Yesterday New Zealand, today Norway
A year afloat: to the Caribbean and back
Sam and Alex Fortescue
Sun 10 Oct 2010 19:00
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43:08.029N
009:10.154W At last, we can see the corner of Europe. After a
14 hour motorsail from Cedeira, we've found an anchorage just a few miles from
Finisterre, where the journey turns south. The dreaded waves were nowhere to be
seen, although there was a big swell at times. The sun shone, the donk donked
and we caught a seagull.
Caught a seagull? The fish-shaped plug we were
trolling behind the boat proved of endless interest to seabirds because it
jigged about so close to the surface. Before we realised what had happened one
of the birds circling had dived, then resurfaced, and disappeared under the
water again being dragged by a wing. We turned the boat slowly round and went
back to help the desperate creature, which had got the hooks stuck through the
feathers in the middle of its wing. We managed to bring the beast onboard in a
fishing net set aside in case of tuna, then smothered the terrified bird in the
mainsail cover while I freed him from the hooks. Five minutes later he was back
in the sea, pride shattered but wing intact. He smelt of fish.
Our anchorage has the look of a Norwegian fjord. It
could be an absolute belter for the night, but we'll have to wait and see. You
never know if there's a fierce local current or mercurial winds. In any case, it
was exciting sailing in here at 7.30ish. We surfed down 5m swell and stalled
riding back up it. Huge waves broke with enormous foam on either side of the
entrance, before we turned into the ria in near perfect shalter.
All we have to do is decide on whether we do a long
hop south to Muros tomorrow or a shorter one to an anchorage called El
Sardineiro, just south of Finisterre. I think we'll sleep on
it...
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