So, with a sensible NW to W and occasional SW 4/5 forecast, we set off around low water on Wednesday for the 200 nm run to South Wales.There was an option to divert to Kilmore in Ireland if the wind became strong westerly or to continue to Falmouth if it got calmer and we got keen - 325 nm of keen.
The wind was, once more, little like the forecast. It decided to be SW'ly most of the time (ie the worst direction for us from all the forecast directions) but not as strong so the waves didn't build too much, even with wind over tide.
Our timing was to take a favourable current down the Norn Iron coastline, where it runs quite quickly, and then to be further out in the Irish sea when it turned against us for the first time. "First time" as the leg from the NI coast to Bishops Rock off South Wales was 154 nm so it took more than a couple of tides to cover it!
A nice grey departure from Bangor didn't show the coastline at its best:
Off South Rock we encountered more fishing marker buoys than we would like to risk at night - a note for future trips up and down this coast! There were a couple of concentrations of fishing boats but nothing too busy as we headed down the Irish sea, more or less in the middle of it. Gives you a great feeling of power when the overtaking commercial ships have to divert around you. Also a feeling of "thank heavens they saw us on the AIS / radar / by eyeball".
Overnight we used our usual "short trip" method of watch-keeping. Roughly translated it means sleep as long as you can on the pilothouse berth then when you are properly awake again, take over! Easier for us than fixed watch times for shorter runs. Typically that means 2.5 hour spells for some reason. You could argue that old guys can't sleep much longer for various anatomical reasons. You would be wrong. You could argue that the captain is so nervous with the crew helming at night that he cannot sleep properly. Wrong again. Somehow we both seem to sleep in 2.5 hour chunks when underway. Peter (the massively overqualified consultant surgeon in Australia) can probably explain why...
For the non boaters, helming at night is actually a very "spiritual" experience - unless it is very rough!! You have the boat on the autopilot and one screen is telling you how that is performing against our plotted course. Another screen is showing the navigation chart and the position of any other vessels that are sending AIS signals in the area. Our third screen is showing the radar picture. Helming means keeping an eye on the AIS situation and any likely close calls. Watching the radar for things that are not using AIS and out of the windows for lights / whatever. Then you have a visual sweep of the instruments: engine temperature, engine load (if you pick something up around the prop the load increases for the same rpm), oil pressure, gearbox oil pressure, exhaust stack temperature, alternator outputs, depth, wind speed and direction. Every so often, you update the paper based log and course plan just in case all the electronics decide to take a time out!
There is time to think, enjoy the motion of the boat, the gentle engine noise, and (if you are lucky as we were on this trip) the noise of the water running past the boat because we had the top half of a pilothouse door open (the downwind one!!) The serious ocean crossers say that after a few days you get into such a rhythm that you don't want the trip to end. We haven't had a run long enough to experience that yet, but it gets close to feeling like that after only a day! Addicted... Just addicted.
There was one amazing moment - a fishing trawler was crossing our path (no AIS broadcast..) heading NE on the radar. We altered course to SW to pass well behind him and after about 15 mins, he called us on the radio (he was monitoring our AIS output) to say that he would be turning to the SW shortly. Wow. Normally trawlers just do that and enjoy messing you about (see earlier posts on channel crossings!) So, thanks nice Irish trawler skipper, whoever you are. Hope you caught lots that night.
The next morning, the wind decided to stay from the SW and so give us a bit more movement than was expected. No big deal though - 6 foot waves on the quarter with the stabilisers busy wasn't a big issue. The day was livened up by 3 pods of dolphins - one came over to play with us and we had several doing tricks in our bow wave and swimming with us for a while. Funny how we saw more of them in the Irish sea during one trip that we saw during all our time in Scotland. Maybe the SNP have banned the local guys from playing with English registered boats? Sadly, the pics were taken of the second lot, who stayed further off - as you can see:
Arrived at St David's Head late afternoon pushing a strong tide. Nice and grey and misty with anchored tankers in the background:
Bishops rock lighthouse looked almost friendly:
We tucked inside Skokholm and headed for St Ann's point - the entrance to Milford Haven which can get very bumpy in spring tides / strong winds. As a hint, the nearby headland is called Vomit Point. Nice.
We didn't need to though - it wasn't that bumpy. Up to Milford Marina holding pier for a couple of hours to wait for free flow through the lock into the dock area. Nice to tie up after 35 hours underway. Dave, the berthing master came to visit us on the holding pontoon. We completed the usual paperwork (plan was to stay 5 nights or so to avoid the gales that were forecast) and then, as we have come to expect, he chatted for ages about the area, his fishing boat, life in general. Another warm welcome - so south coast marinas, you have been warned. The bar has been raised, significantly.
Technical news: Well, our B&G instruments decided to show 100m+ depths as --- again. No idea why. The Furuno kit was showing the correct depth of course. Then the B&G sounder showed 11.7 metres, just dropping the extra 100. This is an intermittent thing and we will live with it...
Weirdly, whilst the crew was helming at night, the PC rebooted itself, untouched so the crew reports. Not a big issue as we always use the plotter to run the course and autopilot (we have a healthy lack of trust for Microsoft based PCs) and the PC was just showing the chart, track and AIS data graphically. It restarted and ran fine for the rest of the trip. Again, no plan to try and figure out why, yet. Let's see how it behaves on the next trip.
No mechanical issues to report. The big Lugger ran very happily thank you.
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Thanks for your ideas / cheek / corrections / whatever! They should hit the blog shortly after the system checks them to make sure they will not put us or you in jail.....