Cherbourg to St Quay Portriex

Thursday 14th August 2008
The highlight of the day was me cooking up one of my famous corned beef curries for Daz - the non believer.

1x tin of Corned Beef (ASDA)
2x tin of Chopped Tomatoes (Tesco)
2x Dessert spoons of Madras Curry paste
1x Lrg Tin of Potatoes
3x Portions of Uncle Bens finest boil in the bag rice
If only we had an onion!...
Job done, he is now converted – he’s never had it so good!

We said farewell to our wooden island around 7pm (UK) after the (now not so) cute chick made us pay an extra 10Euros for half a days berthing – bitch!

As Sods Law clearly states, the direction we needed to travel was exactly into wind – we could tack our way slowly but it would be a risk considering the stretch of water we were about to be passing through and the deadlines we needed to meet.

The Alderney Race is the notorious stretch of water between France and the Channel Islands. Tides run through at break neck speeds and if the wind is against the tide it becomes a mess of horrendous rough water. We had timed our arrival to get to the start just off Alderney around HW (Dover) but our approach of over 6 knots over the ground with only 3 knots through the water indicated the tides might be earlier than predicted. If you get the times wrong through here then you are essentially sailing ‘on the spot’ for 6 hours. Luckily, we had got it right and the tide was with us and pushing us through nicely.

The wind was being fickle at around F2-F3 and still just off the direction of travel so we kept the motor running until safely clear of the headland. Then out came the Genoa, its first real trial. We knew the winds were going to be light and had put it on before leaving Cherbourg, good thing to as we made superb progress at between 6-8 knots toward the island of Sark just off of Guernsey, where we would have been struggling with the standard Jib. Its official, Doris is now FAST! – Well for a 35ft yacht anyway.

Clear skies and a super huge bright moon made for a pleasurable sail, but as the night went on it got really cold. For some reason both Daz and I really felt tired on this trip, struggling to stay awake, at one stage I nearly got out the kitchen timer just in case I nodded off as Daz went for an hours sleep below. We would then only awaken to find ourselves washed up on some rocky Channel Island or French shore! Sleep management was always going to be one of my biggest problems especially when sailing with someone who is essentially a complete novice.

Anyways, none of this happened and we made our destination safely about two and a half hours early. One thing I have noted is that the distance covered should be about 90 nm, however, the final log (distance through the water) reads 79.6 nm. Now that’s some good use of tides and explains our good speed – that’s over 10 nm for FREE!

We found our way in to the marina and to our delight the visitors pontoon was both large and an easy mooring alongside. We are barely human by the time we arrive when sailing all night and the berthing needs to be as easy as possible. It always does for that matter, but more so than ever after a night passage!

Just as we got tied up, Francois came flying over in his souped up RIB waving his finger in the air. Non! - We can’t stay on the berth, we are a foot too short! Instead we have to move to the miniscule finger pontoons opposite. Bastard! – Just what we needed. We wrestled Doris into the new berth after some fluffing around with Francois standing there trying not to provide any help. At one stage Daz threw him a line as he was less than 2 meters away, only to watch him thread it through the cleat and throw it straight back – despite the fact that Daz had one leg over the guard rail about to jump on to the pontoon.

In short, the guy was a twat! – Rant over.

For the first time since leaving the UK, we got the hose out as Doris looked like she was covered in white powder there was so much salt on her. I also noticed she has a bit of weed growth on her bottom, so I’ll need to get under there soon.

Time to sleep… ‘fade to black’.
After waking up later in the evening, it was time for a shower and finish up our corned beef curry with a movie.

Marooned in Cherbourg

Wednesday 13th August 2008
After waking up we got (one of the) cute chicks in the dinghy to take us ashore, where we mooched around Cherbourg and I bought some replacement blocks to replace the broken ones. This should at least go some way making the mainsail easier to hoist.

Nothing else to report really as there’s not much you can do while marooned on a pontoon listening to Jack Johnson.

Ouch!...

Daz finds a father figure...

Le Havre To Cherbourg

Monday 11th August 2008

The forecast is worse than ever with talk of Severe Gales (F9) on the UK South coast, Dover Straits and the Channel Islands. We should have left early this morning as there was a weather window. We may be able to make it this evening and beat the weather as it is forecast to start getting bad around Cherbourg 8am Tuesday morning and then really bad in the afternoon… If we don’t go today we will be stuck here in Le Havre until Thursday.

Do we risk it?...

Well we left at 5pm UK time with a bad feeling. To make matters worse, I discovered that the first reef block sheath had chunks missing out of it, and the main halyard mast block is broken. Not to mention Mike Stevens’ (The Rigging Guy) comment, ‘the rig definitely looks like it needs tightening’ replaying over and over in my head.

The impending forcast seemed surreal as there was no wind at all for the first 4-5 hours after setting off so we motor-sailed as making good time was critical! Slowly, the wind filled in and before long we were surfing the ever growing waves at around 8 knots (Speed over ground), with the motor on and full mainsail up with about 10 knots of apparent wind from behind us.

Just before ‘Barfleur’ I decided to put in two reefs as this headland looked like it could be a wind acceleration zone. This was to be one of the best decisions I have ever made in my life! All hell broke loose, the GPS speed was seen at over 9 knots quite a few times with the odd glimpse of 10 knots!!! The sea state got worse and it was very hard work trying to keep Doris from broaching. It was probably a good thing that the night was pitch black with thick cloud cover as seeing the size of the waves would probably have freaked us out! If I had to guess, I would say the wave height was between 2m – 3m.

Daz ‘played’ the mainsail continuously with me shouting at him ‘Watch the Gybe’ and ‘Ease the main’. He done an amazing job of spilling wind on the stronger gusts and it would have been a nightmare if not impossible to keep the boat sailing without him – all the hours spent reading sailing books must be working!

By this stage the wind was gusting over 25 knots and the waves were huge from just behind the beam. We fought to get ‘behind’ the land for some shelter but steering a course was almost impossible. Then it started thundering and lightening to add to the confusion and Mayday calls could be heard over the VHF from UK Coast guards.

Finally the waves seemed to get smaller as we made our way along the Barfleur headland, the winds eased and the rain started. In seconds we completely lost all sight of the coast and its lights and navigation was extremely difficult – God Bless GPS. We were both completely soaked through to the skin with gallons of water from the reefed mainsail sail constantly emptying over us.

As we rounded the coast on the Cherbourg side everything went strangely calm with barely 5 knots of wind showing on the display and a small sea swell, it was as if the storm hadn’t arrived here yet.. Daz quickly produced two much needed cups of coffee and chocolate biscuits. ‘We’ve made it’ we thought and slowly the Cherbourg approach lights came into view. About 5 miles from the outer approach the wind started to rise again until we were looking straight into 35 knot winds again! Luckily, our approach bearing took us straight into it and this was all I needed to get the mainsail down as fast as possible.

It was now just starting to get light and after much shouting and wrestling with pilotage notes we found our way inside Cherbourg, I wanted to get the fenders and lines all ready in clear water (Cherbourg Outer) before entering the actual marina and with the wind still howling managed to hold her steady for Daz to prepare things.

Suddenly, a huge black / grey ‘thing’ came at least a foot out of the water less than a meter to the right of the cockpit. I won’t lie, I shit myself! It was like the scene out of Jaws, ‘You’re gonna need a bigger boat!’. It was either a pilot whale or a dolphin. Whatever it was, it was huge and it played under the boat and alongside while we prepared the fenders etc.

Still a little freaked out, we headed for the only remaining empty berth, the central pontoon that is normally reserved for larger boats. With the wind still howling it was a struggle and the first attempt was aborted due to the wind grabbing the bow, unfortunately not before I gouged two lines down Doris’ port bow on the metal edged pontoons – bollox!

The second attempt went fine and we got the lines attached and secure. What a night! Daz commented ‘I don’t know if I like actually sailing or just prefer reading about it’.

After a few hours sleep, we were awakened by the knocking of some cute chick in a dinghy! At first I thought this might be French hospitality at its finest but it turned out to be the marina staff. I paid my 50Eu for two nights by credit card in the dinghy!

The rest of the day was spent listening to the howling winds, marooned on our central pontoon that isn’t connected to land. There was no chance of making the shore by rowing against such strong wind and if ever I needed an outboard it was today!

Still In Le Havre

Saturday 9th August 2008
Spent a lot of the day sleeping and planning the next leg to Cherbourg. The wind is howling F5 (Gusting F7) and the sea state is pretty rough.

We went for a walk in the evening to find a hive of activity, including a fun fair, skate park and people everywhere. For some reason we both craved ‘grease’ so sausage & chips it was!

It was very difficult to sleep as the visitors pontoons are quite exposed and small waves are crashing against the back off the boat and it’s very noisy. Poor old Daz is in the rear berth but somehow manages to get to sleep. He is convinced his hair has turned grey from the experience so far!

Sunday 10th August 2008
Planned to leave this evening just after HW 5pm (UK), however the wind is still F5 – F7 with an associated ‘rough’ sea state. I am sure we could make it, but it would be a long night with about 15 hours of night sailing in rough conditions. I finally made the decision to postpone our departure for 24 hours as the forecast looks better and more settled for tomorrow.

Patience is going to be a hard skill to learn!