The last few days have been full of surprises, both ups and downs. We started off from Pwllheli and made our way around the traffic separation scheme (TSS) off south wales and then had a lovely sail across the Bristol channel before going through the TSS at Lands End. We crossed the English Channel and off Brest we started having some problems. The stern gland started leaking badly and the engine was very slow in turning over before starting. This problem is intermittent unfortunately, but with 350 nautical miles to La Coruna and 70 nautical miles to Falmouth, we decided to take the latter option to repair the boat which turned out to be the right decision. The mechanic at Falmouth had a look at the stern gland and said '’I’ve never seen that before!’. It’s a good job we decided not to mess about with it on the sea.

We’re getting hauled out this morning to repair the gland and the electrician will check our system tomorrow and we hope to be setting off Friday for La Coruna. Everybody is taking this well and we’re looking forward to getting back out to do some more sailing.