So we’re in our winter berth in Whitehaven. An easy motorboat ride up from Wales and even the scarily named “Swellies” in the Menai Strait proved to be an easy obstacle. We did manage a little bit of sailing, but with the wind on the nose, we were not making a good course, so we opted for the feeble way out – as we had to catch the tide right when arriving in Whitehaven.

We settled down to some jobs that needed to be done before Laurie jumps ship to head back to the US, so we got all the sails off and folded. Some work needed so we’ll take them over to Goacher Sails on the basis of a couple of recommendations (thank you!).

I then set about dismantling the Generator so that we could lift it out into the cockpit where I could separate generator from engine. The generator apparently needs rewinding. Getting the thing out is not too complex unless you’re a complete and utter idiot like me.

Fortunately, the generator will lift straight out through the cockpit locker and we can use the boom as a lifting gantry. I set up the main halyard onto the outhaul car and strapped a 6:1 vang pulley between the boom and the generator and started hauling. I couldn’t quite separate the exhaust coupling, so had Laurie winch the halyard up. She put everything into it, but no go, we couldn’t lift it.

Laurie started pestering me with silly questions about how I had it set up which I batted off, deciding instead that she’d lost too much muscle tissue in all our recent lazy days! I asked her to have another heave – and she did. Loud crack. Generator settles back down on it’s mounts (with my finger trapped – fortunately no damage). Oops… When I come up to the cockpit, I find that the outhaul has somehow flown forward – thereby letting the boom down a bit. We stop and think. I’m clueless.

Laurie goes below somewhat frustrated (and no doubt annoyed) and then comes back up with more pissy little questions… How’ve you got this thing rigged?? It wasn’t that difficult last time!

YOU IDIOT! If you want to raise the boom, you’d best let off the mainsheet first!!!

10 minutes later, with halyard attached to the topping lift eye, the generator is easily lifted and sitting on the cockpit seat… Now, I wonder what’s wrong with the outhaul…?

We arrived in Wales at the Menai Straits – a canal that runs between Wales and Anglesey. We were keen to visit the Straits for a few reasons – Felinheli is home to two OCC boats, Three Ships (Chris and Fi) and Ocean Hobo (Ian and Linda). I’d met Ian and Linda in Antigua, and then we met them all on the Azores Pursuit. Fi is also on the OCC committee – so we had lots to talk about! At the north east end of the straits lies the university town of Bangor – where I studied Agriculture for a misguided year. It also has the benefit of being located close to Snowdonia National Park and finally, I have two nieces (Cass and Alice) that live in the area with their families. Lots of reasons to visit!

It’s about 12 miles end to end…

Laurie, Chris, Linda, Ian, Fi, Bill

Fi and Chris were wonderful – arranging a mooring for us at Felinheli and then hosting us wonderfully with ferry to the grocery store, doing our laundry and feeding us! They are the Regional Rear Commodores for the UK and take the role very seriously. They have been seriously great hosts! Yesterday, Chris dropped us off in the middle of Snowdonia (maybe he’s trying to get rid of us?) allowing us to do a superb walk on a crystal clear day!

That’s Snowdon in the background

Mountains and Valleys

Moel Eilio to Llanberis

The mooring proved interesting – especially at the reversal of the tide when we had strong wind against tide setting up a very nasty chop – so much so that it was extremely challenging boarding from the dinghy. In the end we began to chafe through one of the mooring strops, and with heavier wind due in a couple of days (storm ‘Callum’), we decided to take advantage of the marina facilities and we’re now shoe-horned into the marina.

We rented a car for the weekend and stayed a night with Simon and Sally Currin in their beautiful house near Montgomery. Simon is OCC Vice Commodore, sally used to be treasurer and we had some interesting OCC debates (I lost) and followed it up with a lovely walk the following morning. On the way back, we stopped in for unexpected dinner at Cass and Graham’s mansion – they bought a massive fixer-upper in Bala and have done a magnificent restoration job on it. It’s a very comfy home.

We were certainly pleased to have moved into the marina – when Callum arrived, he did so with a bang – and 72 knot gusts! Fortunately the highest we saw in the Marina was just 37… Outside on the moorings the boats were heeling like crazy, 2 sank at their moorings, one looks like he’ll lose his mainsail another looks like the Genoa will take some serious repair.

Menai     If you click the link, there’s a short video of the conditions below…

Blowing in the mooring field…

Well Heeled!

Today we have Alice and her throng (including newbie Agatha!) visit Toodle-oo! and then in a couple of days we’ll be off for our final passage of the year – across the dreaded Irish Sea to Whitehaven, our winter berth in Cumbria.

As we left Crookhaven on the southwest corner of Ireland, we weren’t sure if we were going to make it a little way up the coast to Castletownshend, or rather further to Kinsale – or even possibly head off for an overnight passage to Wales! We quickly dropped the idea of Wales since we were planning to arrive in Caernarfon, at the southern end of the Menai Straights – which prove to be a significant navigational challenge, requiring optimal weather and being in time with the tides to cross Caernarfon Bar – we’d leave that challenge for another day. Instead we opted for Kinsale – cruising mecca of Ireland. We had a super sail, in lovely weather – beam reaching in 15 knots!

We’d been to Kinsale before – in 2013 – when we tied alongside at the yacht club. This year, being cheap skates now, we decided to anchor a little upstream of the yacht club. We found a spot with plenty of swinging room, anticipating needing a lot of scope to contend with the current that can flow here…  we deployed the anchor and it immediately disappeared under our keel and we were abruptly brought up short as it bit. The wind against tide was playing havoc with our technique – especially when I got the snubber attached – which went down our starboard side, while the chain went down the port side! This just wasn’t going to work, so we opted for the middle ground and took a relatively low cost £10/night visitor’s mooring.

At our last visit to Kinsale, OCC Port Officer Flor Long outdid himself by getting our American propane bottles filled. Unfortunately for us, Flor was in England for a Grandson’s christening, but Dingle PO Harvey Kenny once again came to our rescue and whisked us off to the propane store, where unfortunately we learned that the filling opportunity no longer exists. We’ll have to make other arrangements when we get to Whitehaven.

Harvey was again a super host and took us into Cork University where he studied law. It was lovely to wander around the gracious old limestone buildings with throngs of young students making their way to classes.

We met up with Layton and Meghan, a young American couple living and working in Kinsale, with aspirations to go cruising… It was certainly nice to be able to offer encouragement to such a lovely couple – I hope they get out there and enjoy the freedom of cruising.

We were in Kinsale for just under a week when the winds blew favorably for us to head along the south coast and position ourselves for a short crossing to Menai right at the south west corner of Ireland in Dunmore East. We anchored there and stayed a couple of nights – it was pretty enough, but not much to do… Our weather window to Menai opened up and we did an overnight passage using the favorable tides in the horrible Irish Sea, and arrived right on high tide at Caernarfon Bar, with almost no wind, so its’ crossing was uneventful. We’re back in the UK…