Neyland to Bangor

We mentioned before that when you travel slowly, you try to work with the tides. Unlike the fast motorboat guys, you cannot just cram on another couple of hundred rpm and still get there at the same time. However, you can afford the fuel, cook whilst underway and you don't have to stop every day to fill up either.

The trip from South Wales up to Northern Ireland is an interesting one to plan. So many boundary conditions to consider. The tides run strongly around the St David's Head area of South Wales and again around the coast of Northern Ireland so you want to try and take those with you. Of course, one is at the start of the trip and one at the end so guesstimating the speed and your arrival time at the Northern Ireland coast is important. It is also tricky as you will have several hours of tides with then against you as you head up the Irish Sea.

You also want to try and leave and arrive in daylight as there are a few pot markers around the harbour entrances to contend with. Then there is the weather - the forecast was for calm conditions but a S or SW'ly wind building on the morning of the second day which would pull up some sizeable waves over time. Oh, and you want to run the engine at an efficient speed for it and be as miserly with fuel as possible given all the above. Here is the track (less the initial trip around S Wales where the AIS system didn't track us properly all the time:

See, this holiday cruising stuff is easy, no planning to do at all really. Anyway, the result was a departure as soon as it was light from Neyland and a 1625 rpm cruise to give around 6.4 knots through the water at our current fuel load.

Things started badly though - the port navigation light bulb blew when they were switched on so the last remaining spare, bought in Guernsey to replace the others, was fitted. This was the second bulb that went pop in that fitting this year - time to check it out. So, we headed off a little later than planned into an eerily quiet Milford Haven. Nothing moving at all, not even one of the many spare tugs, just the strange but somehow compelling twilight view of them and the refinery:

It was as calm as predicted out to sea, for the entire trip as it turned out. Rounding St David's Head and heading north, we took the compulsory South Bishop lighthouse shot again:

There was very little shipping about as we headed up the middle of the Irish Sea. Nothing to alter course for, gawp at, watch overtake us etc etc. Just lots and lots of very calm sea so the radio and TV were busy on board. Sunset was glorious:

Overnight, more of the same except even less to see until we approached the Holyhead / Liverpool to Ireland ferry routes. They caused a couple of detours, usually during the crew's watch to add to her stress levels. Passing the Isle of Man the number of fishing boats increased too - more to focus on.

We arrived off the Northern Ireland coast pretty much as planned, just as the tide was turning to take us north except the **** port navigation light bulb failed. This boat is getting too expensive to keep in light bulbs (the 24v 21W  bay15d fitting bulbs are around £8.50 each!!) - a big check of the fitting is needed when we are in Bangor. A message from David (the Royal Ulster Yacht Club man who you have met in here before) arrived with an offer to meet us in the marina and help with our lines too. Proper Norn Iron welcome coming up.

You pass Donaghadee pretty close in and so yet another little lighthouse for the very boring collection:

As you can see, it was a little bit grey.

We duly trundled into the Marina, backed into what has become "our berth", handed lines to David and collapsed with a coffee to chat to him in the saloon. An amazing trip - the calmest we've ever seen the Irish Sea. No spray more than half way up the hull despite covering around 220 miles out to sea including the usual wide open throttle run just before berthing, plus the trip in the estuary. The wind duly arrived during the afternoon.....

Maintenance:

Just that pesky nav light bulb to attend to. Might also go wild whilst in Bangor and change the main gearbox oil and filter as a routine change is due next month.

Numbers:

It took 31.5 hours and burned about 350 litres of fuel to cover just under 230 nautical miles over the land and 199 through the water. As you can see the faster cruise hurts the litres per mile through the water figure but overall gave a pretty normal 1.5 litres per mile over the ground for the trip. The delights of planning....

Will probably hang about here for a few days as there are some great folks to catch up with, plenty of stuff to do, bits of maintenance to tinker with, an engine room to deep clean, lots to do and see in the area and sleep to catch up on (oh, and because the forecast is pants for the West Coast of Scotland in the next few days).