Plocton to Howth
Jammy Dodger
Neil Martin
Mon 5 Jul 2010 22:50
Monday 28 June (67 Miles)
Up early and sailed to Lochalsh, the old ferry port for Skye, to refuel.
Harbourmaster was away, so luckily found a local garage and got 80 litres in
jerry cans. Nice sail through the Kyle of Lochalsh and the Sound of Sleet
and into Inverie to anchor for lunch. Off again at 4pm and motorsailed past
Eigg and Muck, charging the batteries and running the watermaker. Saw a
basking shark and then some gannets diving for fish. Got into Tobermory on
Mull at 10pm, picked up a buoy and straight to bed.
Tuesday/Wednesday 29/30 June (197 Miles)
5am start, flat calm and low cloud, heading down the Sound of Mull under
engine. All the crew had nice hot showers, whilst running the watermaker.
Great piece of kit! Went through the notorious Corryvreckan channel at
slack water, but still there were some fierce whirlpools. Very pretty,
though still low cloud. Nice westerly wind, up and down, but never really
strong enough for a fast passage, so spent most of the day motorsailing.
Into Bangor in Belfast Lough at midnight to refuel and straight off again.
Nice SE wind developed, so finally got the engine off and had a nice close
hauled sail, with one reef in, down the Irish coast, arriving in Howth
marina at 4pm, with the wind now up to 25 knots on the nose with big seas
building.
