The aim of the cruise was to get to South Brittany -and preferably back - starting in late June. In fact it started ominously with a last minute request from Hunter for me to get "Lots More Flares". Was this Precognition as in Minority Report? Henry Arden must also have got the vibes and made some lame excuse of an important shoot (photographic, not people or birds). Maybe something to do with us going straight to the Channel Islands instead of Dartmouth where he would have got off, resulting in a long swim.

However Jan Gritzmann, Julie Coleclough, Hunter and I set off on Friday 24th far too early and had a cracking sail to Alderney where we picked up a buoy for the night.

The next day we decided to potter down through the Alderney Race to Guernsey and St. Peter Port. The received wisdom is never to do this with strong winds against the tide. So off we set with strong winds against the tide. The landscape started going past really quite quickly and the waves got into vertical mode. Suddenly there was a crash as we rode up one nearly vertical slope –and Lazy Life got pooped. A large wave, well above the stern, broke onto the Rib in the davits, filled it up, and the combined weight smashed the davits and broke a wire hawser attaching the davits to the Rib. Then another crash as the Rib came off the davits into the water trailing on the one remaining davit.

With unaccustomed alacrity, Hunter disappeared from the nice dry wheelhouse with Jan to "Do Something", without his lifejacket or harness, I might add. I attempted to keep us head on to the waves as slowly as possible, and asked Julie to tell me if there were less than two people on the stern. It proved impossible to bring in the RIB as it was full of water and the davit was smashed anyway. So a jury painter was rigged. An unexpected bonus was that the Rib's bucket had fallen out and acted as a drogue to slow us down. Not such a plus point was that its anchor had also fallen out and was trailing behind. This became quite exciting as we crossed the bar into St. Peter Port and had visions of it acting like an arrester wire on an aircraft carrier. However all was well and we tied up in the marina. Not so lucky was the next door boat which had ignored a tiny sign saying Don't Park, and found itself cocked up at 30 degrees on a pile foundation. The owner then got all the local crews to stand on its foredeck to get it off - to no avail.

We then sailed on to Lezardrieux, and I located the only restaurant open on a Sunday, which I had been to several years before -same nice family Owners. Then on to L'Aberwrach. With 10 miles to go and on a lee and very rocky shore, the engine died . This looked particularly interesting as the current was taking us on shore 1 km off and there was no wind. The depth was also out of anchor range. I glanced sideways at the liferaft when no one was looking -but then the breeze picked up, the sails went up and we crept along the coast to the port. A marina Rib came out to meet us and pushed us gently onto a pontoon. Mary Lunn arrived later after an epic and very wet leg from UK, only to lose its rudder in circumstances too horrible to discuss before dinner.

The villain of the piece in the engine department was a recently fitted O ring on the glass inspection cup between the fuel tank and the engine. The Boatyard had cut it to make it smaller and fit, leaving an air gap. And most people know that injecting air and diesel into an engine spells disaster -which it was. A brilliant French Gauloises-puffing engineer came on board, identified the problem, muttered imprecations on "shoddy English Engineers" and fixed it.

We then congregated for a dash through the notorious Chenal du Four. This proved completely uneventful, despite the land going past at an alarming speed. And this Race was flat calm for a change. When we got to Camaret round the corner we felt we had achieved the objective of getting to South Brittany. The sun got hotter, the water warmer and we had our first swim.

Then through the next Race at the Raz du Sein, where we hit 12.2 knots - to a rousing cheer - and on to Loctudy. The main attraction there was a large fish market next to the fishing boat dock. So we got squid and sea bream and cooked them for dinner that night. Sylvia had just joined us, so out came the silver and cut glass. We told her it only came out in port as it made rather expensive splintering sounds as it slid off the table at sea.

Then on to Benodet, and a longer leg to the next port (whose name I cannot remember). We then rounded the Quiberon Peninsula - yet another Race at high speed - and into La Trinite. Just round the corner was the entrance to the Gulf of Morbihan into which we motored in a flat calm and blue skies. Again terrific currents and whirlpools which had Lazy Life opposite-locking to stay on course. Also standing waves which was quite a bizarre sight in windless conditions.

The islands in the Gulf of Morbihan gave quite the prettiest views of the whole trip, and we could have spent several days exploring. Then coming up the river to Vannes a typical Franco-British encounter as we had to stop at our green light at a bridge to let several yachts though, presumably on red. We scowled at them pointedly, but on getting though the bridge we found their light on green too. Try that in London.

So - a great cruise, and many thanks to the Organisers, Hunter and all concerned for making it so much fun.

Donald
 

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