Holyhead to Falmouth (yes, it is a long way....)

In Holyhead, we managed to walk into town to get essential supplies from the Co-op store without being mugged or offered illegal substances.  In fact the crew was so brave that she spent nearly an hour with a local who was using sharp instruments - yes she had her hair cut....

We also met a truly inspirational couple, John and Angela who keep a yacht in the marina. They were interested in the Nordhavn, having looked at one when they were first launched.  In fact, John had a copy of the first "Circumnavigator" magazine on board  his yacht which was all about the launch of the first 47.  See Circumnavigator. We gave them TGT (remember it? TGT= the guided tour) and later on joined them for pre-dinner drinks. All very civilised.

What was inspirational? Well, they are still sailing around and have a very full life although he is 95 years old.  A target for us perhaps??  Before we left, Angela kindly gave us some home made preserves too. Their energy, activity and engagement with life in general was a lesson in how to grow older!

There was one nice weather window that would allow a long trip (40 hours according to the plan) direct to Falmouth.  Breaking it up by stopping in South Wales would lose the calm(ish) conditions forecast around Lands End and up the English Channel. The departure time was critical too - trying to take the tide with us off Holyhead, St David's head and Lands End where the tide runs strongly as part of the overall trip. Tricky planning!

This meant a 4pm departure from Holyhead and then two nights at sea. As we left, Mike the photographer took a few more shots. Inside the breakwater:

Heading out to sea with the Skerries in the background:

The leg around Anglesey was the bumpiest part of the trip with the remnants of a force 6 blowing and the built up waves on the bow as we departed and then on the beam. You can get an idea of the wind strength from the approaching yacht, running into the harbour:

And an idea of the wave height from this nice "nod" as we headed out:

Passing Holy Island (yes, yet another one!!) you could see the bridge across quite clearly:

Just to keep the lighthouse series of pictures up to date, here is a better view of the one on the island. Quite a nice one really:

Shortly afterwards, with the chunky waves astern of us, a tiny fishing pot marker popped up directly ahead of us in the big swell and only about 4 metres away. No time to turn away from it and as we were running with the tide, the line running down to the pot would be even closer still. Quickly into neutral, many bad words about cowboy fishermen and we were lucky, we glided over it and the rope. The stabilisers didn't pick it up and the shoe that runs from the keel under the prop and to the bottom of the rudder helps push the line away from the propeller and astern of the boat. Phew... When will fishermen start using sensible markers??????

Heading south the waves were around 1.5 metres high and coming from astern, so not a big deal. However, overnight we had to make a huge course diversion to avoid a ship towing a cable. The information is here, but the survey area was way bigger than in this plan. The survey ship isn't the prettiest thing - as it was dark we have stolen this picture from the internet:

We either had to give 7 nautical miles clearance astern of him or 3 ahead. We opted for 3 ahead and so headed into Cardigan Bay a bit. A bit meant a cross track error  (diversion to the west) of 6.8 miles so it added some time to the trip, as if we needed that.... Just as we started to head west a little, we encountered a trawler which meant another "jink" east. Yes, this was turning out to be a longer trip than forecast. Here is a rough idea:

To fit with our "go around the headlands with a fair tide" plan, we put a bit more power on to catch up. It worked as we zoomed around St David's head as dawn broke with a lovely 2 knots tidal help.

Crossing from South Wales to North Cornwall we were blessed with the usual pods of friendly Welsh dolphins who came to play in our bow wave. One mum brought her calf along to try it out too. Lovely. It was sunny and pretty calm by now so we enjoyed standing outside whooping like lunatics at their antics.  Linda - we missed you again.

Sunset on night number 2 was glorious. Here is how it looks from the pilothouse:

Overnight, we closed in on Cape Cornwall, passing around Lands End (the Longships lighthouse) dead on midnight. Again the tide turned and shoved us around quite nicely. For the run eastwards up the English Channel, the crew was in charge and had a stressful time avoiding plenty of traffic. It was a touch busy as you can see from the dark AIS plot (screens dimmed for night time running):

The quality of the photograph reflects the tension in the crew's camera hand... The rest of the run to the Lizard was just "ship avoidance" and then we had a last large diversion for a big tanker before heading up towards Falmouth. En route the crew was so happy to get even. A commercial guy who was also heading north to Falmouth had to divert his course around us - the overtaking vessel has to give way and all that.... Here is proof:

The fuzzy "dog-leg" track in the bottom right of the screen is the lucky guy who had to avoid us according to the regulations and he did it most properly.

We even slowed down a little so we would be off the Manacles at dawn to see the myriad of pots that seem to live there, ready to catch Nordhavn's unaware....

In Falmouth Bay there were a few tankers anchored and one was bunkering (for non boaters = filling up with fuel!) ironic how ships that drag crude oil around the globe need some nice refined stuff from little bunker ships. Here she is in the early morning sun:

We entered Falmouth harbour and poodled up river to our favourite mooring spot - Ruan Creek mid-river pontoon. That spot has starred in here many times before. Shock, horror, it was FULL!! Looked like a Westerly yacht owners' rally. What were they doing there on a Monday morning??? So, turned around and went back to the pontoon above Turnaware Bar instead and finally killed the engine after about 40 hours underway.

Mid river there were a couple of older ships laid up again. We think that their names are just so wrong - nothing "flower or meadow like" about these old girls:

This old converted MFV looked way nicer on her mooring buoy:

The view from the mooring down towards the estuary was pretty calm too:

We happily did breakfast and had a snooze on arrival after about 40 hours underway and around 255 nautical miles covered. The log decided to stop working during the trip - we must have some gunge or fishing line wrapped around it, so we cannot tell you how many miles "through the water" we did. Nothing on the maintenance front to report. The big Lugger and the stabilisers (which had the maximum use during the run) were very happy. The crew was the most tired thing on board - the big Lugger seemed happy to carry on.