Day 12 May 27 Padstow to Milford Haven

Vega
Irving & Cate Benjamin
Sun 27 May 2012 21:00

Departure time from Padstow is strictly limited by the harbour tidal gate opening, so we had planned ahead to leave on the first opening (0900), refuel on the harbour wall, and start our long passage to Milford Haven in Pembrokeshire. Refuelling was a bit of a nightmare, lying against a very rough outer harbour wall with metal ladders barely protected by rubber tyres, while the HM lowered the fuel pipe down to the boat 20ft below to fill up.  50 litres later, amd with a full tank, we set off again over the Doom Bar and once we had cleared Pendeen Head we had a single course of 350deg Mag for over 70 nM to the Milford Haven Approaches.  Over a course of this length there is little point in making tide adjustments because there will be an offset to east and about the same to west before we strike land, so (motoring of course - after 2 days of F5-6 there was NO wind at all) we set the Autohelm and relaxed in the sun.  In the late afternoon we spotted our first dolphins, who to our huge pleasure played around Vega for the best part of an hour.  Cate and I both photographed and video'd away from the bow until our batteries ran dry, and still they played, twisting and turning under the bow, charging up at speed from behind and leaping singly or in twos and threes of elegant synchronised swimming.  The photos can hardly do the experience justice, but Cate was quick to upload some video to Facebook, where 'our' dolphins have been much admired by many FB friends. I attach one picture (from Cate's Samsung Galaxy phone, which has a better camera than my camera!), and also one of Cate doing the filming.  (Spot the two 'deliberate' mistakes in the other one of Cate at the bow by the way!)  The dolphins returned an hour later for a reat performance, and we were to comment on our next dolphin day (see later) that they seemed to arrive on the hour, give us a show, and then speed off into the distance.  It was dark when we finally made the enormous estuary harbour of Milford Haven (we did not fly a Welsh courtesy flag, I'm afraid, despite this being the land and indeed county of Cate's father) and navigating upriver in the dark through the huge docks and refineries was rather daunting, including being asked to make way by a Pilot Boat for a gigantic tanker leaving her berth.  After several attempts we were glad to get a response from the Marina harbourmaster, and followed leading lights to a large lock which was open to free flow - a piece of good luck for us - and he actually came down to the pontoon to meet us in and take our line.  It was now 2215 so we settled for a snack and retired after 14 hours and 75 Nautical Miles, which brought us up to 500M since the start of our adventure.
(PS: for those who don't know, a Nautical Mile is about 1.25 Statute Miles.
Oh, and the 'deliberate mistakes' ?  Cate is wearing no lifejacket at sea on the bow of the boat, and to make matters worse in her haste to get the dolphin pictures, is in her CARPET SLIPPERS!)

JPEG image

JPEG image