Thursday 25th June ☀️
We left St-Vaast-la-Houge at 7am on our way to Cherbourg, a shorter hop around the coast. We arrived lunchtime and enjoyed eating on the boat. We paid for one night at the marina office then headed to the PAF office (Police aux Frontier) to have our passports electronically checked so that we could say au revoir 👋 to France 🇫🇷 the following morning. On our way back to the boat we found the older centre of Cherbourg, with traditional buildings, shops and cafes. We enjoyed our wander around then planned to have a swim in the indoor pool near the marina. We found the swimming pool on our way back to the boat but discovered we were unable to swim there as Richard would be unsuitably attired.
We didn’t rush to buy Richard some Speedos, obviously we chose to cool off with a beer in the shade. 🍻
We had our evening meal on the boat and watched a thunder storm pass through from the relative safety of the cockpit 😬⚡️⛈️
Friday 🌥️☀️
We departed from Cherbourg at 7am, and headed towards Alderney in the Channel Islands. We hoped this stop would shave 3 hours off our channel crossing. We arrived in time for lunch and after completing customs formalities, we enjoyed an excellent haddock and chips when we went ashore. We had a wander around the little town then enjoyed a refreshing swim from the white sandy beach. Not needing much to eat after our delicious lunch, we enjoyed a relaxed evening meal on the boat.
Saturday ☀️🌥️wind 3-15mph southerly followed by westerlies of nearly 30mph
Having woken early, due to gaining an hour back on British time, we left at 6am. There was little wind so we didn’t even try to raise the sails. We initially had the tide diagonally against us but managed to edge along at a comfortable 5 knots as we got further away from the islands. It was so calm that Maisie chose to sit in the main cabin for the initial part of the journey.
We had planned to cross the channel in a north westerly direction to reach Salcombe by the evening.
We checked the winds again for the following few days and figured that we probably would not be home until Tuesday. I noticed a 15mph wind was forecast for later in the day in a southerly direction, which would mean a good line straight to Falmouth. We decided to head straight home and for three hours (20 miles) we had a cracking sail reaching speeds of 8 knots. Unfortunately the wind direction changed to westerly and on our nose with gusts of nearly 30mph and rougher seas 💨🌊. We reefed in the sails several times.
We were relieved when we picked up our mooring at 8am 😊
Very much a great adventure, may need a holiday to recover 😀