Saturday 29th June - Bourgenay - N46 26.35 W01 40.72
ALKIRA
Charles & Maggie Bevis
Sat 29 Jun 2013 17:58
Bumped into Jeremy and Patricia today, who we met in Vannes and who live on board their lovely old classic motorboat "Tudora". They came along to us for a chat later in the afternoon and invited us for drinks that evening. Tudora is quite something, lovely saloon, very grand wheelhouse, lots of comfortable seating and also a bathroom with a bathtub! At 25 tonnes she's a bit of a heavyweight. They've owned and loved her for over 24 years now and have no plans to give up living on her yet. We may meet them again at La Rochelle in a few days time, but that's as far south as they plan to go this year.
Our immediate neighbours in the marina are David and Fiona who sail a Halbery Rassy 36 named "Saltmead". Again lots of friendly chats and exchanges of information. They begin heading back to Poole shortly, so it's unlikely we'll meet up again.
Saturday 29th - We woke to a dull, grey, mizzly and windy day. Had breakfast and in spite of the weather forecast not looking so great, decided we'd leave the island and head for Bourgenay on the mainland. We can't get into Ile de Re until the 30th at the earliest due to a race that's taking place between 24-30 June. Crazy really but all the ports these racing boats have been calling into have been closing some 3-4 days in advance of the race yachts arrival, hence they're losing a lot of revenue from visiting boats. Heaven only knows why they close for so long in advance, someone clearly ain't thought this through!
We Left Ile de Yeu at midday and set the sails as we left port in choppy conditions as we cleared the harbour. A downwind full-sail ride at 7 to 8 knots in warm and mostly bright weather. At force 5 there was too much wind for the cruising chute so a poled out genoa and main with a preventer was just the job. Charlie has learned his lesson well, in similar conditions off Sark he tried to grab the main sheet as we gybed and now has a sprained wrist as a reward!
Wonderful sail all the way into port and for once, Charlie's ETA was very close to the mark!
Bourgenay looks to be fairly average, a modern town, geared to holidaymakers and boats but nothing of architectural merit. Good facilities for sailors though. Visitors pontoon is very small, whether that means few actually come here we can't be certain about, but perhaps it's the notes in the pilot books are deterring folk from coming in, which is likely, or everyone knows its nothing special here. Whatever, we only intend to use it as a convenient overnight stop whilst en route to Ile de Rey.
Supper is cooking and it's G&T o'clock. Can't believe how fast the days go by.