Audierne to Anse Pen Hir then Camaret sur Mer - 20th August 2013

We left StEvette  to undertake the 25 Miles trip to Anse Pen Hir and thence to Cameret Sur Mer. 
This involves sailing through the Raz De Seine, a piece of water around the headland that can be rough but on this occasion it was fairly benign and we made the passage without much trouble or incident.

 

Leavin Audierne

 

 

Standing Stones at Cameret

 

Ruins at Camaret

 

 

While moored in Camaret we took a bus trip to Brest to have a look around the various historical parts of the city.  There is quite a lot to see.  A lot from Napoleonic times right up to WW2 and the present day.

 

 

 

Pete with an attack of crabs

 

Brest Castle

 

An expensive tram ride

 

Lifting bridge

 

Castle Keep



 



 

Lochtudy to Audierne - Sun 18th Aug

Firstly I apologise for the delay in getting the blog finished as life has now returned to normal having been home for 3 weeks, but in the interests of completeness I am finishing off the blog.

Much of the coastline here has been covered on the way down so I'll concentrate on the bits that were either interesting or memorable from our point of view.

Lochtudy to Audierne involves sailing around yet another headland, the area of water that takes you round the main headland before entering the bay taking you north to Audierne.  The wind was in the North West so we motored for an hour or so before we could get an angle to sail.  The Ras can be rough but this day there was quite a swell but there were no white horses so the sailing was quite good if a little bit uncomfortable.

 

Nanuk in the swell

 

 

On a Buoy in St.Evette on River entrance at Audierne

 

 

While at St.Evette we took a bus trip to Quimper.  The bus cost us 8 euritos for the two of us.  The bus stopped in the town at Quimper which is a city with rivers an bridges everywhere.  With ancient buildings some of which date back to the 1400s.

 

 

Market Square - Quimper

 

River at Quimper

 

Stained Glass Window in the Cathedral - Quimper

 

Quimper - A street view

 

Much of this part of France was devastated during WW2 and so when they re-built after the war they tried to retain as much as possible of the old medieval city and they have done a wonderful job.  It';s amazing that the Cathedral was hardly damaged!

 

 

Façade of the Gothic Cathedral at Quimper



 

River Aven to Lochtudy - Saturday 17th August (Pete's mad day)

Anchoring in the river Aven overnight was very pleasant but the river isn't very deep and we were not able to travel up river so we decided to move swiftly on to the next port called Lochtudy

 

Harbour mouth - Lochtudy

 

 

Lochtudy was a delightful harbour but a bit of a walk to the town.  We went to the harbour facilities looking for a café to have lunch but the only one there had stopped serving food so we had a rehydrating ale before walking the one and a half kilometres to the town to find lunch.  We walked up the main street and found a very delightful restaurant who were still serving so we took a table for four.  Pete ordered wine for us all and we eat lunch, he then was rewarded with a glass of schnapps (which tasted like rocket fuel) after which he decided that it would be good to have Crepes with Rum. 

 

The waitress wanted to serve the crepe flaming, like crepe suzette, but the wind kept blowing out the lighter, however she eventually got it flaming and Pete tucked in.  It's unlike him normally but by this time there was a distinct and immovable grin developing on his face.

 

 

Crepes avec Rhum

 

 

Cleansing Ale

 

The thing is that Pete is always a complete gent.  He always wants to help and will do anything you ask of him so when we got back to the boat, and a couple of cleansing ales later his desire to help was very much present but his level of usefulness had somewhat tailed off.  It was quite strange because the pontoons were moving up and down a bit with the swell of the water and I was finding it a bit unsteady but Pete didn't appear to notice at all.  I think he was swaying in harmony with the pontoon giving an air of sobriety rarely seen amongst sailors.  Apart from the near miss when one of his sandals got tangled in a guard wire, nearly curtailing his manhood a good time was had by all.

The Weather

As you can imagine the weather has a huge bearing on where and when you sail.  There are three main factors which are crucial to the skipper when deciding to set sail:

• Wind strength and direction
• Temperature and conditions e.g. fog; rain; sun etc
• Sea state

Each of the above can contribute to the success of a passage plan but the wind direction can be the most frustrating.  On a short trip you can motor or tack against a head wind but for a cruising sailor on a longer passage this is often not practical/desirable so you end up delaying and delaying, waiting for a favourable wind direction.

The skipper of a yacht has to have ready access to weather forecasts for the area.  20 years ago you basically only had the BBC and its' shipping forecast (for the UK) but over the years the maritime authorities world wide have developed a system called GMDSS (Global maritime distress and safety system) and this includes a radio based system called NAVTEX.  Basically navtex sends out a text message containing any safety and weather information in your area.  Typically you'll get the shipping forecast and the inshore waters forecast along with loads of information about other maritime issues in your area.  Buoys that have been moved, ships in distress, firing times for ordnance testing along the coasts etc.  So if you are within transmission range of one of the NAVTEX stations, and if you have a navtex receiver you can get a weather view for a period giving a 24 hour forecast and an outlook for the following 24hrs.  On channel crossings you will also get the French equivalents of our shipping and inshore forecasts.

However with the advent of tinternet there is a whole myriad of other specialised sailing weather sites that you can look up if you have a connection via 3G or WIFI so it stands to reason that the main topic of conversation in the marinas is the weather.  Yachties comparing notes on which forecasts they've seen and which they trust.  Most get it right some of the time and wrong some of the time but there seems to be a shift this year that has caught many holiday sailors by surprise.

The English Channel during the summer months would normally present sailors with a south-westerly air flow generated by high pressure over the Azores working in tandem with depressions flowing over the north Atlantic and Scotland - if you stand with your back to the wind the low pressure is always on your left (Buys Ballot's law) hence the SW wind.  This year we have had high pressure regions much further north one over Ireland and one over Scandinavia causing a squeeze and resulting in a northerly airflow blowing across the channel making it difficult for sailors to cross from Brittany to the UK.

Our crossing was being delayed so I e-mailed Simon Keeling (a TV weather specialist who has an interest in sailing) and asked if he had any idea when we might get a westerly or south-westerly and he replied saying early a.m. on Thursday 29th Aug but that it would only last for about 1 or 2 days so we decided that that was the day to choose for our crossing otherwise we would be stuck for at least another week.

We left Roscoff at about 1600 French time on a passage of about 140 nautical miles to Studland Bay near Poole where we eventually anchored at approximately midnight on Friday 30th. a trip of 28 hours.

The Meerkat powered by Duracell

A troop of Meerkats are in many ways like a troop of people, always busy and always on the lookout and some people are always involved, doing something, on a mission, checking the horizon, things to do, people to see, having endless energy and so on - well we have nicknamed Carla as THE MEERKAT LEADER and I'm sure she has a large Duracell implanted somewhere to maintain the necessary energy levels.

You know in the Terminator films the indestructible cyborg rides along on his Harley scanning from side to side picking up on any information, clue or threat - well that is what Meerkats do.  They scan left and right to pick up early warning of stuff on the horizon.

 

Meerkat troop on the move

When we arrive at places and tie up there is less than a nanosecond before the Meerkat troop leader's instinct takes over.  A visit to the capitainery provides a photographic memory of the BUS TIMETABLE, a copy of the town map and the location of every tourist information office in the county.  There is no time for complacency, the time is nigh to make a round trip to wherever looks interesting, to sound out the restaurants, find the best beach, buy the French bread, top up the internet sim card and translate for all the English Yachties who are completely incompetent at communicating with the natives.

I'm not 100% sure if it's true because it all happens before daybreak but I think a typical morning routine for a Meerkat troop leader is as follows:

Rise
S**t Shave and Cut a Cabbage
Swim the channel
Ride the tour de France
Bake bread
Polish the boat windows and wash out the cockpit
Change the engine oil
Scale the mast to check the VHF aerial
While up there scan the horizon for boats arriving and boats leaving
Brew ale for rehydrating various troop members
Catch mackerel for dinner and act as bread fairy, delivering baguettes and croissants to the sleeping masses.

And that is all done whilst listening to the today programme on Radio Wrinkly.

Once the plan for the day has been formulated the schedule starts and the troop follows its leader along in her wake, which is all to the good because we'd probably only see a quarter of everything if she wasn't there getting us all motivated and leading the way.

The only thing that seems to be able to divert a Meerkat from its' planned course is a POSTCARD shop.  We'll be all striding along to see the next view, castle, lighthouse or museum when suddenly the lead Meerkat will disappear off sideways from the planned course into a tabac and emerge with numerous postcards - then the hunt is on for stamps and a post box.  Once this need has been satisfied the troop will be re-directed back to its' original objective.

One cultural aspect of Meerkat life is the importance of sport.  The preferred sport of the adult Meerkat is the sport of POOSTICKS.  We've seen this played in the past at Tilford in Surrey but here in Quimper it is a new concept and the French can't quite comprehend the rules.  The idea that you drop a stick into a flowing river and time its transit down stream to the other side of the bridge seemed just too exciting for them and it resulted in the number of spectators being quite limited.

 

The Start is all important

 

The finish is electofying

The only thing that appears to disrupt or dent the determination of the Troop leader is when the Wi-Fi won't work.  When you key in your password and the little tombstones say you're connected but then the internet can't be browsed, the Meerkat goes into a state of decline.  The ever optimistic upright stance begins to sag and such expletives as BOTHER and OH DEAR are heard to utter from her direction. It's worse when my old steam laptop connects first time but her new FLAT BRAIN can't be made to work at all.

But credit where credit is due, the Meerkat isn't down for long, she just diverts onto the next objective and we find ourselves following the wake again.

 

Carla

Not like her mother at all  !!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ile de Groix to River Aven - 16th August

Having stayed at Ile De Groix for a few days we were wanting a change of scenery and we had decided to start making for home so Chris and I set sail in the morning for the River Aven.  The sail across was uneventful (no it wasn't it rained!!) and we arrived at Port Menach at about mid afternoon.  The fact that it is called Port Menach doesn't really indicate that it's a port as it is quite shallow and there is no marina so we anchored in the river and waited for Nanuk to arrive.  P and C had decided to leave Ile De Groix later and so they arrived about 2 hours after us but half way there they were caught in a torrential downpour which cut visibility dramatically and forced them to don oilies for the latter half of the trip.

 

Rainy

 

Port Menach

 

Menach sea wall

 

 

Skyline

 

Sunrise

 

 

View up the River Aven

FOG - every sailor's nightmare

Today Pete and Carla departed L'Aberwrac'h to sail to England (probably Falmouth or Plymouth depending on the wind).  After about 5 hours we got a text saying that they had abandoned the trip due to poor visibility and they were sailing to ROSCOFF instead.

Fog at sea in a small boat is un-nerving.  You feel as though you are totally alone until you hear that fog horn.  When you hear one you cannot easily determine how far off it is of what direction.  You can't see so you can't identify it (unless you have radar or AIS) and you have no idea if they are aware of your existence on their radar.

The rules of thumb are if you get into fog:

• Nav lights on.
• Engine ticking over and ready.
• Everyone on deck to keep look out.
• Reduce speed but maintain steerage.
• Use fog horn.
• If you have radar have it on.  (We have one)
• Wear wet weather gear and lifejackets
• If you are worried contact the coastguard and report your position speed and course
• Navigator to keep a record of position every few minutes
• For a small boat, if possible move to shallow water where ships can't go

When we made our northbound transit of the Chenal Du Four we were engulfed in a fog bank which was completely unexpected.  We implemented the rules of thumb and stuck to our course on the GPS but I had set a waypoint quite close to what I thought was a channel marker.  The tide was running at about 5 knots and when we got close it loomed out of the fog and was actually a huge concrete pillar about 20 ft high and the tide was dragging us towards it.  Luckily we had our engine running and were able to drive away from it - quite un-nerving!!!!  While we were in the fog there were about 12 other boats in the vicinity and their fog horns were quite confusing as they all sounded the same and were coming from all around us.

We left for L'Aberwrach from Camaret on Friday 23rd August and we are still here waiting for a weather window.

 

Chanal du Four without fog

 

1/2 hour later our visibility was 25 feet (seriously worrying)

 

You might say why go out in fog - well, it was not forecasted.