Dawn over Biscay
Tillymint.fortescue
Sun 2 Aug 2009 19:12
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Sunday 2 August - Our first leg over Biscay in
progress as I type, all around is toning shades of grey. There have been light
winds, then no winds and not much traffic - all in all the feel of an out of
season ferry crossing. Even the skipper is reading his book as there's not much
going on. We set out before dawn and watched the sun rise over Raz de Sein and
the hours plod by towards our estimated arrival time at around 7pm this evening.
We are very diligent about filling out the log each hour with position, wind
speed etc and our latest bit of data gathering is water temperature, current
best is 17.9 degrees C - no where near enough to get Mummy in the water so we
plough on South.
Today has been good practice for dealing with time
at sea. It's calm enough to be down below and cold enough to not want to be up
top. We've each finished a book today and the littles are currently watching the
Sound of Music to while away the time. A little boredom setting in as we near
journey's end - or is it the anticipation of arrival?
A little aside to Sam & Alex - we have just
passed through the latitude of your wedding celebrations last year; flying was
quicker we concluded. On the topic of distance and time, I had just popped up
top to do the 5pm local time log (you probably didn't notice that I was
gone) and, to while away a moment longer, I worked out our sea miles covered
since we left Lymington. By the time we reach Belle Ile we will have sailed
330 nautical miles in 48 hours at sea over 13 days since leaving Lymington.
Compare and contrast this to the distance to go to reach The
Canaries:-
If we could sail as the crow flies (which is
already an ambitious and frankly unrealistic navigation across mainland
Spain) we would have 1328 miles still to go. That's four times the distance
covered already, another 2 months at our current rate...! When did
term start again, did I leave enough food for the cats? I am sure we can do
better than 2 days at sea each fortnight, the first 2 weeks did have some
special circumstances attached to them; but there are so many new places to stop
en route, it is tempting to linger. Will the next 4 weeks be about the arriving
or the journey.....????
STOP PRESS - 6pm - dolphins sighted off the port
bow - officially the highlight of the day!!
7.30pm - arrived safe and sound. Anchored
in the tranquil and beautiful bay of Sauzon on Belle Ile. The motley crew
are busy re-hoisting our Brittany flag which isn't flying very straight - can't
have that on a well shaped ship. Anchor ball up, supper cooking, wine poured and
no need to defrost or wring out the skipper this evening so the weather must be
getting better. The optimistic fisherman is assembling his rods, might
be mackerel for breakfast...???
ps - as part of a larder clearing excercise I
brought a lonesome Christmas pudding from home which we have just eaten for pud.
This feels a bit bizarre for France in August and the littles requested that
this strange event be recorded.
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