43°10'34.1"N 9°12'90.6"E

882 miles run

972 Miles since leaving Sandwich

 2^nd September 2022

It’s been a while and I am really struggling to get back into the flow of things with this blogging malarky. We are now in Spain having crossed Biscay last week and I am about 10 blogs behind and I think the only way I am going to catch up is to do a brief summary of what we have been up to since Harwich and then start properly from tomorrow.

12^th to 13^th July with Tommy and Chris aboard I did a return trip from Dover to Queenborough. All went well with the boat but when we got to Queenborough the Isle of Sheppey had no water and so all of the pubs were shut…..Disaster!! Anyway, we had fish and chips sitting on a bench in the park before bed and a trip back in the morning.

16^th to 23^rd July I took Spectra with Chris Rook and Steve King aboard up to Ramsgate so that she could perform corporate boat duties for the RTYC Ramsgate regatta. All didn’t go as planned due to the tragic death of one of the crew aboard a competing yacht and the corporate day being rightly cancelled as a show of respect. I did make myself useful however by acting as the radio operator of choice on the committee boat for the week.

27^th July to 2^nd August. Again, with Steve and Chris aboard I started the journey proper.

Day 1 Dover to Eastbourne.

Day 2 Eastbourne to Osbourne Bay Isle of Wight. Anchor for the night and we caught a fish 😊

Day 3 Osbourne Bay to Folly Inn, River Medina.

Day 4 Folly Inn to Newtown Creek. Anchor for the night. While at anchor we decided to give the new dinghy and outboard a test run. 30 minutes later 3 intrepid adventurers were aboard and chugging up the river in search of a pub. The pub was eventually found after a lovely walk across the national trust reserve and the local wares were tested several times. Unfortunately, while we were enjoying ourselves the sneaky tide went out and on returning to the dinghy we found it sitting in a sea of mud. There was nothing for it and off came the shoes before 3 drunken men dragged the dinghy ankle deep in ooze for about ½ a mile before we found water deep enough to float in. Then to add to the fun the propeller hit bottom and broke the shear pin meaning another ½ mile of rowing was needed before we got back to Spectra. Muddy, tired, still inebriated and probably none the wiser.

Day 5 Newtown Creek to Lymington Town for 2 nights. Clean, dinghy, clean ourselves, eat an excellent curry.

Steve left us after the first night in Lymington and I received news that Normas mother was now very ill indeed and not expected to last much longer and so Chris and I decided to take Spectra back up the river Medina on the isle of Wight and leave her there until things reached a conclusion. On the 2^nd of August I locked Spectra up and left her on the mid river pontoon in order to travel up to my son’s house. Chris and I parted company at Southampton train station with plans to meet up in the west country when Norma was back aboard and we were ready to go.

Norma and myself returned to Spectra an the 17^th of August after the sad loss of her mother and the funeral in Ireland. It’s such a shame that Betty will not be able to follow our adventures this time around as she took great pleasure in reading the blog last time and knowing that she is not following our travels leaves a hole that can’t be filled.

The master and commander returns.

19^th August Folly Inn to Newtown Creek. Anchor for the night.

20^th August Newtown Creek to Weymouth. We stayed in Weymouth for three nights and on the first night we heard a shout, “Is that Norma” from down river and Graham from the Royal Temple YC in Ramsgate came alongside aboard an Australian yacht called Whinaway (spelling? Sorry). They stayed for two nights and then Colin and Trish, friends from way back, joined us with their yacht Simtrisity for a night and a meal aboard Spectra before we headed out in the morning.

23^rd August Weymouth to Torquay. Long boring motor sail against the wind plus a complete shocker when we were presented with a £171 bill for two nights! As we had been quoted £85 for two nights on the phone I sent Norma in to bat. They stood no chance the poor unsuspecting fools, 30 minutes later we were settled in at the lower rate, bless her.

On the 24^th Chris Rook and Shaun Roper joined us as crew for the Biscay trip. The weather looked good and there was no reason to hang about and so we cast off our lines and set out the very next morning.

We arrived in La Caruna at 19:40 local time on the 28^th August and at last I felt that we were on our way again. The Biscay trip took 82 hours and was a mixture of down wind sailing and long periods of motoring. I could have hung about waiting for wind and saved on the fuel bill but you don’t mess about with Biscay, it looks a whole lot nicer when you’re looking back at it.  Shaun and Chris fell into the watch pattern of 2 on 6 off with a single 4 hour watch early evening for one person every 4 days to avoid repetition. See below if it makes sense.

Spectra as always behaved herself impeccably when it counted, and the only collateral damage was the main boom kicker ripped out of the mast in the swell and the topping lift attachment snapped. All repairable. Everyone had a go at cooking to Normas recipes and we certainly ate well as we chugged along in our little patch of ocean. Lots of dolphins joined us every day and no Orcas, which was a blessing. In fact, the only fly in the ointment was thick fog which descended about 30 miles outside of La Caruna and stayed with us all the way in and then through to lunchtime on the next day.

In La Caruna we met up with Terry and Carol, friends of Tommy and Sue our ever-loyal base camp team in Ramsgate. What a lovely couple they are. Terry gave us an aerial photographic book of the Galician coat which will come in very useful over the next few weeks I’m sure. We went out under their leadership and had a lovely Tapas meal followed by drinks in one of their watering holes. A very good night out was had by all.

The next morning Shaun had to fly back to blighty and although we all promised to get up and see him off by the time I dragged myself out of my pit at 0630 he was long gone. Anyway, he is a great crew and is more than welcome to join us again for the Atlantic crossing later in the year.

And now there were 3. On the morning of 31^st August we filled up with fuel replacing what had been burnt crossing Biscay, 254.84 Litres costing €523.70 or Bloody Nora!!! In the common tongue. And that was only ¼ of a tank for crying out loud. Visibly shaken Norma had to feed me with several cups of sweet tea before my hands stopped shaking enough to steer the boat out of the harbour, in the fog again of course. The fog cleared before we reached the headland and so we were able to wave to Terry and Carol who were hanging a red towel out of their apartment window as we motored by.

Next stop was Laxe about 25 miles along the coast, we anchored for the night before heading on again to Muxia in the morning in you guessed it, thick fog. Muxia was bigger than we remembered from our last trip and we had a very nice meal ashore in a BBQ meat fest. Our freezer has stopped working meaning even with lots of ice bags piled on top we are at serious risk of losing our stack of meat. On arriving at Muxia we asked about a mechanic and were told he would come down as soon as he had received a parcel delivery. 8 O’Clock that night he arrived and was a very pleasant man but unfortunately, he only did engines and so the freezer remains broken.

Today we sailed the whole 2 miles to Caraminas in search of a mechanic and I believe with all my heart that we have found the man that will solve all of our problems. Unfortunately, he won’t be here until tomorrow and so that is a story for another day.