Shake down trip to Waterford, Southern Ireland

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Wednesday 8^th July 2009

"50:21.21N 3:33.15W". 

After provisioning on the Tuesday evening we decided to head off at about 10.00am on the Wednesday morning heading for Waterford in Southern Ireland.  The intention was to sail there in one hit, arriving Friday 10^th July. 

We left Dartmouth with a brisk north-westerly wind in our sails.  After crossing Start Bay and we rounded Start Point with the tide pushing us along, John informed me that he wasn’t feeling too well.  The decision was made to head for Noss Mayo and Newton Ferris. 

We arrived there at 6.00pm and rafted up alongside two fibreglass boats.  John jokingly said to the owners ‘your boats might be a little bit narrower later on’.  We sat down, had a beer whilst John cooked us a nice meal.  The tide had changed and was pushing us onto the other two boats.   Our 22 tonnes was actually squashing them and at 9.00pm it was decided that we would move off and pick up a buoy.  During this manoeuvre our spring was thrown into the water and got caught around our prop.  Luckily our rope cutter did the job and avoided a catastrophe.

Thursday 9^th July and Friday 10^th July 2009

We left Noss Mayo at 6.30am and had a pleasant sail to the Lizard where we rounded and headed for the Long Ships Lighthouse at Lands End.  We sailed all day; as it was getting dark we started our 3 hour on and 3 hour off system.  After negotiating the numerous ships navigating the separation zone at Lands End we headed off into the Southern Irish Sea.  The wind was still north-westerly blowing force 5-6.  We had a good sail but decided to avoid landfall at night, this we did by going into ‘hove to’ in the middle of the Irish Sea for 3 hours.  During this time we watched a DVD.

Saturday 11th July 2009

"52:17.00N 7.0.30W". 

Dawn broke and we could see the Southern Irish coast.  We headed for the entrance to Waterford and sailed up the estuary for about 1.5 hours.  We arrived at Waterford at 8.00am. 

After mooring alongside another yacht we found a cafe and enjoyed a hearty breakfast.  Pete had a full Irish breakfast, which is exactly the same as the English variety but with a different name.  John had the vegetarian option.  A well deserved meal.  We returned to the boat until lunchtime when we ventured out in the pouring rain to find some Guiness.  We found this in one of the 500 oldest pubs in Ireland.  Guiness £2.45 a pint!

We later returned to the same pub in the evening to witness a local band with Irish locals making merry and dancing into the early hours.  It was a great atmosphere there – just what we had expected to find.

Sunday 12th July and Monday 13^th July 2009

After listening to the Coastguard forecast Pete couldn’t understand a word the guy was saying so it was decided to phone Brixham Coastguard and get a forecast for the day.  This was south-south-westerly 6-7, occasionally veering westerly force 5-6 later.  It was agreed that it would be okay to head towards the Isles of Scilly.  We waited for the tide to ebb out of the harbour and we said goodbye to Waterford.  We also said goodbye to one of our cockpit cushions. 

We put up the main and sailed along the estuary until we got to a wide bit where we deployed the genoa.  Big Mistake as we couldn’t turn into wind to make it through the narrow channel which is constantly dredged for big ships.  At this point the gyb sheets got tangled and we couldn’t get the genoa in.  John generously offered to go and sort this out.  20 minutes of battling and fighting the genoa sheets ensued but John eventually sorted it out and managed to get the genoa in, whilst still battling with wind over  tide and a tremendous chop.  We exhaustedly headed out of the estuary, got clear of land, hove-to and reefed down. 

We then set off for the Isles of Scilly. The seas were massive and we could not make the intended direction as the wind was yet again, on the nose.  We tacked several times over the rum line but weren’t getting very far.  After a day and night of battling against 40 knot winds, the wind veered to the west ,which allowed us to make Lands End.

Tuesday 14^th July 2009

We rounded Lands End as dawn broke, having had to make a couple of evasive manoeuvres to avoid large container ships.  The wind was now in the south-west and it was decided not to head for Isles of Scilly but to head back to Dartmouth.  We rounded the Lizard at about 7.00am and started a broad-reach along the south coast.  At times the log was reading 10 knots, the speed over ground, against the tide 8.5 knots.  We were flying.  The sun came out and for the first time on the journey we were enjoying the ride.  We were south of Prawle Point in large seas when Pete decided to do a ‘man overboard’ exercise.  We tied some rope to a cushion and threw it overboard.  Using our tried and tested, shorthanded man-overboard manoeuvre of heaving-to and using the engine we recovered the cushion first time.

We carried on our journey and with the tide against us, rounded Start Point and still doing 6 knots over ground.  We gybed into Start Bay and some calmer waters.  It was here that we realised the furling gear on the genoa had fell to pieces and the rope was tangled around the bottom of the forestay.  After battling with it, yet again, Pete decided the only thing to do was to pull it down and stow it down below.  This was quite difficult as the wind was very strong and the sail very big.

We arrived in Dartmouth at about 8.00pm and moored on the Town Quay totally knackered.  Dee and Judy were waiting for us in the Yacht Club with beers at the ready.

On reflection:

Fai Tira is a fantastic ocean going boat and has given us confidence in her.  The wind vane steering is brilliant and did all the helming for us and is now known as Denise, after Peter Durrance’s wife.  Pete being a great supporter of the trip.  Automatic Identification System (AIS) is a fantastic system and integrates perfectly with the Chartplotter.  Anyone thinking of doing long distance sailing would be advised to invest in this system.  Overall, despite a few dramas, the trip was a great success.  John and Pete worked well together and they are looking forward to using their new founds skills on their round the world adventure.