We are sailing!

 The weather was kind to us and yesterday we had a fabulous day’s sailing. We feel we have deserved this after two and a half months! The wind was a westerly which allowed us to sail on a reach - the fastest point of sailing. We had up full main, staysail and jib and for one brief moment reached 8 knots (unheard of!) and were at 6 - 7 knots for most of the day. And joy of joy we didn’t need our engine. The final delight was seeing seals in the harbour - there is a colony who live here and one in particular keeps popping up his head - probably hoping to be thrown a fish. 

We were expecting to reach Eyemouth at around 10 but in fact got here at 7.00 p.m. There was no room on the visitors’ pontoon ( the rest of the gaffers snuck in before us) so we rafted up against Hilda, who was against a wall.  This was fine and we had a good night.  My only problem was to come this morning, when it was low tide and the climb up the ladder, with the bottom rungs covered in slippery seaweed, did not appeal. By late morning we moved onto the pontoon, still rafted to another boat but with good shore access. 

This afternoon we visited the local museum which gave an interesting picture of life in Eyemouth in the past. But the saddest part of the exhibition was the story of the great storm on October 14th 1881.  The fishing boats had been in port all week with bad weather and desperate to get out and earn a living on the Friday they ignored the low barometer and were beguiled by the calm, sunny weather. By lunchtime the whole country was hit by a dreadful storm and most of the boats never returned.  129 men died that day. 

Tomorrow we set sail for Holy Island where we will have to anchor (a first time on this trip). As I write Alan and Roger are up on deck measuring our anchor chain. Let’s hope it is long enough.

Photos of Indian Runner in full sail and the seals of Eyemouth 




Arbroath to Eyemouth        45.6 nms


Comments

  1. RickJuly 19, 2023 at 12:23 AM

    Wow-Holy Island-a landmark that I recognize. You are making excellent progress.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Home at Last!

Image
We finished last week wondering how we would get our lovely boat fixed. The local man (rightly I think) felt we would be better served by getting a Yanmar dealer, but the one we contacted in Chichester was clearly not interested in taking on the job. There was another firm in Chichester, Cutler Marine, whose voicemail said they were closed for annual leave so on Monday this week, Roger was on the case at 9 a.m.  Success! Luke from Cutler Marine said he would be at the boat at 8 a.m. on Wednesday morning to investigate the problem.  Roger travelled down to Littlehampton by train on Tuesday to be there when Luke arrived.  What wonderful service - Luke arrived early bringing with him some spare parts he thought might be needed.  Not only is Cutler Marine a Yanmar dealer, but they look after 30 Crabbers in Chichester. By mid-morning Luke had fitted a new wiring harness, starter motor and ignition plate and we were back in business!  I was about to go out with the local Ramblers group (expe
Read more

A safe harbour

Image
 Our exit from the Caledonian Canal felt like ‘speedy boarding’.   They really pulled the stops out and from our first bridge at 8.20, everything else was seamless, locks, bridges, and finally the sea lock, all open for us.  We were safely tied up in Inverness Marina by mid morning. We liked the marina and Inverness very much. The city is attractively built on both banks of the River Ness and we enjoyed a run in the morning and an Indian meal later that night.  We had been intending to aim for Lossiemouth the next day, then Whitehills, then Peterhead but we looked at the weather forecasts and decided we didn’t have the luxury of taking three days as the weather was definitely looking stormy on the Saturday. This has turned out to one of our better decisions.  On Thursday we sailed straight to Whitehills. It was a long day but a good one. We made excellent progress all day and covered the 60 miles in 12 hours, arriving at Whitehills at 21.00.  The entrance to the harbour was magical.  F
Read more

Not quite the finishing straight

Image
 Well sailing keeps springing surprises. Up until around six o’clock last night we expected to complete our circumnavigation either today (Friday) or tomorrow.  Only 37 more miles to go. It was not to be.  Everything was going really well. We have loved having Georgina on the boat and we had a great day’s sailing from Dover to Eastbourne which ended with a delightful meal with Martin (and Jack the dog) and Barbara in an Italian restaurant.   Eastbourne Marina is some distance from the town itself and entry and exit is via a lock.  We were moored by the lifeboats and saw the crew come home happy from whatever rescue they had been engaged in.  The next day (yesterday) we headed for Littlehampton. Littlehampton has a bar to cross so entry and exit has to be a couple of hours either side of high tide. The earliest we would safely be able to get in was 5 p.m. so we didn’t have to have a very early start.  We refuelled at Eastbourne and came out of the lock around 10 a.m. Before long we were
Read more