previous visits that I'll add to the Places album.

Thanks again for your emails and comments.

Nancy and Tim

Dart River opposite Town Quay

 15 May 2012 | Dart River opposite Town Quay

We've been anchored in the Dart River with Quintet since the last post.

Quintet, Sea Brigand and Larus is behind them both. Everyone re-anchored a number of times often to get the distances right for every state of tide.

We have had the most interesting combination of wind and rain over Spring tides. At certain times the wind and tide have had equal effect on the boats at anchor but in opposite directions. This meant that every once in a while no one behaved as expected and an eagle eye and a fender to hand were de rigueur. 

The day Dart Festival started, we was sunshine for three whole days. No one, particularly the organisers, could believe it. 



We've watched many a band in the rain in previous years. The band above is RSVP Bhangra and Mike Sanchez were definitely our favourites of the festival.



The 'screwing in the light bulb' dance move. RSVP had a dance leader and called out the moves - a kind of Asian line dancing.



Bayard Cove from above and opposite is Kingwear and the Royal Dart Yacht club.



The Royal Dart Yacht Club where despite the sun the wind kept the temperatures down. We were cold!

A little later this afternoon we will head off across The Channel to France. The next post should be from Cameret, where as of today, is just as cold as it is here. 

It looks like we'll have to chase the sun a little harder.

You'll find more photos in our People, Boats, and Places albums.



See you later!

 

Quayside Marina to Kingston Marine Services, East Cowes, Isle of Wight

03 May 2012 | Cowes

Quayside Marina to Kingston Marine Services, East Cowes, Isle of Wight

Not a particularly dramatic beginning, I know, but we have to start somewhere. 

It was quite emotional leaving our friends at Quayside Marina after 25 years. They will be sorely missed not only for their marine expertise but for their friendship as well. 

Starting as we mean to continue, we sailed down Southampton Water despite the light winds. No more gratuitous motoring because we're in a hurry. Tim planned it well (and the wind picked up) and we arrived spot on time.

We were lifted out yesterday by travel hoist at Kingston Marine Services on the Medina River.



We're more used to being craned out and it was very amusing to watch the travel hoist operator manoeuvre it with his thumbs via remote control joy sticks as he sauntered along behind it. 



We fitted the keel cooler for our water cooled fridge to the outside of the hull and 'burnished' the copper coat anti-foul. 



We washed, polished and waxed the hull and it is now so shiny you can see the boat next to us in it.



We greased prop and changed the anodes. 



This is the remains of the anode we changed on the propeller. The pointed silver cone is the new anode.



I've added another pic of the propeller because Tim is very pleased with how shiny it looks, finely sanded and coated in lanolin to stop things from growing on it. We painted the lanolin on with a blow torch and brush. 



We're back in the water tomorrow morning and heading for Newtown Creek to anchor for the night. 

The plan for the weekend is to sail for Dartmouth via Weymouth in the company of 'Quintet' and their owners Nick and Vanessa, one of our neighbours in Quayside Marina. We'll anchor in the Dart River and stay until after the Dart Music Festival when we plan to head south