First sail of 2025 - Sunshine at Last

We've been going down to Maunie regularly over the winter, but mostly to check that she's OK after a succession of gales, named storms and generally poor weather, so it was a welcome change to have some cold, sunny and reasonably breezy conditions this week.

So we had a lovely shake-down sail in Start Bay on Tuesday; it was great to shake the cobwebs off and remind ourselves of how to do it. The boat performed perfectly and, even though we were the only yacht on the water, the sunshine saw a lot of people visiting their moored boats to start waking them up from winter hibernation.

This is a short video to give you an idea of the day - click here to view it.

We hope it's the beginning of a good sailing season! 

A sunny October weekend on the Yealm

Just back from a lovely few days - a sail west to the River Yealm (about 30 nautical miles) in rather rolly conditions where we were the only yacht on the water, according to the watch keepers in the National Coast Watch lookout on Prawle Point. Then a day sheltering from a Force 7 southerly (a good time to service the winches) before two days of gloriously sunny weather for some long hikes along the coast path. Here are a few photos:

Saturday morning after the winds had calmed

Walking out towards Wembury Point

Surfers in Wembury Bay

Looking back towards Wembury Bay and the entrance to the Yealm

The Yealm

Yealm Pool

Good conditions for a trip up the mast

Sunday morning started with some dense fog but it burned off in the morning sunshine for some more great coast walking.

Yealm entrance

view from the Ship Inn 

The passage back to Dartmouth on Monday was entertainingly windy, though with a confused sea and lots of rain. A RNLI lifeboat - on a delivery trip we think - came to have a look at us before bashing through the waves towards Falmouth.

Overall a super week aboard with only one hiccup - our hitherto completely reliable electric outboard has stopped working. We managed to test it at a local ePropulsion agent and confirmed that the battery is fine so the fault is somewhere in the outboard leg so it'll have to go back to the service centre in Southampton for investigation.

Taking back control

The return voyage from France confirmed what we'd been suspecting for a little while - Maunie's steering was becoming increasingly stiff. Safely back on the mooring, we disconnected the Whitlock Mamba wheel system from the rudder which confirmed that the Whitlock system was turning freely but the rudder was seizing up. Nothing for it but an unplanned trip up the Rive Dart to have the boat hauled out at Baltic Wharf.

Graham had worked out the process of disconnecting and releasing the rudder but was, understandably, a tad apprehensive so he enlisted the help of Dave Sharp and the team at Baltic Wharf to assist in removing the heavy rudder and diagnosing the problem. 

With the bottom bearing removed we had to rotate the rudder back and forth to get it to slide out

With a 70mm diameter solid stainless steel shaft, the rudder needed 2 strong people to lift it

With the rudder removed we found the first probable cause of the stiffness. The lower lip seal (designed to prevent water getting int the main bearing) had collapsed and the stainless steel tensioning spring had broken - we think it was coiling up as the rudder turned, impeding the movement.

The next issue was slightly perplexing. Inside the hull is a heavily reinforced rudder tube with a hard polymer plain bearing inside it. At the side of the rudder tube is a grease line which feeds waterproof grease from a manually operated greaser to the stainless shaft.

Well, that's the theory. What we found was that there was no hole drilled through the inner (cream coloured) bearing to allow the grease to reach the shaft - we now understand why we never had to refill the greaser and could only ever get an eighth of a turn on its handle. 

We've now drilled a hole through and were lucky to be able to read the part number on the lip seal and get a pair of replacements (there's one at the top of the bearing as well).

All the components of the rudder system, checked and dry fitted before reinstalling

With the help of Dave and a hydraulic jack, Graham was able to refit the rudder and reconnect everything. We relaunched on Wednesday and are delighted that Maunie's steering is now one-finger light. We're very happy to have solved that problem!

We're now hoping for some decent autumn weather to go sailing again.

A great cruise

 Though by no means one of Maunie's longest cruises, our two-and-a-half weeks across to the Channel Islands and down to Brittany was a thoroughly enjoyable trip. We're very glad that we decided to head south rather than our original plan to head to Ireland as the weather was definitely kinder to us.

The other obvious bonus, without wishing to knock Irish cuisine, was the food and drink in France. We ate very well aboard, thanks to some excellent markets and bakeries, and had a few memorable meals ashore too.

Healthy lunch aboard

Our favourite restaurant in Paimpol

Paimpol market

Though we had a few days of mixed weather, including a memorably intense thunderstorm, the sunny days allowed us to complete some great coastal hikes. The Brittany countryside is beautiful and the old villages very picturesque; it appears that the planning authorities have been largely successful in curtailing the development of unsympathetic modern additions.

As you'd expect, we've put together a video of the experience, slightly longer than the norm at 32 minutes, but we hope it gives you a good idea of the trip and explains why we'll definitely go back to this part of France!

Click HERE to view it on YouTube

Heading for Ireland, ended up in France

The weather hasn't be great so far this summer, so we were watching the long-range forecasts for mid-July with interest as we prepared for a 3-week cruise on Maunie. The original plan was to head west and then across to southern Ireland but it just looked as though we'd be beating into brisk NW winds and the temperature forecasts showed highs of about 15 degrees on a good day. Time for Plan B! 

We elected instead to head south to Guernsey, a 77 mile, 12-hour run that would allow us to have the wind on the beam, much nicer than thumping to windward. Our crossing day coincided with spring tides (delivering the fastest currents) and a brisk westerly breeze so we let the flood tide take us east, up Channel, and then the ebb tide brought us back to the west - hence our curved track on this chart.

As the tide started to take us west, the seas built up in a typical Channel wind-against-tide manner so we had some quite lumpy conditions as we reached the SW corner of Guernsey. Thankfully, we returned to calm water as we headed up the east coast into St Peter Port and our timings meant we were able to motor straight into the marina, where a cill (an underwater dam) keeps the boats afloat at low tide but limits entry to a couple of hours either side of high tide.

We were pleasantly surprised to find the Victoria marina (reserved for visitors and usually crammed with English and French yachts) remarkably empty.

The marina at low tide, with the entrance to the left. We actually settled on the seabed, in spite of the harbourmaster's assurance we'd have enough depth, so moved back to deeper water when the tide returned

Having arrived in sunshine, we then had two days of pretty wet weather but were able to get some hiking done and used the excellent island bus service to explore this lovely island. The Museum of the German Occupation was fascinating and WW2 fortifications are to be seen everywhere.

Finally a hint of red sky at night and the weather improving

Clarence Battery, looking north back towards St Peter Port. Originally a Napoleonic War fortress, with German WW2 additions

St Martins Point at the SW tip of the island. WW2 observation post to the left.

Looking out to the St Peter Port entrance, with the impressive Castle Cornet 

Our next stop was for a night on the neighbouring island of Sark - population less than 500 and a car-free island. It's a beautiful place but relies heavily on tourism and we thought it had a rather down-on-its-luck feel to it. However, our anchorage in Dixcart Bay was superb.

The next passage was to be to France and, after the madness of Brexit, we were slightly concerned about the process of customs clearance. Immediately after Brexit new rules were put in place which required yacht to clear-in only at major ports and the crews to present themselves at the customs office to have passports stamped. This apparently dissuaded a lot of UK boats from visiting, so this year a "Derogation System" is in place. We emailed a completed form to the marina office at our chosen destination, they forwarded it to the French Customs who stamped it and emailed it back to the marina who emailed it back to us! Amazingly this all worked perfectly and we received our clearance email before we arrived in St Quay and didn't have to present passports to anyone.

The 55nm route from Sark to St Quay

We chose St Quay as our entry point because, unlike a lot of ports on the very tidal Brittany coast, its relatively new marina is accessible at all stages of tide. It's not attractive but the staff were wonderfully welcoming.

The old port, which dries out completely

The newer marina next door. The bridge walkways were pretty steep at low tide!

After one night here we motored about 10nm north to Paimpol, an ancient port only accessible a couple of hours either side of high tide.

Distinctly challenging navigation. The brown bits dry out at low tide.

The route to the port at low tide

A lock allows the inner marina to retain about 3m depth at all times

We sailed up this! Looking back along the entrance channel at low water

Low water, looking towards the marina lock

Sunshine at last

We've rather fallen in love with Paimpol. It's very much a holiday destination but has some wonderful buildings and the locals are very friendly - also very patient while we try to remember our school French!

Enjoying the alfresco dining

Yesterday was Bastille Day so we ended a long day, after a great coastal hike, with a superb fireworks display just across from Maunie.

Tomorrow is Market Day so we'll restock Maunie with local delicacies and head off on Wednesday to explore more of this intriguing coastline.