31 July 2013 – Falmouth Marina

The weather has broken – the consistent easterlies gave way to southerlies at the end of last week and so the wait commenced for favourable winds to go south.  As of today (Wednesday) it looks as though the winds may swing at the end of this week.

Falmouth is a great natural anchorage from southerly winds.  When we arrived late on Friday we found a perfect spot to anchor, in gripping mud – just in time to beat another couple of boats, one Dutch and the other Belgian.  Congratulations and a cup of tea were in order, and the kettle on, when the harbourmaster came over, firstly to move the Dutch and Belgians, and then to move us on as well – a warship was coming in at 5pm and the anchorage needed to be cleared.  A green visitors’ buoy was the option.  Of course, because we were the last to be moved, the last buoy was further away from the landing stage.  The young man in the harbour launch was alongside to collect the fee before the cup of tea was finished!  £19.50 a night.  The anchorage would have cost £11. It’s done by length of boat.

It was still fine and Jan came to supper. It was lovely to see her and hear all the news.  The weather in Greece has been extremely hot.   Roger fired up the barbeque that will sit on the stern quarter.  Only sausages, but it worked a treat!  Once the weather is seriously hot in Spain and Portugal, it will be very well used.

After a couple of days on the buoy we transferred to Falmouth marina and had a couple of nights staying with Chris and Sandra near Truro. All very pleasant.

Apart from the pleasure of spending time with them, their generosity allowed us to do the BIG SHOP.  They took us by car into Truro and then to the Tesco Extra near Redruth – a real monster – for an orgy of shopping – hardware and fishing kit in Truro, and ship’s stores in Tesco.  The number of teabags  required is immense, and there are a load of  other necessities such as Colman’s mustard, ketchup, mango chutney, marmalade etc that I do not expect to see again.  The whole saloon was full of bags!

It’s taken a couple of days to sort out the storage, and create the inventory.  At the moment I know exactly where the 4 jars of mango chutney are (in a box under the aft galley bin) but I place no reliance on remembering in a month’s time! (or even a week!)

So all that’s left is to get the fresh stuff once the forecast is favourable and we put ourselves under orders to go.  Roger is minded to run the water maker again tomorrow, and exchange the butane cylinder for a propane one.  We’re in good shape!