When to Leave to go around GB?

 WIP

You may well have little choice in the matter and if, like me, you get fed up at home a start in late March or April is attractive, also I try to do a long cruise early in the year and a shorter one late in the year, being home for part of the school holidays to avoid crowds, so that mandates a start in April. 

Here are a few factors that you might want to take into consideration timing your start and direction of travel, in no particular order apart from the first as that could to be the most important..

• Likely weather, see below.
• Scotland is infamous for midges in July and particularly August.
• ....
• Some yachting centres and favourite destinations get very busy and are best avoided during high summer; The Solent, Scilly Island, Channel Islands, Oban, The Crinan, The Caledonian Canal and Tobermory come to mind, the latter especially so and you will probably need to arrive early in the day to have any chance of a berth or mooring, and that might not work during prolonged bad weather.
• On the west coast of Scotland you can normally find somewhere to anchor or berth at any time of year but if the weather cooperates there is something special about being the only boat in sight and that favours being there in April, May and early June. Again likely mandating an early start if travelling any distance to get there.

Tip

At weak-ends and bank holidays try and avoid yachting centres (some noted above) and anchorages / destinations a days sailing from them as many people will go there for a night or two, on the south coast anywhere close to the Solent, Poole, Dartmouth, Plymouth and Falmouth will get very busy if the weather is good so slow down or speed up to time your visit mid week, Fowey gets busy being visited as a favoured destination in its own right and as a favourite place to visit for a night from Plymouth and the Fal. In Scotland Tinker's Hole, Iona and the Sound of Mull get particularly busy with boats from Oban on long weekends. I'm sure this also applies around the Clyde but I have only skirted the area.

Weather

This is becoming an increasing problem to predict, over the last few years Scotland had essentially done without summer even when there were heat waves in the south, I have had significant problems with poor weather most years, the best weather was in spring 2023. Anecdotally in recent years there has either been too much wind or none throughout the season - that certainly appeared to be the case in 2024. Passage charts are the normal place to go for long range planning.

A portion of the American passage chart for April.
(free to download)

Historically April has always had a wide mix of wind with more easterlies than other months but fairly well balanced from all directions. Unfortunately I don't have my preferred UK charts for April but I would not expect them to be much different. Now look at the more detailed climate data chart from Predict wind for April averaged over the last ten years.

Here we see a preponderance of easterly winds along the south coast (not a surprise) and a lot of northerlies and easterlies down the west coast. That reflects my recent experience, quick passages to the far west country from the Hamble, and a slow one to Dover in 2021, only to get stuck on the Fal or Newlyn waiting for a fair wind to get around Land's End and across the Celtic Sea - you don't want even a moderately fresh wind against the tide round Lands End (going against the tide is not practical), or a beat of 110 NM to Milford. And the only shelter along the north coast of Cornwall and Devon is at Padstow with access only a couple of hours either side of high water and the "Doom Bar" to contend with that is completely exposed to northerly winds. 

The good news is there are plenty of places to wait, especially in moderate winds and in a gale there is Newlyn (getting expensive), Penzance, the Fal, and Truro river.

The anchorages at Newlyn and St Michael's Mount have good
shelter from northerly winds but I did not fancy anchoring
off in a northerly gale on a spring tide when I was weather
bound there for 10 days in early April 2022.

On the east coast there is the same problem with northerly winds and easterlies closes down essentially all anchorages until you get to Orkney.

See: Passage Planning:

• The Solent - Land's End.
• Land’s End to the North Channel and which side?
• Passage making along the East Coast.