Friday 24th to Sunday 26th October: voyage home
Awelina of Sweden
James Collier
Sun 26 Oct 2014 14:07
Eddy, who works in Dublin had moved aboard on Monday as hurricane Gonzalo was forecast, and indeed it got jolly windy and he went round doubling up mooring lines around midnight. James flew to Dublin from Cambridge airport on Thursday evening, and after a good dinner in Howth and a night's sleep Eddy went to work for the morning and James provisioned the boat and paid for the marina berth, so we were ready to depart shortly after midday on Friday just as the tide turned in our favour.
The wind was WSW between F5 and 6, and due to increase, to gale force on Saturday, but lighter further south. The forecast data we downloaded in GRIB file format showed that provided we made good progress we'd never get winds from directly ahead (which was pretty much due S) and would instead be able to ease to 50° to 60° off the wind, and keep winds mostly to F5. And so it proved; we made excellent progress south, passing just E of the Arklow bank (full of wind turbines - all stationary) until the tide turned against us just as it got dark and we moved into night watch mode. We put a single reef in the main as a precaution. By 11pm we'd passed Tuskar rock and were leaving the St Georges channel for the Bristol channel, still making the expected good speed despite the swell from the Atlantic which was now evident. It's 136 miles from Tuskar to Longships (ie Land's End), so should take around 22 hours. During the night the wind did increase to F6, just as we'd expected, and the coastguard began to warn of gale F8 in the Irish sea (but not for Lundy or Fastnet). We reduced sail gradually through the night, to 2 reefs in the main and only 1/3 of the yankee, as the wind increased to about 23-25 knots true (so about 28-30 over the deck). On one of Eddy's watches there were shooting stars, so bright that he initially thought they were distress flares!
Through the night and the next day - Saturday - we just ploughed on, on a close reach, and as per forecast the wind styed obligingly WSW and dropped off a bit as we got south so that by mid afternoon north Cornwall came into sight and we shook out the reefs. As it got dark we passed the north part of the traffic separation scheme and then went between it and Longships, passing Longships at around 7pm and altering course to pass 1/2 mile south of the Runnel Stone. The tides at Land's end favour north going voyages, but at Runnel Stone we at last got a favourable tide and managed to get to within about 4 miles of the Lizard before it again turned against us. Then followed rather a slow part of the trip, doing 6 - 7 knots through the water but only 3 - 4 over the ground until nearing the Manacles buoy when we came out of the grip of the main up and down channel tides. We decided to anchor for the night at Porthallow, which we reached at 01:30 (the clocks changed last night), and had a second supper before getting some sleep. The average speed over the ground for the whole passage was 6.8 knots, 100% of it under sail.
It's absolutely the top of spring tides, being 2 days after new moon, so we had to worry about getting into Mylor before low water tomorrow, hence set the alarm for 8am. The next morning dawned fair and the wind had dropped during the night so we motored the last four miles or so to Mylor, arriving at our mooring at 10:15 with plenty of water to spare. Then to tidy up and strip sails off ready for Awelina to be hauled out for the winter: the end of 2014 sailing season has arrived (and we saw almost no other boats even in the Fal despite it being Sunday and unseasonably warm).
The end of a reasonable season: gales prevented us from making Greenland, but we did circumnavigate Iceland and visit the Faeroes as well as having a Scottish and Irish cruise on the way home.