35 hours of Firsts!

We are now in Fishguard. We left Porth Dinllaen on Saturday 3rd October at 3.30am and put the anchor down at Fishguard on Sunday at 2.20pm. Some of the firsts (at least on Vida):

• leaving an anchorage because it had become too uncomfortable
• picking up the anchor in the dark
• setting sail in the dark
• doplhins (twice)
• getting becalmed for 15 hours
• night watches
• a long beat to get to harbour

For several days we had planned/expected to leave Porth Dinllaen early on Saturday. It had been a good protected anchorage for strong (Force 7) winds from the south. On Saturday we had the only opportunity for quiet conditions in Cardigan Bay before some strong notherlies (when Porth Dinllaen is unprotected and would be very uncomfortable, even dangerous).

As expected at about 11pm on Friday the wind swung round from the South to North West and dropped significantly in strength. Even with the drop in strength the boat became really uncomfortable from about 2am, so much that we couldn't sleep in our aft cabin. After trying for a while in the saloon we gave up and at 2:30am we started to get ready to leave (4 hours earlier than planned). So we hoisted the main sail and the anchor, leaving at about 3:30am.

The wind continued to reduce but we were able to sail to the end of the Llyn penninsular, where Bardsey Island is separated by Bardsey Sound (with strong tides). We added some speed through the water with the electric motor to give more control and the waves (affected by the tide, the remnants of the strong southerly on Friday, and the wind waves from the NW) got quite confused and lumpy. Still we came through that tidal race with no problems, as soon as we were through the wind died to almost nothing.

It was then that we saw a large pod of about 50 dolphins coming towards us, they played around the boat, gettting really close on every side, for about 30 minutes. It was absolutely incredible. This was so excitring as we have never seen wild dolphins before and wondered why they avoid our boats 😀

In the end we remained becalmed to the south West of Bardsey Island from 9:30am until midnight. For most of that time we just bobbed around (rolling quite a lot) with one of us on watch in the wheelhouse while the other slept. It was a beautiful clear night, with a fantastic view of the stars and later a bright half moon.

We had decided to experiment with a flexible and quite short watch system that we had read about and adapted a little. When one of us is going off watch there are practical things that might need to be done (sail adjustments, go to the loo, make drinks or food, check weather, ...). None of that time is counted. When you get into the bunk to sleep you start a 90 minute timer. This means you get 90 minutes of quality sleep (unless the other needs to call you on deck, usually for a sail manouver), which is supposed to be optimal for a short refreshing sleep. Over 24 hours we each got about 7 of these and we found it worked well.

By midnight the wind had reappeared, gentle but consistent from the South West, we were able to start sailing (although not able to sail directly towards Fishguard). Until about 1pm the wind gradually strengthened to just Force 4 and changed direction to be come towards us directly from Fishguard. Of course during this time we had multiple tide changes (basically every 6 hours, some helping us, some trying to take us back to North Wales.

So we had a long, slow beat to windward to get into Fishguard harbour, we timed it just as a Stena Line Ferry was leaving but were able to keep well out of the way. Dave has probably brought us too deep into the harbour for the bigger tides at the end of the week (we will go around on Saturday unless we move a little), but we can easily move.

There is a lot we can do to improve the sailing. As expected there are teething and setup issues (for example sheets and halyards coming untied and slipping). However, despite that we made it all the way and even reached 7.8 knots at one point.

Also work is needed to improve the reliability of our NMEA 2000 data network (the VHF sometimes fails to get the position from the AIS and the Garmin Display often doesn't get the speed, occasaionally it also loses the depth).

We have a list of DIY projects over the next few days. Probably, the first focus is getting the most out of our solar power for a not very bright week. But we don't have so much to do on storage, nothing has fallen out despite some intensive rolling and heeling during this passage. Also Dave has got to write a week of Bible Studies ASAP.

Overall this was a challenging passage (especially with the time pressure to leave an anchorage that incoming weather will make unsafe), we are absolutely delighted with how it went, we are a lot closer to Plymouth as our winter base.