30th May 2005 - Plymouth to Bayona - Day 2

Posted at 6:18 AM, Monday, May 30, 2005

Swagman Log – Monday 30^th May 2005

It could have been a lovely night sail if one was not trying to race other yachts! 

As we continued to beat slowly on a S / SW course before a variable light SW / W breeze, we had to alternate between sail and motor just to keep moving.  

The sky gave us big clouds looming black and ominous out to the SW, and we even had one light spatter of rain.

As we closed Ushant our second dilemma arose. 

Our Raymarine / Navionics Gold charting software showing the direction of the two traffic flows were totally at variance with the pilot and the paper charts! 

It may seem absolutely incredible one could be wrong in such an important matter – especially as the charting software was only purchased weeks ago.

We decided that the paper charts were most likely to be correct, but took a stab out to the west to avoid the zone completely - just in case we’d also got it wrong.  As we again tacked south and slid past the zone, the lights of the other ships transiting the zone indicated Raymarine / Navionics definitely had it wrong!

As we progressed south west into an increasingly lumpy sea searching for the breeze that created it – we struck lucky.  At sun rise we were making a good 7 knots boat speed into a WSW F4.  The boat was up and charging along.

During the night we had attempted to keep track of the few other rally yachts lights, but in daylight it was harder to pick up any.  The horizon seemed empty.

At 1000 we sighted one blue hulled yacht on the horizon in front of us, but it was too far off to identify.  As we suspected most would have motored more than we did it could have been any one of the five blue yachts in the fleet.

Midday UTC saw us at 48.01N, 06.26W.  The morning run of 87 nautical miles in the past 13 hours (we’d moved from BST to UTC) gave us a VMG speed of 6.5 knots.  Not good, but much better than day one.

The midday weather relayed by the rally radio net indicated a high pressure system settling in mid Biscay.  This was definitely not what we wished to hear as a high usually comes with light or no winds – and in coming from the direction we wished to go! 

We had no choice but to angle our course slightly west of the rhumb line to find the shortest line through the high, and waited to see what arrived.

As sun set what wind there was died – so on again went the engine for about 90 minutes.  Then the breeze, now warm but still light, filled in from the SW and gave me what has to be one of the greatest sails I’ve ever had through the night.

The wind rarely topped F2, but the seas were as flat as glass and Swagman trucked on more like a true race boat than the cruiser she is. 

We had to tack down our rhumb line towards Finisterre, but maintained speeds over 6 knots, and pointing closer than 30 degrees to the breeze, in true breeze of only 7 knots!

Our sparking wake seemed to reflect the star filled sky as we swooped southwards.

Midnight saw us at 46.57N, 07.11W. 

A total distance covered in the past 12 hours of 68 miles, giving a VMG of only 5.5 knots.

But we were loving it.