Currently I am in Wick having sailed overnight and non stop from the Shetland Islands, a journey of some 130 miles. We seem to be hampered by bad weather, or gale warnings. Anyway, I am really pleased we made it up to Lerwick on the Shetland Islands, this is higher than the 60 degree Latitude parallel - quite high for a small sailing boat.
Since my last blog, our passages have been:
-Kinlochbervie on the top North West corner of Scotand to Scrabster (the port for Thurso) on the top North East corner of Scotland. Scrabster is a commercial and fishing port and we had to moor against the wall which is not ideal as in some wind conditions you have to keep adjusting the ropes as the tide rises and falls. Also to get ashore you have to climb a steep slippery ladder and sometimes even pull the 13 ton boat in to the wall if the wind has blown the boat away. On top of all this we were next to the noisy Ice making plant (for the fishing boats)! See photos:
- Scrabster to Stromness on the main island of Orkney, Stromness is a most attractive harbouside town
- Stromness to Fair Isle, a small island in between Orkney and the Shetlands miles from any other island; I only had a few hours on Fair Isle but we were fortunate to have good weather so I cycled all over the island - spectacular remoteness and a bird sanctuary
- Fair Isle to Lerwick, the main town on the Shetlands, an unspoilt and it seemed to me prosperous harbour town
- Lerwick to Wick, on the top North East corner of Scotland
Apart from the odd passage, or section of passage, the saling has not been great as much of it has been motor sailing. This is because we have limited time to wait for the right weather window and wind direction, so sometimes have to motor against the wind to get to our destination quickly before bad weather sets in, for example last night when we are expecting gales and didn't want to be caught out miles from any safe haven on the long passage in open seas from the Shetlands.
So I am a little disappointed that we have not sailed more, but nevertheless have taken every opportunity to explore with my folding bike. I cycled to John O'Groats to have my photo taken under the same sign I stood under some 27 years ago when I cycled from Lands End. Actually I had to cycle the 20 miles from Thurso in two attempts, giving up after 12 miles the first time due to rain and worse still strong headwinds -a cyclists nightmare. I called in to a hotel exhausted, had a coffee and a beer, and the landlord kindly gave me a lift back to Thurso. The next day I caught the bus back to Mey where I had stopped, popped in to Castle Mey which was the Queen Mothers summer residence and had a personal tour of the castle as I was the only person on the 10:20am tour - most interesting!
We also now have a new skipper Aubrey who joined us in Scrabster. Like the others, he has extensive experience of sailing including in his case a large number of yacht and motor boat deliveries (eg new boats, or to / from the Mediteranean for owners who want their boat there for the summer) so seems to know everybody famous. He chats non stop and jumps from topic to topic - most tiring for me as you can probably imagine! Aubrey is not keen on the modern electronic chart navigation, which I am because I am not intending to take the Yachtmaster exam. I find the traditional chartwork is much more likely to make you sea sick as you have to spend significant time at the chart table in the cabin plotting "dead reckoning, estimated positions, depths, log of distance etc". Nowadays all this information is readily to hand or redundant as it is instantly available at the push of a button with an electronic chart plotter and GPS. Anyway, it is great to see the different approaches to being a skipper - so I am learning nevertheless.
We had a narrow escape in Stromness after an evening sail and arrival in the dark. As we arrived late we decided to pick up a buoy rather than go to the pontoon. This avoids paying pontoon fees and it is usually easier to pick up a buoy which requires only one or two mooring lines, rather than tie up to a pontoon which requires at least four lines and more work. We then planned to go on to the marina pontoon the next morning. Anyway, we tied up to a buoy which seemed to have lots of seaweed on and went to sleep. The next I knew our skipper was waking us up at 5am saying we had "dragged the buoy" so all on deck. Our boat had been blown right the way across the harbour, which was used by a large car ferry (!) about a hundred yards to the other side and we think the buoy then hit the bottom again and thankfully stopped before we went aground. We were very fortunate not to have been blown in a different direction hitting something or going aground, or into an even more dangerous situation ! Anyway, no harm done and lessons learned.
We are now on to the final East Coast passage of the trip on the way back to London. It continues to be a fantastic trip - I just wish the weather would stop interferring! Maybe we are in for an Indian summer .... I wish ..
