We arrived in Porto on October 1^st after a frustrating light wind sail/motor from Baiona. The fishing pots were far less dense than we feared – I guess once one has sailed in Maine, anything else is just plain tame – though it was frustrating here that while some pots were very clearly marked, others were definitely camouflaged!

Not knowing any better, we’d arranged a berth at Marina Douro – a nice enough marina, but we could have stayed outside the marina on an anchor – or even gone up river and anchored right in the heart of Porto, which is a delightful city. Marina Douro is a couple of miles west of Porto and right at the entrance to the river – which meant that we’d be able to cycle into Porto. One good thing about the marina was that they offered a free Port tasting at Churchill’s!

Kopke – Oldest Port House

A nice selection!

Port – Courtesy of the Marina!

Another fine selection!

Too true!

Porto is a lovely city and we enjoyed just strolling around – but managed a port tasting at Kopke – the oldest Port wine house as a precursor to the following day’s visit to Churchill’s. We also got to spend an evening enjoying a fantastic musical evening listening to Fado. We were treated to a traditional Fado trio of Guitarist, Portuguese Guitarist and a singer in a small cellar environment which turned out to have perfect acoustics for the event. If you’ve not listened to Fado, it’s a somewhat acquired taste – we can’t understand a word of what she’s singing, but are absolutely aware that the songs are totally and utterly tragic 90% of the time! This group did not disappoint in any way.

Rather empty restaurant 🙁

Narrow street of Porto

Porto Streets

More little alleyways

Inside the Cathedral

The Cathedral

Boats used to bring port from Duro Valley down to Porto

We met up with a couple of Dutch boats: Karin and Eric on Mareliefs and Frans and Femke on Skellig. We enjoyed an evening aboard Toodle-oo! and would find ourselves bumping into them again and again as we travelled south.

We only spent three days in Porto – which could have easily been a week – but a weather window opened up with very favorable wind for heading south to Cascais – 170nm or so to the south, so we departed early on the 4^th, followed out of the river by a 44ft catamaran ‘Windwatcher’. With fairly light wind, we wasted a bit of time with a spinnaker for a few minutes, but then decided our code zero would work better and set off with Windwatcher on our beam having caught up during our change of sails. It was like the two boats were on a long bungee cord for the longest time – he’d get ahead then we’d catch up… he finally blasted away from us as the wind strengthened and we were forced to furl the code zero and set a genoa. We lost sight of them during the night, but as we turned dead downwind for Cabo Rasso in the morning, sailing wing on wing, we quickly caught up to Windwatcher and blasted past them as they gybed each way on their way south. As we rounded the cape, the wind died completely and we motored into Cascais and anchored outside the marina among a good crowd of cruising boats.

Cascais is another very pretty town – this one quite affluent and rather more modern than those in the Rias. Simon and Jenny on Fenetia were in the Marina and know Cascais well and were able to act as wonderful tour guides – so we spent the next 10 days there in Cascais – including a couple of nights in the marina while some nasty weather passed over us.

Cascais Harbour

Toodle-oo! and Fenitia

We broke out the bikes for a ride along the coast – but unfortunately, the finger piers of the dock are narrow and wobbly and my new Brompton bike ended up in the drink! I dived to get it but couldn’t see a thing in the murky water, but with Simon’s help, managed to retrieve the errant bike with our new dinghy anchor! After a good hose down and liberal spraying with anti corrosion stuff, we were able to get in a couple of enjoyable bike rides.

Doesn’t look good…

Rescued!

Lovely ride along the coast

Our new Dutch friends were also in Cascais, along with another Dutch boat – Blue Beryl, with a  lovely young couple aboard, setting out on a circumnavigation… As I write this, they have already arrived in St. Lucia in the Caribbean! We tried to organize a Dinghy drift in the harbor, but then realized that we’d be violating all sorts of social distancing mandates, so unfortunately scrapped those plans – and instead gave our livers a workout with Fenetia!

Commerce Square – downtown Lisbon

Laurie and the dude on the horse…

We sailed over to Lisbon and took a berth at Parque de Nacoes – a marina built for a past world expo – and stayed a couple of nights only so that we could go into Lisbon (by bus) to rekindle memories of our visit there in 2003. Turns out very few memories remain! We like Lisbon – but it left us with a feeling of being somewhat exposed to C-19 with significant crowds and having to travel by bus – so we decided to make our way south on another overnight sail to the Algarve.

We had a fast and bumpy dead downwind sail for most of the way, but with few other boats around us, so no racing opportunities! We were planning to head to Lagos, but instead saw what looked to be a decent anchorage right after Cape St. Vincent (the southwest corner of Portugal) – called Enseada de Sagres.

Cape St. Vincente

Our pilot information said that this anchorage is very rolly, but when we arrived there were other boats there and everything was very calm. We spent 3 nights at anchor, getting off to explore the small village and have a decent clifftop walk – but by the 3^rd night, the wind had swung towards the south east and we were experiencing the heavy swell – so we moved around the corner to Baleeira where we hoped we’d get some relief from the sea wall. It worked, but by morning the wind had come up significantly and there was now a large swell in the harbor breaking dramatically on the rocks just a 100M behind us! Time to leave!

Cliff-top Walk

Anchorage at Sagres (while calm!)

We arrived in Lagos – just 13 miles away – with a strong onshore breeze and swell. As we approached the entry, we were following another sailboat into the harbor – and it was difficult to know what to watch – the sailboat in front of us that had just been rolled broadside in a big roller, or the numerous surfers enjoying the rollers on either side of the harbor entrance!! It took a certain amount of concentration but once we were in the channel to the marina, everything calmed and we were able to easily tie up to the reception pontoon.

We’d stay in Lagos for a couple of nights…

We spent the whole of September in Spain – starting with a welcome weekend off the boat visiting Bas and Agnes in their new Spanish farmhouse, while Toodle-oo! was moored at Portosin Marina. Their new farmhouse is quite the place with lots of land with mature apple and fig trees and vines, a lovely old building with 2 kitchens plus a huge wood burning bread oven in it’s own dedicated shed – Laurie was swooning over it but apparently neither Bas nor Agnes are into the idea of becoming bakers! Their whole cruising plan aboard Tisento has been completely upended as their boat is still in Australia, but they’re not allowed in! So they purchased this place and plan to renovate in stages. We had a lovely weekend and they gave us a wonderful tour around the impressive scenery – so much more rugged than we had anticipated.

Bas and Agnes

The View

Monastery

Once back on the boat, we moved just a short way south to an anchorage off a lovely beach and found ourselves surrounded by 6 other foreign boats – French, British and Swiss. We tried to get some social activity going with the Brits, but sadly, they were feeling rather exposed to C-19 and declined.

We dodged around various anchorages according to wind direction – which gave us opportunities to visit various different locales within Ria de Muros and finally returned to the first anchorage we’d visited: Ensenda de San Francisco which was convenient for our next hop south to Ria de Arousa – but the swell forced us to put out a stern anchor to keep the boat pointing into the swell – so as not to get kicked out of bed! Overnight, we got inundated with a bazillion tiny little black flies – the boat was covered in dead or dying bodies!

We motored south to Ria de Arousa, through a pretty narrow but easily navigated channel and anchored off the beach at Rubeira with 1 other boat. (I can imagine that in normal years there’d be more like 50 boats anchored here!) There’s a decent marina at Rubeiro, which we were able to use to land the dinghy and go walkabout. Ribeira is a larger town, not so touristy, but with good shopping opportunities.

Ribeira

On our second night at anchor, I was out in the cockpit and suddenly realized things were quiet – too quiet… the dinghy was gone! The painter was still attached to Toodle-oo! but the shackle at the dinghy had loosened up. I made a frantic call to the marina (at 10pm) and had a barely understood conversation with Manuel, but concluded that he didn’t understand… Not much to be done in the dark, so we went to bed… In the morning, I called the coast guard and after about 30 minutes of trying, finally managed to raise them. Half an hour later, I got a call back from them that the dinghy was located and would be towed back to Toodle-oo! in an hour… and an hour later it was tied alongside again!!!  Turns out, Manuel, using binoculars the previous night had spotted the dinghy heading out towards the Atlantic, got into a rib and towed it back to the marina – where the coast guard “rescued” it the following morning! Needless to say, Manuel was thanked profusely and hopefully enjoyed the liquid goodies!

Once again, we moved anchorages according to wind direction, thereby getting a good looksee around the various aspects of the ria. Initially we headed up to Enseada do Caraminal where we anchored off another far too deserted beach where there were just three other boats anchored – including ‘Acid Rain’ with a young couple aboard, Alex and Irena, fresh out on a cruising experience…

Across the ria from there, there’s a little town Xufre, with an anchorage on north and south sides of a causeway-like feature… we were able to stay on the north anchorage – but it was rather bumpy with fishing boat traffic. Unfortunately the southern anchorage was too small to accomodate our final nights in Ria do Arousa, so we ended up moving back to Ribeira in preparation for our trip to the next ria.

Xufre Harbour

Xufre Seaweed

Xufre Anchorage

We managed to actually sail to Ria de Pontevedra – almost right up to the very pretty town of Combarro – where we anchored close to Acid Rain again in just 2.5M of soft mud. Combarro is a beautiful old town with numerous little back alleys and cut-throughs with bars and restaruants hidden away – but sadly unpopulated due to C-19.

Combarro

Narrow Streets

Deserted hole-in-the-wall bar 🙁

Cut-throughs

Combarro

Our final stop in Spain was in Baiona where we anchored outside the marina. We’d been warned of sunken moorings which come up to attack at low tide – and indeed, one very large mussell infested buoy showed up the morning after our arrival, but fortunately just outside our anchoring circle!

Baiona

Laurie finds her Paella!

The fort at Baiona is very impressive and must have been really interesting during it’s heyday. We enjoyed an overly priced drink at the hotel now situated within the fort’s walls – with a stunning view across the bay. We also managed to find an excellent Paella in town!!!

We’d have stayed a day or two longer in Baiona, but a weather window was very favorable for a trip south to Porto – a full day of sailng we were anxious to complete in daylight so that we could watch for fish pots – which apparently are all over the place on this passage…

Stealin’ Time – Pam and Tom

We ended up staying on the dock in Dingle for 8 days – bringing our time in Ireland to 15 days – but still not allowed off the boat as Ireland (or at least many of her ports) are closed to all foreign vessels. We were going a bit stir-crazy, so once the weather had eased, we decided to head to a nice anchorage by Valentia with an opportunity for a mini gathering with OCC boat Stealin’ Time (Tom and Pam) who we’d last seen in Antigua in 2016 – they duly arrived and shared a beverage aboard Toodle-oo! and regailed us with their recent anchorage experience in which they’d seen gusts to 63 and had dragged twice during the night! Ouch! It was great to be able to meet up with cruising pals – the first since August of last year (Ocean Hobo)!

Passing the Skelligs

The weather forecast was continuing to give us problems – but a ‘sort-of’ window was opening to allow a crossing of Biscay the following morning – BUT it would be boisterous with tailwinds of 25 gusting to 40 and heavy seas. The alternative was not clear – with no crossing opportunities for the forseeable forecast future – another 10 days stuck aboard Toodle-oo! was not particularly enthralling! We hummed and haaaed all morning and it wasn’t until the anchor actually came up that we committed to the crossing.

A ‘crossing’ it was! Fortunately, the wind came in behind us and stayed there pretty much the whole trip. The waves were around 3 – 4 meters and slightly across – so the ride was extremely unpleasant with both of us feeling queezy for the first 48 hours. Fortunately, the rain stayed away, so we were able to stay in the cockpit fairly comfortably and avoided a meeting with Ralph and Huey! We arrived in A Coruña just 3 days 4 hours later – with an average speed of some 7.4 knots – and just 5% usage of the engine!

The Haircut

We anchored off a pretty beach in the north of the ria for a few days – which included a trip by dinghy into A Coruna and a hircut for Laurie…

The Aftermath

The Result

Fenitia – Jenny and Simon

We moved to the Marina to await the arrival of Simon and Jenny aboard Fenetia. Our second gathering in under a week! They arrived having suffered a pretty nasty crossing of Biscay too – from northern Britany. We had a lovely couple of days catching up with them and enjoyed a fabulous lunch. Our livers took a serious beating over the course of our gathering!

A Coruna Square

We stayed an extra day in A Coruña exploring the old city and then decided to take advantage of mild weather to get around Cape Finisterre – which unfortunately turned into a 13 hour motoring extravaganza! However, we’d prefer no wind to too much – though could have done without the fog that persisted from the cape right up to our destination in Ria de Muros. Once again, we caught up with Fenetia and once again the livers suffered!

Muros Street

Muros

Tidal Grain Mill in Muros

Looking towards Muros

Muros is a lovely old city with narrow streets and alleyways and we’ve been enjoying fabulous weather – though it’s somewhat tiresome having to wear masks everywhere we go.

Looking after the souls lost at sea

Fat Cat!

Tomorrow we’ll head into Portosin marina, where we’ve arranged rental of their car (35 Euros) and will head inland to meet Bas and Agnes (of Tisento) who are estranged from their boat which is in Australia, but who have just purchased a property in the Rias – boy are we getting to be sociable!!! (And we get to bring our laundry!!!)

We continued our trip down the Caledonian Canal – having good weather and taking our sweet time. There wasn’t much traffic on the canal this year and social distancing made it a pretty unsociable event – though we were able to chat with other boats while transiting the locks.

Down the Caledonian Canal

One overnight stopping place

With a view of Ben Nevis

We nearly missed our opportunity for the final drop into Corpach through ‘Neptune’s Staircase’ – a series of 9 locks one after the other – we’d been expecting a 9 – 9:30am departure, but suddenly noticed other boats piling into the lock at 8:00! Fortunately, we managed to get it together and join the group for the ride down.

Neptune’s Staircase

Quite difficult managing the staircase as I was ashore handling bow and stern lines while Laurie drove the boat – but to make it more challenging, the lady handling the lines for the boat behind us needed assistance (geometry of the lock made it impossible for her) – so I was sort of looking after 2 boats!

We made it and then motored in zero wind down Loch Linnhe, all the way to Oban. We were expecting to have to take a mooring in the marina opposite Oban on Kerrera but when I called the marina, the lady warned us that the moorings were so unused this year that the lines were likely to be severely fouled – not very appealing! Also, the free ferry to take folk to the town itself was no longer free… A second call to them illuminated that in fact we were allowed to anchor in the few designated spots, but might get moved on if they filled up with commercial vessels. Since all 4 anchorages were empty, we took an easy chance and got to stay a couple of nights in Oban at no charge! We launched the dinghy to find out that the outboard was not unsurprisingly acting up, necessitating taking the carburetor off and cleaning it thoroughly – it now runs great again!

Glen Coe from Loch Linnhe

Anchored in Oban

We went ashore and managed a serious provisioning run, buying sufficient meats for 2 months and enough regular groceries for a couple of weeks…

Our plan was to head down the Irish Sea making stops at the Isle of Man and then Carnarfon (to visit friends and for more grocery provisioning) and on to the Isles of Scilly and from there on to Spain…

However, in true Toodle-oo! form, plans change… The weather forecasts all showed zero wind in the Irish sea for at least a week – but… there was good wind on the north and west sides of Ireland – so we could go around Ireland, direct to the Scillies. We decided that the allure of the south was just too much and we should head off – so we pulled the anchor and motored through the windless lochs while Laurie cooked countless meals for the freezer, until finally the wind came up as we passed Collonsay and we could sail.

This plan was always somewhat risky – in that the wind was expected to die out around the south west corner of Ireland, but if we maintained sufficient speed (6.5 – 7.0 knots), we’d be able to arrive there, just as wind veered to the east – to carry us right to the Isles of Scilly.

Initially we made good time – with the wind keeping us going at between 7 and 8.5 knots – but the going wasn’t very pleasant with a significant cross swell that saw both of us taking sea sickness pills to calm the stomachs.

Through the evening of the second day, our speed began to drop as we headed dead downwind in decreasing wind and on the morning of our third day, I was sound asleep when Laurie called for the Spinnaker – which we duly raised and made a valiant effort for the next few hours, keeping speed above 6 knots – but sadly even that died and we ended up with nothing.

Now we were in a bit of a pickle… we’d missed the wind on the south coast and would be forced to motor much of the way from Ireland to the Isles of Scilly – BUT – a new weather forecast we managed to receive, showed that following the lack of wind, we were going to have something of a storm coming at us – that would mean that if we did manage to get to the Scillies, we’d then have to move on within a day or so to Falmouth in order to seek shelter! On the other hand, having managed to find ourselves in SW Ireland, it represents a much better starting point for our crossing to Spain – being so much further west – BUT – we didn’t have sufficient fuel to reach Spain (should we need to motor). BUT… Ireland is not open to foreign yachts!

We called the Irish coast guard and asked if we might have permission to anchor off on the Dingle Peninsular (Ventry Harbour) and also if it might be possible for us to make arrangements to come into Dingle briefly to pick up fuel. They took some time to think about it, but came back with permission – on the understanding that we were not allowed to set foot on land.

We motored into Ventry on Friday evening and enjoyed a well earned cocktail amid a torrential rainstorm. A customs boat came by on Sunday to check us out – no problems here…

Customs come pay us a visit

The weather was turning into a bit of an issue… The tail end of Tropical Storm Kyle was due to join up with another low and aim directly for our location on Wednesday evening/Thursday morning – until then there wasn’t any wind to go anywhere. We sat on the anchor amid very pretty surroundings and fretted!

Ouch!

On Tuesday morning, we came into Dingle by arrangement and picked up a full load of fuel from a tanker truck on the dock, then made our way back to Ventry, tucked in as close to land as we dared for as much protection we could get, and planned to make all preparations for the storm the next morning.

Another look at the weather charts had us fretting even more… They were now calling for sustained 45 knots, with gusts to 74knots! We’re now looking at Violent Storm conditions. I left a message for the Dingle Harbourmaster, asking if it would be possible, under the circumstances, for us to shelter at Dingle Marina for the duration – he’d not called back yet – so we started making preparations for what was going to be our strongest ever conditions.

Just as we started, we received a DSC radio call – it was the coast guard announcing the storm – which was to be a Force 9-10 with gusts to Force 11! Oh Jeeze!

We dropped and ‘folded’ the Genoa. We left the jib furled tightly on it’s stay and wrapped it multiple times with the genoa halyard. We removed the mainsail and managed a better folding of it. (Our sails are pretty big and heavy – these two packages dominated our cockpit.) We were going to prepare our spare anchors and rode and were planning to inflate the dinghy, launch it and then half-fill it with water and tow it from the stern – in an effort to reduce Toodle-oo!’s tendency to sail to an anchor, thereby putting significantly more stress on our ground tackle. Fortunately, before we went through those procedures, the harbourmaster called back and said that Ireland have an emergency exception and they’d allow us to come to the marina for the duration of the storm – but that we mush complete a Health Declaration before entering.

Laurie set to on the computer, downloading the Health form and then printing it with a printer that’s almost out of ink – and after multiple tries, she managed to get it printed and filled out. We emailed that to the Harbourmaster, lifted anchor and began making our way back into Dingle.

We arrived in Dingle at noon and tied up to a hammerhead pontoon and continued with our storm prep, taking off the cockpit canvas – anything we could to reduce windage. Lines were doubled and we hunkered down by watching a couple of episodes of Downton Abbey!

Stripped and ready.
(Stop checking out the big boat!)

Meanwhile, another check of the weather forecasts indicated that the likelihood was that the extreme weather was not going to hit us – with the forecast gusts now only at around 53 – 55 knots – still lots of wind!

The wind arrived Thursday morning around 1:00am and as I type, it continues and will do so through all tomorrow and into Saturday. We’ve had some pretty decent gusts already, but are no doubt significantly sheltered from the wind – and very dramatically sheltered from the waves. A very good decision to find shelter – it would not have been very nice out at Ventry!

Strongest so far…

We’ll stay here another couple of nights probably, then head back to Ventry to await reasonable conditions for our trip across the Bay of Biscay to A Coruna, Spain.

We’ve actually been back aboard Toodle-oo! for 2 weeks now 😊 !

Our first week consisted of doing loads of chores while in our lockdown berth in Newcastle’s excellent ‘Royal Quays’ marina… Laurie completed a load of finicky varnishing – around the hatches and the companionway, while I tackled a major re-plumbing of the head – which proved to be considerably more involved than I had imagined. We also did a thorough clean up and waxed the topsides – which involved doing one side first, turning the boat around and then doing the other side. The only problem there being the turning around part – which involved nearly crashing three times! Thankfully a close neighbor came to our rescue – and then wonderfully blamed the whole escaped on the sudden wind shifts!

Polar Bound – off to the North West Passage – Again!

Our berth was adjacent to David Scott Cowper’s exploration boat, Polar Bound – who is trying, this year, to complete the North West Passage for the umpteenth time, doing a particularly challenging route apparently. It was great to spend an evening with him and partner Jane aboard Toodle-oo! and hear of all their exploits aboard Polar Bound and previously making record breaking circumnavigations aboard sailboats. David is currently preparing a boat for the 2022 Golden Globe (when he’ll be 82!) – single handed circumnavigation in a boat of similar vintage to the original race’s winner – Sir Robin Knox Johnson.

Our 2020 plans were to head north to Scotland, through the Caledonian canal then south by way of the Isles of Scilly, Spanish Rias and then on to the Algarve coast of Portugal for the winter.

We finally bade farewell to Newcastle on August 1^st and sailed in light winds up the Northumbrian coast to Newton – a strange little anchorage close by Dunstanburgh castle – which obviously saw some serious battle in it’s time! The anchorage is tucked behind a reef – which protects it from the North Sea swell – at all but high tide – when it rocks and rolls for an hour or so! It took us three attempts to set the anchor on a very rocky bottom, but we succeeded and ended up sharing the anchorage with three other boats – the close one being new friends Peter and Sue on Shuuper.

Dunstanburgh Castle

Newton Anchorage

We had planned to meander up the Northumbrian coast for several days on the way up to Scotland – but in the end Newton was our only Northumbrian overnight – the other anchorages we had thought of were likely to be rather rolly, so instead, we sailed up to the Farne Islands where we anchored for just a few lunchtime hours among all the sea birds, before heading overnight to the Moray Firth. Sadly, that passage was a massive motor-fest with the expected winds not materializing one bit. We were so slow that we were unable to enter Whitehills Harbour where we’d stayed in 2014 because the tide had dropped too low – so we continued on to a lovely anchorage at Sandend – which put us in a good position to sail into Inverness the following day.

Wow! So many Gannets! (In the Morray Firth)

Unfortunately, while we’d timed our entry to Inverness well – with respect to tides – we got snookered by the railway bridge and so were not allowed to enter the canal on arrival, but instead had to take a berth at the nearby Inverness Marina.

Locking into the Caledonian

The following morning we made our way into the canal – locking through with a small sailboat – Swedish Mermaid and made our way up the flight at Muirtown and finally into Loch Ness – where the wind was howling and in our face – so we ended up coming back to the wee Loch before – Loch Dochfour and anchoring there.

Careful Driver

The Great Glen

Yesterday we motored down Loch Ness on a windless sunny day and arrived in Fort Augustus for a well earned pint or two!

Well earned pints!

Tomorrow we’ll continue on our canal trip and get as far as we can while the lock keepers are on reduced hours…

We continue to enjoy ourselves in Swaledale – but looking forward to the opportunity to go to the pub from next weekend. The Farmers Arms will only be serving take-away initially – nothing indoors – but we’re hopeful that Tan Hill (Highest pub in England – and just up the road from here) will be open properly…

We’ve done a few walks – notably to some old Lead Mining areas which were hugely active around here in the 18th century – not so much now(!) and unfortunately, many of the spill sites remain – 200 years later…

Gang Mines

Big Spoil area – 200 years old!

Proximity to lots of water…

Entrance to a ‘Level’

Interesting stonework

(Click on photo to make bigger…)

We somehow got off the beaten path – and found ourselves bush-whacking for a while – fortunately, the heather is still pretty low and the ground was not too wet…

No, we’re not lost…

Well I know where we’re supposed to be!

We prefer the more groomed trails – here above Muker on the Corps Way – and we’ve been out and about on Steve and Sue’s Tandem quite a few times too…

Above Muker on the Corps Way

Looking down Swaledale

Recently, we’ve had quite a bit of rain… the rivers are full…

Rainby with lots of water (not actually flooding…)

A rather full Stonesdale Beck

It appears a bird wasn’t too enamored by the weather either – and tried to get in… must’ve had a headache in the morning!!!

Wing imprint on window.

Strangely, even though I’ve been coming up to Swaledale all my life, I managed to find myself in a place I’d never been to before – less than 2 miles from the cottage – Kisdon Force. Two large waterfall/pools just slightly off the beaten track – but which was the location for a ‘Rave’ a couple of weekends ago as lockdown in the UK eased somewhat. I can understand why they were attracted here – hidden away and with opportunity for wild swimming. Wish I was 40 years younger!!

(Click on the pictures to see them full size…)

Kisdon Force

Upper Falls

Lower Falls

Couple of other pics from a previous walk…

Swing Bridge

Stile

Angram

Aygil

A lovely walk today on a stunning sunny day – we took a ride to Horton in Ribblesdale and walked up Ingelborough – one of Yorkshire’s Three Peaks (the others being Whernside and Pen-y-ghent).

A stunning walk but it sadly showed the deficiencies of the human race… despite the relatively low numbers of walkers that are able to make it to this picturesque area – and attracted here by it’s beauty – within just a few weeks of lifting the Covid Lockdown, the amount of litter that is already on the hillsides is just awful. Since access here is by foot only – and everyone brought all their food and supplies, how come they can’t take the trash back with them? We’ve even seen full bags of trash left behind. What’s wrong with us???

Ingelborough

Limestone Pavement

We made it!

At the windbreak

Ribbelhead Viaduct (and Whernside to the left)

Pretty Flower

Pen-y-ghent

Very little going on – we’re enjoying the space afforded by the cottage – and taking the opportunity to walk around the dale. Slowly more and more folk are venturing out and enjoying rediscovered freedoms!

It’s lambing time

Bridge at Firs

Stone Bridge

Waterfall below Keld

East Stonesdale

Swaledale

Hartlakes

Lovely Seat

Hooker Mill Scar

The Pimple

With the bridge situation sorted, the channel dredged and Laurie’s crown installed, we were all set to leave Holland on April 9th – so on the 8th Laurie investigated who we should be checking out of the EU with. After 13 telephone calls, being redirected all over the place, she finally reached a person who announced that someone would come to the boat in two hours time to stamp our passports.

Three hours later, she called again. “Oh… can’t find that information… someone will come by your boat tonight at 9:30pm.” Fine – that works.

Two hours later, I take a call that announces nobody is coming – the virus has prevented all patrols – you must come to us. Where are you? Close to Rotterdam airport… How do I get there? Drive! I don’t have a car… What?? I don’t have a car… Public transport then… OK…

Public transport was somewhat doable – though we didn’t like the idea of exposing ourselves to others germs – it’ll take a three + hours to get there and back.  Then, the folks with the power boat next door get wind of our plight and very nicely offer to lend us their Mini – so I call the official back and tell him we’ll be there tomorrow – and we agree a time. When we get there, the huge building is deserted – save for the official and his guard – they were both armed to the teeth! A quick stamp of the passport and we’re done.

So we end up leaving Holland on Good Friday (good job we’re ignorant of the Friday voodoo), catching the 9:00am lift of the Dordrecht bridge. We have a favorable current all the way through the canals – making it to the open sea about 4 hours later. Our crossing is uneventful – unfortunately with far too much motoring – but better that than the alternative – and arrive at the entrance of the Tyne at 7:30am nearly 48 hours later have enjoyed about 4 hours sleep the entire trip.

The marina in Newcastle is shut down – but we’d made arrangements for them to accept us and operate the lock for us – but we had to get out asap. We quickly assembled nearly all our stuff – yes of course we left some of the more critical items on the boat – and bundled it all into our arranged taxi – good job he had a big car – and arrived at my brother’s cottage in Swaledale 90 minutes later. Phew!

The UK’s lockdown for the Corona Virus is rather more strict than the Dutch – probably because the Dutch have more common sense and don’t need to be commanded! This has apparently led to some tensions out in the sticks – with locals protecting their environment from virus infected incomers. Once our new neighbours found out that we didn’t have any alternative and that we’d been effectively isolated for the past month, tensions eased and we’re now deemed acceptable!

Today we had a lovely walk in the dale – in magnificent spring weather.

Approaching Muker

On the way to Keld

My mum’s got a wonky horn!

Look behind you Laurie!

High-tailing it to the bush!

East Stonesdale