At 06:00 there was a light cold drizzle so I delayed departure as long as I reasonably could with a reasonable chance of getting to Browns Bay at a sensible time, Bangor is normally a reasonable alternate but would make getting across the North Channel problematic due to tides. Spending another day going to Red Bay would help but the forecast for Thursday did not look good with very light northerly winds that would mean motoring all of the way.
So I left at 08:15 in a light drizzle and a light headwind for the first few legs, as I approached South Rock buoy just before 11 the wind conveniently increased to a sailable 8 – 11 knots from the east so as I headed NW for Skullmartin and Donaghadee Sound that ideally I would reach at 16:00 as the tide turned favourable. The rain stopped at about midday at about the same time the cruising chute went up until the wind died as I approached the Sound when the engine went on and I entered the Sound at 15:30.
Whilst still in the fast running tide I again picked up weed on the shaft and / or propeller with smoke coming from the exhausted as before but also with quite severe vibration; I tried three or four times to clear it by moving from forward to revere gear which improved matters somewhat but did not clear all the weed. Not wanting to be carried further down tide I changed course for Bangor to anchor or go into the marina. I tried again and this time with a serious amount of power in reverse and this time it cleared and I resumed my trip to Brown’s Bay arriving at 19:00.
 |
| As I prepared the nights curry the Nicholson 38ft Ketch Galloper that had been berthed next to me arrived doing the trip about 3 hours quicker than me. |
.JPG) |
| A Coastguard exercise at Brown's Bay. |
45 miles in ten and three-quarters of an hour.
Click here for Browns Bay to Gigha
No comments:
Post a Comment