The Channel Islands - Paradise with a Twist (2018 Summer Cruise Conclusions)

This was our longest cruise away from base to date ... and for reasons I'll come back to later almost certainly our last "long" cruise for some years to come.

The leg down channel was not, it has to be said, a pleasure cruise. Dover to Sovereign Harbour was, for the second year running, particularly frustrating. Pagan doesn't much enjoy bashing into an F5/6 on the nose with a steep Channel chop knocking the stuffing out of her forward progress. And frankly the crew didn't enjoy it much either.

In hindsight, it was probably a little too ambitious to plan to make St Peter Port in a week. Do-able, certainly, but it put pressure on that we could have done without. That said, the overnight passage from Eastbourne to Guernsey was very satisfying (I do like night sailing!). Another time I'd make sure we had a more relaxed schedule.

Once in the Channel Islands, we were blessed with a sustained spell of astonishingly good weather. There was, perhaps, a little bit too much wind from the North East in the first week (and oh how we could have done with that wind a week earlier!) but it did little to affect our enjoyment.

It did though get a bit too windy for comfort over the middle weekend but we'd wisely cut and run back to St. Peter Port on the Thursday. That proved to be a very astute decision as St. Peter Port filled up rapidly on the Friday with everybody wanting to get into shelter over the weekend.

As detailed in the earlier posts, we felt we hadn't done Sark justice and changed our plans to go back a second time rather than move on to Jersey and St. Malo. That too proved to be good judgement. Sark is without a doubt magical.

We missed out on Herm but we didn't mind. It gives us an excuse, as if we needed one, to go back another time!

We spent a lot of time in the two marinas, more perhaps than we envisaged. But it's impossible to regret that. St. Peter Port is lively, vibrant and full of places to go, places to eat, places to drink and places to shop. Beaucette is peaceful, sheltered and has a superb restaurant (but nothing else). Each in their own way is to be highly recommended.

And now for the twist.

Swell

Only in Beaucette, and in St. Peter Port when the cill was uncovered, were we ever entirely free of the influence of a (mostly) Southerly swell. No matter what the wind conditions, no matter what the wind direction, no matter what the tide was doing, the swell made it's presence felt the whole time.

With the exception of the one night on the buoy at Havre Gosselin (Sark) it was never particularly bad or uncomfortable but it was always there. And we had near ideal weather conditions. Even so, there were times when even in the shelter of Victoria Marina in St. Peter Port the boat was swaying about sufficiently to make life on board slightly annoying if not downright unpleasant.

And I would reckon that if the wind blew up for a spell there is probably nowhere in the Balliwick of Guernsey which could be described as fully sheltered at all states of the sea and tide. It isn't a reason to avoid the islands but it does have to be considered - especially in high season when the availability of inner marina berths is at a premium. Out on the outer pontoons at St. Peter Port over the middle weekend the moored vessels were plunging about sufficiently to make life damned uncomfortable.

Despite changing our plans half way through the cruise, the crew changes worked smoothly. I am most impressed by the service provided by Flybe - being able to go onto their website and quickly change flights at minimal cost (anything up to two hours before flying although we did it several days ahead) made the change of plans very easy to execute.

The return leg was definitely more of a holiday than the outward leg. With neither myself nor Richard needing to be back for ten to twelve days, we were able to take a bit of time at the nice places along the way. Unfortunately we also had to take a bit of time at my least favourite port due to the weather.

So would we go back to the Channel Islands again? Hell yes! But there is a but. I would want to have at least six weeks to do it - two out, two there (minimum) and two back. And preferably longer in the middle. And it has to be acknowledged that on another visit the weather might not be as good, indeed it's unlikely it would be as good, which could make all the difference.

Looking ahead, we learnt a great deal from this cruise.

The first is that we simply have to upgrade Pagan's anchoring gear. Hauling 45m of somewhat rusty chain aboard with the old manual windlass was a killer job. We want, as soon as we can afford it, a self launching anchor, new (and longer) chain and an electric windlass.

The second is that we need to sort out our dinghy and outboard(s). The borrowed roundtail dinghy proved an excellent servant but can't really carry the 4 stroke outboard all that well. The Avon 3.1 I bought cheaply earlier in the year has proved to be just too big.

So we want a transom dinghy around the 2.7m mark with three chambers. Not easy to find these days but I've found one. And I want to fit a pair of lightweight removable davits in due course. The dinghy will get flip down transom wheels on it as carrying the damn thing up the beach nearly killed us!

As for the outboards, the borrowed Mariner was reliable and effective (but as mentioned too heavy for the roundtail) and our 2 stroke Tohatsu went from being ultra-reliable to refusing to start at all at whim. It needs a major strip down and overhaul of the fuel system. It'll get it before next year. The bigger Mariner 4 stroke I acquired from a friend also needs sorting out as I plan to continue to carry both outboards.

All of this will have to wait on finance being available. We are very nearly skint and by the time we've had one final excursion for ten days or so next month and had Pagan hauled ashore for the winter the sailing coffers will be empty.

My mission from September, for as long as necessary, will be to earn some serious pennies to refill the coffers and then save up the money to do the ongoing improvements and upgrades to Pagan and the kit we carry.

And as that is likely to involve me being back in proper gainful full time employment for a couple of years or more, we are going to be back to holiday sailing and weekending from next year for the forseeable future.

And that leads to one final decision that has been taken - when we relaunch next spring we'll be going back onto a swinging mooring and giving up the mud berth. It has served it's purpose for the last three or four years but the logisitical problems of only being able to get on and off the berth on Spring tides don't sit well with getting good use from the boat when we can only take a maximum of two weeks holiday at a time.

Oh and a final final bit of thinking is that we're thinking of not going very far afield next year. We, and especially Jane (unprompted), have identified a need to improve our skills in a number of areas. Jane in particular feels she really needs to get to grips with helming the boat when we're anchoring or picking up buoys (but probably not, she says, in the confines of marinas!). We've talked about having a year where we devote ourselves to learning to handle the boat better and as yet we haven't done it. So maybe next year will be the year

2018 Summer Cruise - Homeward bound

I'm going to keep this one fairly brief (you'll be relieved to read!) ...

The girls flew out from Guernsey on the Monday morning leaving Rich and I to get in some shopping and make ready to leave on Tuesday.

Leave we duly did making a decent passage to Longy Bay on the South side of Alderney where we'd hoped to anchor. To my annoyance, somebody has laid two "private" moorings that occupy the whole of the decent anchorage area.

Being reluctant to pick up a mooring clearly marked as private, and equally reluctant to anchor in an area with unknown ground tackle just waiting to foul the anchor, we bailed out and headed around to the East of Alderney towards Braye.

Technically, we thus sailed, or should I say motored, through the Alderney Race. In fact, I gingerly picked my way through the inshore rocks and shoals to avoid a line of offshore breakers and a long detour. In an area marked on the chart as "incompletely surveyed" this was a slightly edgy experience but I had taken into account that any shoals or isolated rocks would show up as a disturbance on the surface (the marked shoals and rocks could clearly be seen this way).

Arriving in Braye, we picked up one of the last four visitor mooring buoys. Within quarter of an hour the other three were occupied by yachts that had come up through The Swinge. We'd snuck in ahead, just, which was a bit of a result! We might have been able to pick up a buoy on the other side of the harbour, although the available depth over there might have been an issue otherwise it would have had to be down with the hook and lie to our own gear.

Conditions in Braye, which can be nasty, were very benign so we decided to stay put for a day. Then we discovered it was three nights for the price of two so we decided to make it two days!

Alderney is very different to the other islands in the Balliwick of Guernsey. Different archtecture, different atmoshphere, different scenery. I liked it!

Come Friday we made shift to get back across the Channel. We'd decided against heading along the North French coast due to the long legs between harbours and some doubts about the weather for the coming week. Off to the Solent was our decision.

We had a contretemp with a freighter heading East who was clearly not keeping a good watch. As the stand on vessel, it was my legal obligation to stand on until it was obvious the other vessel was not making an effort to avoid a collision. When we started to get too close for comfort I called the vessel up on the VHF to clarify his intentions and, somewhat to my surprise, got a reply.

The reply was less than reassuring. The voice on the other end sounded confused and unaware of any of the traffic around him. He stated his intention to maintain his course and speed and when I pointed out that this would result in a collision with the yacht off his starboard bow (us) he replied that he couldn't see us! I responded that I was rather surprised by this as we were barely 1.5 miles apart, we were transmitting on AIS, our radar was active (meaning we would definitely show up on his radar) and the visibility was perfect.

After a further confused sounding response, where he proposed that we BOTH alter course to starboard (which would have resulted in his running us down from astern instead of from the side. Not exactly an improvement) I got authoratitive about matters and made it VERY clear that he should do NOTHING, maintaining his course and speed, and that I would circle around and pass astern of him.

Thankfully he got that message and the incident passed without further ado but it was a worrying indication of the reported suspicions that smaller cargo vessels are increasingly so poorly manned as to be unable to keep a proper lookout.

It was blindingly obvious that the person who replied to my VHF call had zero situational awareness and that he was struggling to get a grip. One can only speculate whether he'd been asleep, texting on his phone having just got a signal for the first time in weeks, or doing something else. What he clearly had not been doing was looking out of the window, monitoring his radar or his AIS

Anyway, rant over and on to Yarmouth on the Isle of Wight we proceeded. The fun though wasn't over yet!

As we approached the Needles, Solent Coastguard put out a request for any vessel to assist a small speedboat broken down just off the Needles. A yacht somewhat closer than us responded and headed their way, nobody else chimed in at all (despite several more suitable vessels being in the vicinity). So I called up the Coasties and offered our assistance if required albeit we were around 40 minutes away from the incident. A few minutes later we were called back, thanked and released to continue our voyage.

Entering the Solent via the Needles channel was a first for me and it's an impressive sight. I suspect it would be rather less pleasant in unsettled weather but we still had sun, heat and not a lot of wind.

We arrived in Yarmouth and rafted up to a rather pretty yacht with very friendly owners. The next morning we moved to a finger berth. Although I could have had free nights in Lymington Yacht Haven, I fancied a visit to Yarmouth as I'd never been before by boat. Very nice it is too.

We probably should have moved on on Sunday but the Solent was wall to wall boats. Big boats, little boats, sailing boats, motor boats, jetskis, speedboats, dinghys. it was just boats everywhere. So we went to the pub again!

Come Monday morning we set off hoping to reach Eastbourne. However, Pagan was proving to be rather sluggish and we simply weren't making good speed through the water. At the start of the passage, the sea was like a mill pond but by late afternoon off Brighton it was building an increasingly annoying steep chop, the wind had got up and we were being chased by a cold front coming in rapidly from the West.

We gave up and bailed out into Brighton. Our first stop was the refuelling dock as it seemed sensible to take the chance to top up the tanks then we moved onto a finger berth. I offered to take a berth that would have our keel in the mud at low water to avoid the chaos that was the visitor berths. The marina staff were doing their best but the number of boats trying to get in was overwhelming the capacity of the availabe moorings and their ability to cope.

Brighton marina desperately needs dredging. It's been allowed to get into a parlous state and although some aspects (such as the toilet and shower facilities) are better than they used to be I do object to paying the same to visit Brighton as I pay to visit Soveriegn Harbour or Chichester where the facilities are fantastic and you can always get a good berth.

Grumble aside, we then had to stay in Brighton for a second day as the cold front and the following low pressure system blew through. It wasn't an absolute "no go" day but an examination of our hull below the waterline at low water had revealed a considerable amount of fouling. This accounted for our lack of get up and go and I felt it worth trying to shift some of it with the deck brush.

I also had a suspicion about the cooling water intake filter. Whilst we were by no means overheating and there was a reasonable amount of water being ejected from the wet exhaust, my instincts were telling me that it wasn't as much water as usual.

So we took the chance whilst in Brighton to have the basket filter out of the intake box and sure enough it was partially choked with weed. We also gave the air filter a clean while we were in the engine hole, a job I'd meant to do before we left several weeks ago that didn't get done. It wasn't desperate but it could do no harm. And some work with the deck brush shifted some of the weed.

Wednesday saw us make the relatively short hop from Brighton to Sovereign Harbour. We left with some hopes of perhaps making Dover but we were still lacking in the boat speed department. It was frustrating but there was no help for it. We were resigned to making Dover on Thursday and then having to split the final leg with a stop at Ramsgate on Friday.

To cut a long story short, we did indeed make Dover on Thursday and in fairly good time too. Pagan had suddenly found at least some of her missing get up and go. I have a feeling we had something, perhaps weed, foulding the prop as the prop wash on the run from Brighton to Sovereign Harbour had struck me as being unusually violent and on this run it was back to something like normal.

That, and other considerations, put us in the mood to stop idling about and get the hammer down on Friday. There was a reasonable chance of getting Pagan back onto her mud berth Friday evening and that would be the last chance for over a week. So get the hammer down we did and happily we made the passage from Dover to Fambridge almost exactly as planned.

Less happily, the tide failed to make by well over a foot and Pagan will have to lurk on the river pontoon for a week until Jane and I can go down next weekend and move her

Thu 19th July passage plan

Departed Sovereign Harbour 06:40UT towards Ramsgate eta 19:00UT (latest 21:00UT)

Alternate Dover eta 17:00UT (latest 20:00UT)

Foul tides, foul bottom ... weeeeeeeed.

On my original outline plan for the cruise, today is the day we should have been back in Fambridge. Obviously, we're not! This is not a problem and I'd always allowed for the possibility we might be a few days adrift. I was, and remain, keen to minimise the amount of "sailing to a deadline" as that always leads to a lot of motoring, a slightly stressed crew and sometimes poor decisions (such as going out when the conditions are beyond your comfort level - although I will never sail if the conditions are going to be seriously iffy).

So I have no regrets about the decision to wait out the weather for a day here in Sovereign Harbour, and yesterday was definitely a day to stay in port (solid F5 rising F6 with, by the afternoon, getting on for a metre of swell and wave action from the South West. It would have been no fun at all)..

Nor can I regret the decision earlier to avoid the Solent madness and stay in Yarmouth over the weekend or, for that matter, the earlier still decision to have a full day in Alderney. Those decisions were good decisions at the time based on the weather forecast we had for the coming week which did not include the cold front that brought yesterday's "no go" conditions.

A further factor has put a slight crimp in my plans - Pagan has developed a significant amount of fouling below the waterline. I didn't notice anything significant during our time in the Channel Islands nor did it become evident on the passages to Alderney and then onwards to Yarmouth but a distinct loss of performance was evident on the run from Yarmouth to Brighton.

We are, and it's significant, at least half a knot slower and possibly as much as a knot slower than I would normally expect. The effect on Monday was to put us into Brighton when I had realistically expected Eastbourne to be feasible (although had we been able to get a berth we'd have aimed for Newhaven but that'a another story).

We just were not going quite fast enough to get there at a sensible time. Whereas I had expected to carry a fair tide all the way to Beachy Head, if not beyond, it was on the turn when we cut and run for the nearest harbour having had enough.

The situation was not helped by my unwillingness to pile on the revs and burn diesel to compensate. I had a growing suspicion that all was not quite well in the engine cooling department. Whilst there was, to the casual eye, plenty of water being ejected from the wet exhaust my growing familiarity with the boat had me a niggling feeling that it wasn't as much as usual. I also felt that perhaps the exhaust noise was more than normal too (another sign of a lack of water).

So I suspected that we had a partially blocked intake filter. Not sufficiently blocked to make stopping and investigating at sea necessary but the suspicion was enough to make me unwilling to use high revs and risk overheating our venerable Mercedes OM636.

My suspicions were justified yesterday when we removed the filter boc cap and found the cage filter partially blocked with weed. Whilst we were down in the engine bay, I also removed and cleaned the air filter (a job I really should have done before we left but it didn't seem too bad at the time) as it was starting to look a bit claggy. It certainly wasn't critical but it was a fifteen minute job and it won't hurt.

There's not a lot we can do about the weed on the bottom other than live with it. That basically means passage planning at 4 knots instead of 5 knots so that we're not chasing a short schedule.

That brings me to the other "problem". A consequence of being several days behind my original draft plan is that the optimum passage times for a fair tide are going awau from us. The tide times progress day by day getting around 50 minutes to an hour later each day. Obviously, this means the tidal stream direction changes from (in the Channel) an east flowing tide to a west flowing tide and back again an hour later each day.

This means that whereas (for example) on Monday the best time to leave Sovereign Harbour to go to Dover would have been 07:00 with an eta of 19:00 it's now 09:00 with an eta of 21:00. And that's before we knock a knot off our speed. And it doesn't take into account that we had to accept a damn near drying berth here in Brighton as the visitor berths were complete and utter chaos. (That's another story I'll come back to later). The effect of that is that we can't leave here at the optimum time today (09:00UT) as that is low water and it will be at least an hour and a half, possibly two hours, later before there's enough water to get out of the finger berth.

We could, of course, leave early but that would mean punching a foul tide for at least three hours. With a weedy bottom. It would be slow, tedious and burn copious quantities of diesel. I think not.

So the upshot of all that is that reaching Dover today from Brighton is not an attractive plan. It could be done and if it had to be done it would be done but the key factor is that we do not HAVE to be back in Fambridge until Saturday (and it would not be a total disaster if we weren't back until Sunday). I'd like to be back sooner but I don't HAVE to be back sooner. It's that old monster of deadline sailing rearing it's ugly head again.

So today we're short hopping around Beachy Head to Sovereign Harbour. That will take three to four hours (some guesswork is involved until I've assessed how fast we can realistically expect to go through the water) which, of course, takes three or four hours off the run from there to Dover tomorrow.

Dover back to Fambridge, a passage I'd normally consider perfectly do-able in Pagan, might prove to be similarly afflicted by a reduction in average speed as Brighton to Dover. So we may end up short hoppng from Dover to Ramsgate to cut the long passage into a third and two thirds again.

That would get us back in the Crouch on Saturday which is acceptable (although I would really have liked to get home this coming weekend) but too late to get back on our berth. Which then raises the prospect of there being no space on the river pontoon when we get back. With loads of kit to offload.

So we might have to go into Burnham for the night and move upriver when space appears on Sunday or even Monday. Rich can hop the two stops on the train to fetch his car and get off home from Burnham without too much inconvenience (although he would prefer to travel on Satuday and have a day at home before work on Monday). I'll happily single hand the hour or so back upriver.

Much depends on how we go today. I'll take the hit and burn the diesel as long as I'm happy that we're not going to strain the engine and if we can crank up the revs and regain our lost speed then getting back from Dover on Friday becomes feasible again.

Once back in Fambridge I have another dilemma. Looking ahead, the next opportunity to get Pagan onto her berth is a week on Saturday. But if I don't make it home this weekend I definitely want to be home next weekend. And from there it's only two and a half weeks before I'd have to travel down to Fambridge a few days ahead of our late August ten days aboard in order to get her off the mud again.

Leaving her on the river pontoon for that length of time at this time of year might cause some grumbles (as we'd be blocking a space that could be used by paying visitors) so I'm contemplating seeing if there's a mooring free that we could use for a few weeks.

Once we're back from our August mini-cruise, which will be local pottering about, that's effectively our sailing for this year over. There's weekends available at the back end of September and late October when the tide would be right to get on and off the berth but we've used up Jane's holidays getting the three two week breaks in the Spring and Summer.

So I'm contemplating having Pagan out of the water fairly early in September, especially as there's only a limited amount I can do about the fouling with her afloat, and getting stuck in to the job hunt asap. From there we can make plans for carrying out the work that either needs doing or we want done and know where we're at for next year.

And my mind is all but made up (I just need to persuade Jane) about going back on a swinging mooring next year. The mud berth is great for the convenience of being able to simply hop straight on the boat when we arrive in Fambridge by car but it's a massive pain in the backside when it comes to planning to go out and use the boat. It only works now because my time is totally flexible (especially right now when I'm effectively unemployed!), it is going to be a massive crimp in our style if, as I'm hoping to do for a year or three, I get a "proper" job with a steady income.

Nothing above is a disaster. It's simply musings on options so that I've got my ducks lined up in a neat row and can choose which one to chuck in the pot and cook.

Wed 18 July 2018 Passage Plan

Departing Brighton Marina between 10:00 and 11:00UT towards Sovereign Harbour, Eastbourne eta 16:00UT

No alternates.

2018 Summer Cruise - Reboot Week

Apologies for the tardiness updating the blog, there just never seemed to be time! This will be the first of several catchup posts, this one covering the second week in the Channel Islands.

So when last we posted about our epic adventure we were in St. Peter Port planning to leave for an anchorage off Sark (having changed all the travel plans for the end of the week!).

We set out from St. Peter Port as soon as there was 2m of water over the cill and motored out of the harbour. To our utter delight and amazement we were immediately surrounded by a pod of dolphins swimming ahead, under and alongside the boat. It was magical but despite shooting off over a hundred photos we failed to get one single pic with a dolphin in it!

After a few hundred yards the dolphins left us and swam back to repeat the performance with the next boat to leave the harbour and we headed on towards the Muse Passage that cuts through the outlying rocks to the South of Herm.

The wind was more Easterly than forecast, what there was of it, and the seas were calm with just the usual Southerly swell (which seems to be a nigh permanent feature of the waters in the Channel Islands) so we decided to head for Havre Gosselin and try for one of the buoys we'd failed to get on last week.

After some very careful navigsation and helming to counter the strange tidal offsets (you go from being set off course by upwards of 40 degrees to Port to being set off course by 30 or more degress to Starboard three quarters of the way across for no apparent reason) we arrived at the moorings to find the two outer buoys available. Happy days!

Getting on a buoy meant we could go ashore right away - at anchor I won't go out of sight of the boat until we've been through a tidal cycle and I'm confident the anchor isn't going to drag. We'd inflated all bar the bow chamber of the dinghy and carried it on deck so all we had to do was blow that up, launch the dinghy and crane the outboard on.

The previous week, we'd used the borrowed Mariner 3.5 4 stroke outboard but we'd found it was a bit heavy for the (also borrowed) roundtail dinghy. So I dug the venerable old Tohatsu 2.5 2 stroke out of the locker and tried that. Last year it had been a bit unreliable but I'd given it a burn and a dose of nice clean petrol and it started well. It continued to run well, starting on the first pull of the cord, for the next two days (but it would go back to it's recalcitrant ways later as I shall describe in the next installment).

There's a neat little landing at Havre Gosselin and we tucked the dinghy in and left it afloat. More enthusiastic and probably fitter crews than us haul their dinghies out and up the steps but in the calm conditions I felt it would come to no harm left in the rock pool by the steps.

We were then faced with the climb up from the harbour to the top of the cliffs. It's not as precipitous and rough as the climb up from the beach to La Coupee but it's longer with more steps! 299 of them to be precise (according to the pilot book, we were in no fit state to count).

It's a pleasant walk along leafy tracks past occasional cottages and farmsteads to get to the main drag of cafes and tourist tat shops called The Avenue.

We had a nice wander, a beer or two and made our way back to the boat by early evening and those 299 steps again!

The next morning (Tuesday) we set off ashore again at a reasonable hour with plans for a whole day ashore. It was Jane's 21st birthday (again) so we chose Hathaways at La Seigneurie for a birthday lunch. Not too expensive, although not cheap, but very very good indeed. I greatly enjoyed a particulary fine bottled brew from the Sark micro-brewery called "Dark Monk". Something akin to a cross between a brown ale and a porter is the best description I can manage and it was lush! Sadly, it's only available on the island and none was to be had at the time.

That was followed by a walk around the very nice gardens.

Then it was back towards the Avenue and down to the harbours. There are two next door to each other. Creux harbour is the original drying harbour, thought to have been established by the 16th century settlers from Jersey who repopulated the then uninhabited island. Messeline Harbour was built in relatively modern times to provide all tide access for the island ferry and it now caters for the day visitors coming over from Guernsey.

To be honest, the walk down to the harbours, and particularly the walk back up the long steep hill, was a step too far and not really worth the effort. It left both Maire and I nursing painful knees which required the application of a liberal quantity of medicinal alcohol (best applied internally) when we got back to the top of the hill and staggered into the Bel Air Inn!

Back to the boat for a light tea and an early night after a fabulous day ashore. Sark is deservedly often called the jewel of the Channel Islands and with its unmade roads and complete absence of cars it's a real step back in time. There's a surprising amount to do and see and we by no means did and saw all of it.

We'd been fairly comfortable the first night on the buoy, a little bit of rolling around but nothing too much to handle, but the conditions changed (inexplicably but I've come to the conclusion that nobody really understands the seas around the islands) and within fifteen minutes of retiring to bed Jane and I were baling out of our cabin and setting up the pull out double in the saloon.

There was simply too much random motion and noise up forward (Maire seemed to suffer less in the aft cabin and managed an OK night's sleep) but close to the centre of motion in the saloon we slept fine. No point in being martyrs after all.

That up our minds made and we decided to go with the plan for the rest of the week that involved heading up to Beaucette Marina for a few days. The entrance into the marina is, like St. Peter Port, over a tidal cill but whereas St. Peter Port has a waiting pontoon in the outer harbour, at Beaucette there are a couple of buoys amidst a rock strewn area of shoals! So I planned our departure in order to arrive with the tide, which also meant (in theory at least) a fair tide or at worst a cross tide all the way there.

For a couple of hours on the leg across from Brecqhou to the Muse Passage we even managed to get the sails up and turn the motor off! That would prove to be the only time in the entire fortnight that the big white flappy things would get used. As we approached the passage, the wind dropped to the point where we couldn't make enough boat speed to counter the cross tide and we had to go back onto the motor for the rest of the trip.

The approach to Beaucette is not for the faint hearted!...

I willfully rejected the approach vector shown on the chart in favour of passing to the North of Grune Pierre, a drying rock, as I could see swirls and eddies on the marked approach that suggested some interesting stuff happening below the water. Our timing was spot on to go straight in and we were given a good berth which did involve backing Pagan in as we'd been told (for whatever reason) to go port side too. There was acres of space so I was quite happy to give it a go and it went off without a hitch.

Beaucette is as different from St. Peter Port as it possibly could be. Small, intimate and sheltered, it has none of the vibrancy, life and, let's be honest, noise, of it's bigger "rival" but it has peace, tranquility and charm by the bucket load.

The Restaurant at Beaucette is one of the most highly regarded in Guernsey and therefore very popular with locals and visitors alike so we booked a table for the following evening soon after we arrived (we'd have preferred Friday but that and Saturday were already fully booked).

The rest of the day, and the following day (Wednesday and Thursday) were spent in idle idleness before donning frocks and trousers (per choice and gender preference) for an superb meal ashore (nominally Jane's birthday dinner, albeit a few days late!). The prices are sensible for fine dining and the food fully justifies the price. Highly recommended if you're ever that way.

Come Friday and Jane and I planned a long walk around the headland to L'Ancresse Bay and L'Ancresse Common. The best preserved neolithic monuments on the island are to be found between the fairways of the Royal Guernsey Golf Club (there's no problem with access, it's public land, it just pays to watch out for flying golf balls!).

Maire had baled on the day as her knee was still giving grief so she elected to spend a day in the shade of the cockpit tent reading.

We set off with our expedition backpacks loaded down with water, cans of coke and snacks. The water and coke were in a cool bag with the fridge block and that successfully kept them cool until it all ran out and we had to resupply at a handy shop half way through the afternoon. It was seriously hot weather and keeping hydrated was essential.

We visited Fort Doyle and headed towards Fort le Plomb. Both of these Napoleonic era forts are accessible by the public at no charge. They are small but interesting, not least because of the adaptations the Germans made during their occupation of the islands.

Then it was on to L'Ancresse Bay

The bay is beautiful (its the Channel Islands, it's bound to be!) and surprisingly quiet.

We had an ice cream and then Jane went for a paddle to cool off her feet ...






On we trogged in the hot sunshine, it's a chore but it has to be done, to explore the prehistoric wonders hidden in the undergrowth of L'Ancresse Common.

The hidden delights were indeed well hidden and it took some time of wandering around before we all but stumbled upon the first objective.

This was La Varde, a neolithic passage grave (a.k.a. dolmen) that dates back at least 6,000 years. In it were found both burnt and unburnt human remains in at least two seperate phases.

The site is open and you can walk in without hindrance.

The passage is fairly simple as such things go but it is quite large.

Buried under the golf course landscaping is the ring of stones that would have once visibly surrounded the grave, probably forming the foundation of a mound (as we'd see later at a reconstructed dolmen).

Further fossicking about in the undergrowth led us to Les Fouaillages.

This monument is contemporary with the Dolmen and is descrbibed as a long burial mound. However, it is also said to have been an open site (not covered) with at least three areas of activity surrounded by an arrow shaped stone boundary.

It's like nothing I've seen or read about before and I have my doubts about it being a burial site at all (although in the acid soil that is characteristic of the island any bone in contact with the earth would not have survived). Without going into all the nitty gritty details, two things struck me.

One is that the site could actually have been a cremation / excarnation site. (Excarnation is the practice of leaving a body in the open allowing birds and animals to clean the flesh off the bones). The cremation remains and / or bones could then have been removed to passage grave.

The other is that the shape of the outer boundary resembles a typical flint arrowhead and, I think (I'll have to check) aligns with a solstice sunrise. I need to do more research into this one!

We then had a break from the prehistoric and enjoyed an ice cream on the beach. Jane decided to act her shoe size rather than her age and have a go on the swings!

Good swings they were too. Proper ones like when we were kids. Not the wimpy things they install these days.

Mind, I wish we'd had the rubber play area surfacing (made from recycled vehicle tyres by the way) back in the day. I might have a few less scars on my knees if we had!

We now wanted to get back across the top right hand corner of Guernsey to Bordeaux Harbour and given that it was a very hot day we elected to catch the bus back.

Except we didn't. The tourist guide claims that the bus service on the island is very simple and easy to use but it neglects to mention a few salient points.

The first is that they cleverly save money by only putting a bus stop sign on one side of the road. And the signs were on the side of the road heading away from where we wanted to go. It took us some time to catch on to that (by which time we'd walked most of the way anyway). It seems obvious in hindsight but at the time we got ourselves into a mental cul-de-sac about it.

The second is that the bus route map and timetable is far from simple to work out when you're not familiar with the geography and the mobile app (a wrapper around the website, I hate that) doesn't work at the detailed route planner level (I later found a way to make it work but too late).

Anyway, the long and the short of it is that we decided to walk back by the shortest route on foot according to Google maps. It was only going to be a couple of miles, if that. Before setting off we replenished our water supplies (having set out with two bottles of water and two cans of coke, we were now dry).

It was an interesting and pleasant walk which as much as anything served to illustrate how built up, in a (mostly) picturesque way, the interior of the island is. Apart from a couple of small paddocks we seemed to be walking though one endless long village.

We arrived at Bordeaux Harbour to find there's nothing there. It's bascially a bay that dries at low water full of local boats moored up and not much else. So it was back to the prehistoric with a walk up the coast path and a cut inland to the Dehus dolmen.

It's worth a visit to Le Dehus if you're interested in such things as it gives an idea of how a dolmen (prehistoric passage grave remember) might have looked.

I say might have advisedly. The structure has been extensively rebuilt based on interpretations by 19th century antiquarians and early 20th century archeologists and there are known errors and who knows how many untold ones.

The tomb has a (possibly unique) world famous carving in one of the cap stones (the main roof stones over the large chamber at the end of the passage) known as "Le Gardien du Tombea". This has been interpreted as a bearded male figure with a head dress carrying a bow, possibly a representation of Orion. Other carved capstones have been found in France but usually with female figures.

I couldn't get a good photo of the whole carving but I did get a fair image of the head. If you're interested  http://www.megalithicguernsey.co.uk/le_dehus_dolmen/ contains a good digital image of the whole carving and more details.

You'll be relieved to read that we were prehistoriced out at this point and it was a short walk back to Beuacette. My legs were like jelly by the time we got back on board!

We idled the evening away in idyllic surroundings (well why would you not?).

I honestly can't remember what we did on Saturday! Not much I assume.

On Sunday, we departed Beaucette as soon as the tide was high enough over the cill and made our way back to St. Peter Port. We'd decided that the crew change would be much easier there and I also needed to restock some of the galley stores and there's no shop at Beaucette.

It's just a short hop down the coast made complex and interesting by the sheer number of solid lumps of granite that need avoiding!

Avoid the yacht traps we duly did and we were soon alongside in Victoria Marina for the third and last time.

The crew change went without a hitch and with my homeward crew Rich aboard, the girls off on the toy aeroplane (it has propellers, they expected jet engines!) back to home (and sadly work), and the supplies resupplied we were all set for the final leg of the cruise.

I'll write up more about our impressions of the Channel Islands later but suffice it to say for now that they are magic!

Although by the time I've written and posted this Pagan is half way back home this seems a fitting place to end this installment. My apologies for the length of the post!

Passage Plan 16 July 2018

Departing Yarmouth IoW approx 05:00UT towards Sovereign Harbour, Eastbourne, eta 18:00UT (latest 21:00UT)

Alternates: Newhaven, Brighton

Anticipate light westerly airs in the morning with a sea breeze developing from lunchtime onwards.

2 July 2018 Passage Plan

Departing St Peter Port approx 08:00UT (went approaching rain has passed through) towards Dixcart Bay, Sark

Alternates: Derrible Bay, Havre Gosselin, La Grande Greve (all Sark) or in the unlikely event none of the above available Rosiare Steps (Herm) or back to St Peter Port

Risk of thunderstorms and rain today, wind NE 2 to 4 potentially getting gusty up to 6 later but within anchoring limits. Tomorrow onwards looks near ideal.

2018 Summer Cruise days 15 to 18

Back to the future...

It turned out to be a cunning move to get into St Peter Port on Thursday. It seemed like every boat for a hundred miles around wanted to get in here on Friday!

The weather wasn't bad as such. It was still very sunny and hot. But the breeze was strong enough to make life at anchor somewhat uncomfortable and, like us, a good many crews had decided to head for shelter.

Our bone idleness continued through the weekend although we did manage to invigorate ourselves enough for a proper look around St Peter Port yesterday followed by an excellent Thai meal with live music (to listen to, not eat!)

With thunderstorms forecast for today we decided on a fourth day in port. We had rain this morning but no storm.

Once the rain stopped, we shopped for ships stores, blew up the dinghy and made plans for the coming week.

We'd already decided to scrap the original tentative plan of visiting St Malo in France. With that decision made, we'd further reconsidered the planned crew change in Jersey next Sunday.

Given how busy the weekends have been in St Peter Port, and taking advice that St Helier in Jersey is often packed to capacity in the summer at weekends, we'd have to be there by Thursday to be sure of getting a berth.

And we felt we had a lot of unfinished business in and around Guernsey!

We frustrated ourselves through poor planning and inexperience last week and the whole crew felt very inclined to have another crack at a couple of days in Sark, with a possible side order of Herm before finishing up in Beaucettte for the final weekend.

That meant discussing onward travel arrangements with the incoming crew and rearranging the outgoing flights. This was all accomplished via a Messenger chat and five minutes on the airlines website (and an extra £26)

So although there is a 50% chance of thunderstorms in the morning, we're planning on making our escape shortly after half past seven local time and heading for one of the South coast bays on Sark.

We'll check the weather radar before leaving of course and try and avoid any nastiness (nothing dire is forecast). We may get a bit soggy but we shouldn't get a battering.

If we can't get in or don't like either of the options (Dixcart Bay and Derrible Bay) we'll head back round to Havre Gosselin or La Grande Greve.

If all goes to plan, we'll have a good run ashore on Tuesday with the option to stay on Wednesday. Then we'll either try Herm again or go direct to Beaucettte. If all else fails we'll come back in to St Peter Port

Dinner on board tonight and probably beer on board too. We need to be up and about by no later than 7am and ready to go as soon as there's enough water over the cill and the weather offers a suitable window.