St Peter Port to Dartmouth

The strong(ish) SW'ly wind was due to drop and turn to a NW 4 to 5. This was going to help us by dropping the size of the swells from the west that were rolling in but would mean that we might get some waves on the nose as we approached Dartmouth - the NW wind would have been blowing consistently for about 12 hours and would be building up some "chop". The real win was that the closer we got to Dartmouth, the shorter the fetch and so the gentler the waves would be.

Decision made, we also opted for a civilised departure time so we could stay in the Victoria marina overnight. The cill in the marina was not going to cover sufficiently for us to escape until around 9am so no silly (sorry for the feeble attempt at humour) alarm call was needed. It did decide to rain a little as we headed out and we had a large audience of yotties who popped out from their sprayhoods and wanted to see us hit something (not them presumably) as we backed off the berth and then wriggled astern around a pontoon so we could motor out. Pressure on - had to do it without using the thrusters to show the yotties that big fat motorboats can manoeuvre properly.

Heading up the Little Russel channel we had good tidal help even though it was not spring tide time any more:

10.9 knots over the ground is really flying for us. Nosebleed territory indeed. As we are all pretty robust, no blood was shed but a few squeals of excitement were heard.

For this trip the tides were a pain - carrying us to the east to begin with. This spoils taking the "direct" route across the channel to Dartmouth, which misses the SW corner of the TSS where the big guys play. What to do? Two choices - one is to push the tide to get far enough west to avoid the TSS and then, ironically, we would have to push the tide when it turns the other way to avoid ending up in Plymouth not Dartmouth. The other is to let the tide push us to the east, cross the TSS at the compulsory 90 degrees (still getting pushed east as we have to steer to cross at 90 degrees, not have a water track at 90 degrees) and then let the tide unwind this drift after it turns later on, helping to push us back towards Dartmouth. Mental maths (dangerous at our age) said to do the latter hence the track below:

There was a residual swell from the stiff SW'ly winds of the previous few days. So, we had a couple of metres of swell on the port quarter which the stabilisers duly countered. Some of the bigger ones were coming in at pilothouse window height - an unusual experience for Irene who coped with it very well indeed. The forecast suggested that the swell would die down as we hit mid-channel and it did so right on cue. They also said that there would be fog banks and they were spot on again - of course this happened in the TSS as we were dodging the big guys but the AIS and radar didn't mind.

Lunch in the pilothouse turned into quite a civilised affair:

Archie suits the napkin so well, all he needs is a dinner jacket and a monacle to complete the look.

The NW'ly wind that was predicted to increase during the afternoon duly did so giving us a few little waves on the nose for the last few miles of the run into Dartmouth. A chance to throw a little spray around.

The grey gloom had lifted and we also had a pod of dolphins come past us to liven things up. Poor Archie had no idea why all of his humans were squealing in delight when there was no food or alcohol being consumed.

We arrived in a quiet Dartmouth after a 10.5 hour trip and happily deposited ourselves on the free hammerhead in Dart Marina. Yes, we used a marina so Archie had a simple "walkashore". He definitely needed easy access upon arrival.  He had attempted a wee on passage but was seriously put off when his chosen spot (the windward scupper in the aft cockpit) gushed sea water, resulting in soggy paws. Archie was not amused.

We had booked the marina and were told to phone just as we entered the harbour. We did so, only the number came up as an invalid one. No matter, John and Kath (the Broom 39 folks you've met on here before) were berthed in the marina already and John came to meet us. Zephyros (Andrew and Linda, the Welsh connection) were also around, on the mid-river pontoon that we normally frequent. Quite an impending social whirl really.

The harbour is as glorious as ever of course:

Maintenance news:

The trip helped to correct the slight list to port that we always have when both the wing fuel tanks are full. This is because the boat was originally ballasted for the first owner with a huge RIB on the boat deck. Our Avon is smaller and lighter than his monster tender and hence the "over ballasting" to port that exists. We did look at removing some but it has been so beautifully encapsulated in GRP that cutting it out would be a messy nightmare and one that didn't seem worth living through.