Grand Slam

More on Sunday 22nd, Arklow

The forecast strong gale (F9) hit us overnight on Saturday / Sunday. We were being blown onto the pontoon but it wasn't too uncomfortable as the fetch over the river was small and there were a couple of big boats moored to the windward side of us. Joe, in Ethmara, a Malo 37 in front of us was not so lucky and lost a couple of fenders - so knocked us up at 6 am Sunday to borrow a fender a the front of our boat that wasnt being squashed. We leant him two and blew up our inflatable fenders to give us a bit more protection.

The wind was 25knts + for most of the day. Ellan Vannin, a Benny 411 from Ardrossan, tied up in the small "sheltered" marina in Arklow measured 45 knts of wind over night.

Sunday was then a bit of a rest day including shopping in the very nearby Aldi, only 2 minutes walk from the pontoon.

On Saturday night we had gone to the Raj restraunt on the river. Nice Indian food. Sunday night we went to the pub on the bridge that was very pleasant and watched the Spain v Italy game that was very boring. Got my daily ration of Guinness.

Overall I liked Arklow and was glad we found it. Nice people and good shops and the facilities (showers etc) were good. No chandlers or diesel etc and there was no water tap within 200m of the boat. One thing not so good was the colour of the water in the river. With all the rain on Saturday, the river was in flood and very brown. The colour was partly due to the raw sewarage outlet upstream under the bridge. Not very pleasant when you know that. We will need to give all the ropes and fenders a good wash down when we find the next hose pipe.

The weather forecast for Monday looks promising so the plan is to go tomorrow.

June 16th, Bangor to Dun Laoghaire

We left Bangor on Sunday mid day to get down to Dublin before the forecast low pressure hit and would have given us a force 5 on the nose. The 30 mile trip to Ardglass was again a run with nice blue sky. We even got the spinnaker up for a few hours in winds of 15-20knts. Timing the tides here is important and again we were lucky to have them coincide with when we wanted to go down.

Ardglass is a quaint little marina. No room to manouver so it was lucky there were some easy berths to get into. The marina "person" wasn't much help in telling us where to go and it was difficult to judge how deep some of the berths would be. The entry channel is very narrow and not one I would like to do in the dark for the first time.

Not many places to eat ashore so we ate on the boat and then went for a beer or three in Mannies (down to Spar and turn right up the hill before you get there - near the golf club). Typical local pub - at 10pm the doors were locked and curtains drawn - "a lock in". Here's Alan and Murry enjoying the drink.

Ardglass seemed a nice place and one I would probably go back to unlike many of the stops we have made (Rathlin excluded).

The next day was a 60 mile run down to Dublin. It started great with 15-20 knts on the beam and we were doing high 7's with the assymetric up. Shame it died after a few hours and with less than 5knts wind we had to motor the rest of the day. Moored up at the extremity of the marina which proved very bouncey with the wash from all the passing boats. We stayed here for a couple of days to sit out the bad weather and to have a look at Dublin.

Mandatory visit was the tour round the Guinness brewery and sample the beer. Quite a good trip round with a skytop view of the city of Dublin from the top. Here's Murray enjoying a pint there.

Murray and Alan left today to fly back to Edinburgh and Pam and I will leave tomorrow to head south for Arklow.

Saturday 14th June, Glenarm to Bangor

As per the last 5 days, the wind was still from the north and blowing F5-6 which meant another downwind sail - no complaints again then.  The sun came out and we had wall to wall blue sky for the 20 mile sail down to Belfast Lough and into Bangor Marina. The waves were quite high with all this wind so we left one reef in. Exciting sailing and a good job we weren't going the other way.

Bangor Marina is big with good facilities. It turned out to be regatta weekend so the RUYC was packed. We went up to the bar for a pint after eating in the town. Wifi access was via BT Openzone but what a rip off at £10 for the day.

The weather is looking like the wind will go westerly and then south westerly by tuesday hence the plan is now to aim to get down to Dublin by monday evening so we will head off to Ardglass this afternoon.

Friday 13th June, Rathlin to Glenarm

Friday, 13th June. For the superstitious not a good day to go sailing....but as we are not - we went!

The meal in Rathlin was very good and the locals very hospitable the following morning. Tea and scones at Mary's while Alan and Murray cycled off to the end of the Island.

We left at lunchtime to sail across Rathlin sound and into Ballycastle. A small town with a marina. Blue sky, 20knts of wind again but still behind us – it took about an  hour. There is not a lot of room in the marina but the hammerhead at the end was free so we took that. There is another pontoon in the outer harbour but it did look a bit exposed and the local neds were using it as a diving platform despite some colditz style wire fences.

Bought some great sausages from Wisman's butchers – we had met him in Rathlin  on Wenesday. Also at long last found a shop with fishing rods  so I got a rod and reel.

A guy had recommended the Anzac pub in the village which turned out to be very  plastic and nothing going for it. We stopped for a few guinness as there didnt seem to be any other more “Irish” pubs. Does real Irish music exist???

John the harbour master failed to materialise despite many visits to his office. I think he is just a figment of my imagination. Overall I thought Ballycastle was a bit of a waste of time. I don't think I would choose to go back given Rathlin is so close and a better call.

Friday we left at lunchtime to catch the SE going tide down to Glenarm. Only a 22 mile sail and again we had blue sky and 20 knts behind us. The sea was quite lively with a bit of tide against us at the start but flatted out once we go round the NE point of Ireland. Great sail down though but it could still be warmer – only about 14 C today. Looks like the northerly winds are going to last at least a few more days so some comfortable sailing. Be nice if the 20knts would reduce a bit!

Plenty of room in Glenarm marina with few yachts in there.  Good depth and loads of space to maneuver. The village looks a bit sparse with few shops but we'll try a local pub out later. Facilities seem a bit basic – and as usual no wifi.

Here's a question. What's black, red legs and lives in holes in the wall. Best guess so far is a black guillemot but any other suggestions? I must find that bird book.

Tomorrow is off down to Belfast Lough and probably into Bangor.

Wednesday 11th June. Islay to Rathlin Island

Wednesday 11^th June. Well we gave up in Port Ellen as it was too lumpy siting on the mooring and made a dash across the North Channel to Rathlin Island. It was a really pleasant beam reach with 15 to 20 knts but quite a lively swell coming from the west. Our preference was to go down the west coast but the wind from the west and the swell made the decision easy. Here's Alan helming over to Rathlin with Islay in the background.

By the time we got to Rathlin the wind dropped a bit and it was actually warm. I got a photo of the only upside down lighthouse with a red light in Ireland! Maybe I will try and get a photo up here if I can get access! - actually it didnt turn out too good so not worth showing!

The entrance to Rathlin harbour was easy but rather shallow in the harbour – methinks our depth gauge is a bit optimistic. We came in at slack water which helped. The pilot book said it could be difficult in strong W-NW winds but no sign of that.

Rathlin harbour was empty apart from one yacht. Parked the boat for the night although we did do a hair-raising maneuver to turn the boat into the wind because it built back again to over 20 knts and the slapping at the back of the boat would have driven Murray mad.

David, the harbourmaster gave us all the gen on the island. After showers (the showers were good – not listed in the pilot book!) and an hour of boat repairs (ie finishing the job Sam had not finished) Murray and Alan went off for a walk and Pam and I decamped to the Auld Kitchen. Two Guinness later we had even more info on the Island. Definitely a good stop over. Pam reckons it was more than two as I drank her's.

We booked a table for the restaurant tonight in the Auld Kitchen. It's the chef's first night and the first it's been opened up in the evening for tourists like us. I'll let you know how how the meal goes (it was very good and good value - worth a trip).

Overall 10 out of 10 so far for Rathlin Island – worth a visit and the Guinness in the Auld Kitchen was great.

Monday 9th June. Dunstaffnage to Islay

Monday 9^th June. A 9 hour beat down the Sounds of Luing and Jura were not too much fun when you have 20 – 25 knots coming at you. At least it was all on one tack so we made good progress but the sea was rough. Top speed of the day was 13knts SOG with 6 knts of tide behind us. Good job we weren't going the other way. I must say whoever worked out the tides did a great job – oh that's right, it was me.

Plan A was to make it down to Port Ellen on Islay but by 5 O'Clock we were knackered so on to Plan B and into Craighouse on Jura. The entrance was easy to find and plenty of mooring buoys free. The pilot book didnt score it well for anchoring saying it was full of kelp. It was very shallow (circa 3 -4 metres deep) but you could see big patches of sand on the bottom so maybe not as bad as the book says to drop the hook. During our sail down we had overtaken a slightly smaller yacht and around an hour after we got in, Namaste turned up with Bo of RoBo fame on board. We watched them try to pick up a buoy a couple (?) of times then spend 2 hours on the foredeck sorting out ropes.

The wind kept up at 20Knts + until late in the evening so we declined to go ashore as the chop was excessive. Tom and Andy had left us in Dunstaffnage and we had been joined by Murray and Alan for the next 10 days.

Rob had completed the drinks cabinet late on Saturday and had christened it with us on Sunday afternoon so we gave it a thorough test drive.

Tuesday morning and the wind had swung more north westerly but was still blowing 20+. At least the direction was good to get us round the bottom of Islay before the last hour of beating up into Port Ellen. We picked up a mooring buoy in 25knts of wind rather than try and get on the pontoons given the lack of space there. All of mooring buoys were empty so we had our choice and picked one up at the third attempt using the new “buoy picker up thingy” that Pam had bought in Dunny (it was blowing hard!). it looks a pretty nifty bit of kit. Top speed today was 8knts but we did have two reefs in.

As I'm writing this there is still 25knts blowing and the dinghy is firmly tied up waiting for it to subside so we can get ashore. The sun however is shining and and the Duogen going round and round at warp speed. The forecast is for high pressure to build to the west of Ireland and for strong northerly winds to develop. This will certainly be good to get us down to Ireland later in the week. We'll decide how long to stop here when we get chance to get ashore.

Back in the water

It looks like Dunstaffnage Marina has done a great job and lifted the boat, cleaned it and put on a couple of coats of nice silver antifouling. Shame it doesn’t stay like that for more than a year! It’s now back in the water and all set to go …….once Rob finishes the drinks cabinet! That is due for completion tomorrow (Saturday). Pam’s happy she has more space to store other things now the whiskey, gin and wine plus all the glasses have somewhere nice to go.

 

.......and here it is - the finished drinks cabinet. Rob came over with it on Saturday night and its all now in place and up and running. Rob gave it a test drive before he left.

 

The plan is to head of down to Islay early next week. It sounds like there should be high pressure over the country by next week so maybe some reasonable weather. Hopefully there will be more internet access than over the past 10 days so I can keep a running log of where we are.

There’ll be four of us for the next part of the trip with Murray and Alan joining Pam and I for the next 10 days.