Welcome to the Maunie of Ardwall blog

This is the blog of Maunie of Ardwall. After a six-year adventure sailing from Dartmouth to Australia, we are now back in Britain.

Saturday, 25 August 2012

In Falmouth, watching the weather fronts roll in


The 40 mile passage from Plymouth to Falmouth was pretty uneventful, after a very peaceful night at anchor. The wind was light so we motor-sailed for most the day, the engine running on economical revs with the mainsail just helping us along by harnessing any available breeze, and we arrived at about 18.30
The phrase ‘calm before the storm’ was amply demonstrated to us on Thursday night– we had a very still evening then at about 2.00am the weather front hit us. Not a storm, it has to be said, but we were hit by a wall of wind and heavy rain that had us straining against the mooring lines. As Friday wore on, the weather eventually improved and once again we had a calm evening, with a Force 7, possibly Gale 8 forecast for Saturday night, then a calm on Sunday then another gale on Monday.

We’ve all sadly become accustomed to a rotten summer but these low pressure systems aren’t what we need right now for our passage to Spain. So we’ll sit it out for a few days and watch the forecasts carefully! We’re in the very sheltered Visitors’ Yacht Haven, just across from the excellent Maritime Museum at the moment, but will probably move to a quieter and cheaper anchorage further up the Fal Estuary at the weekend.



In spite of a full load of water, fuel and all our kit, Maunie doesn’t look too low in the water!

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