Cruising the Dark Sky Country

While Jersey and Guernsey islands are rich in history and culture (you’ve all read the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society, right?), the memories of our short visit have been quickly reduced to scones with clotted cream and jam, carrot cake, fish and chips, cheddar cheese, swanky shops along winding pedestrian streets, bus tours, rugged coastlines and lush hilly farmland with some of the most beautiful cows you’ve ever seen producing some of the richest ice cream you’ve ever tasted, and tax-free diesel for the boat.  

Sad, really.  Because we’d visited the islands only 2 years ago, there wasn’t much of a sense of discovery. 

But this time around, armed with a swing keel boat, we spend 2 days anchored off Sark Island.  In the mid 1500s, the island was granted as a fief to a Jersey nobleman by Queen Elizabeth I with the condition that he manage to keep the island pirate-free.

Mareda anchored in Derrible Bay (click on the image to see the panorama).

What makes a great pirate hide-out?  Bad weather, difficult navigation, numerous coves for anchoring with narrow passages protected by hull-shredding rocks, high cliffs to provide look-outs and strategic outposts, fresh water, game (rabbits and pheasants abound) and the all-important caves to hide booty.  Sark, in other words.  

The new Sark pirates (tougher than we look...)

Mareda in Derrible Bay, Sark.

As we wandered around the island, we kept seeing signs saying "welcome to a Dark Sky Community."  Strange, I thought, to actually advertise to tourists that it's always grey here.  After digging a bit deeper, we discovered that this distinction is given to communities with no light pollution, allowing for great astronomy. When the cloud cover permits, that is.

Mareda (2nd from left) in Dixcart Bay.  Derrible is prettier, but Dixcart is easier to debark with the dinghy.

Mareda goes it alone for the night in Dixcart.  Who's afraid of a little swell?

The cliff path up from Dixcart Bay.

We spent two days in lovely anchorages with few neighbors.  Apparently, the anchorages here are well-known to be a bit rough (swells), but we found it to be more or less comfortable in Derrible and Dixcart Bays with winds from the West to Southwest.  Next up:  the Chausey Islands and then on to St Malo for Mareda's first 50 hour motor tune-up and rigging tune-up. 

Havre Gosslin, the other good mooring on the island (but not good for westerlies)

Good place to hide booty.  Location undisclosed.

Local fishermen.

Local horses.

The precipitous pass between Sark and Little Sark.

This is what they call the main port.  I'll anchor out, thanks.

Town with ubiquitous tractor.  They pride themselves on not having cars on the island, but the bloody tractors are everywhere.

   

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One month out

We’ve now been sailing and living aboard Mareda for one month.  We’ve sailed slowly around southern and northern Brittany and are now island hopping our way around the Channel Islands.  Time for a review of how things are going.

One month of laundry at Lezardrieux.  Is it still Bling ??

Performance:  We’re thrilled with this boat !  Fast, stable, smooth, easy to handle.  The twin helms provide excellent visibility and the twin rudders give great control in the water.  You never feel like the boat is on the verge of rounding up into the wind.  With the keel fully down (2m25) we can sail into the wind at about 35 degrees.  I’ve lifted the keel fully (1m10) when sailing downwind and it seems to give us an additional 0.2 knots of speed.  With the hard chines, the boat heels over about 15 degrees and then glides along happily.  When the wind gusts, you can feel and hear the sails tense, but the boat doesn’t heel over much beyond its 15 degrees. 

Mareda in St Helier, Jersey, Channel Islands

Pat and Jacko in Jersey.

We’ve only had to reef three times so far. The first time, we had 20 knots with gusts to 25 on a close reach.  We rolled in the genoa about ½ and put one reef in the main and she did beautifully – smooth and stable.  The single winch system (used for both the mainsail and genoa sheets) is no problem.  You just have to plan ahead for gybes (but don’t you always? heh heh heh…)  It’s always reassuring to have the mainsail sheet close at hand.

The wide stern gives the boat a see-saw motion with swell from behind rather than a rolling corkscrew motion.  While the see-saw motion is more “rodeo” than with rolling, I’m convinced that it is less seasickness-inducing.  That corkscrew motion on round-end boats gets nauseating fast.  The motor is more powerful than we imagined.  With smooth seas, we can get 6 knots at 2000 rpms.  At full-throttle we can get almost 8 knots.  However, the combination of the sail-drive system, twin rudders, and a boat that sits high in the water means that port manoeuvres are a wee bit stressful, like trying to park a car in a tight spot on sheet ice.  I suppose we’ll get used to it.  For now, our strategy is to put out lots of fenders !

Glad to be in port when it blows in Jersey.

Deck:  It’s clear that this boat was designed by sailors.  The hand holds and foot braces are right where you need them, even for shorties like me (5’4” or 1m63).  The cockpit is deep enough to feel protected but easy to climb out of to go forward.  We LOVE LOVE LOVE the fold-down stern that allows us to get in and out of the dinghy so easily.  Coupled with the davit and pulley system that allows us to launch and recuperate the dinghy with ease, this boat is made for island-hopping.  The fresh water hot/cold shower on the stern deck is fabulous, too.  The twin helms leave the central stern area open, so no more climbing over or around the helm to get from stern to cockpit.  Bliss.  The solar panels are powerful !  During the day, we can orient the panels to take best advantage of the sun and the batteries stay fully loaded even with the frige and pilot working all day.  We recently spent 5 days at anchor and had absolutely no energy problems. Solar panels make more sense than a wind generator, since you try to anchor in areas not exposed to the wind.  For a long and grey crossing, panels may not be the best option but you can always run the motor.  Better to run the motor during a crossing than have to do it at anchor, no?

Hoisting the English flag for entry into the Channel Islands.

We continue to have problems with the genoa furler.  It’s much too hard to pull in.  Patrick can do it without the winch, but it takes all his force.  We slacked the genoa halyard a bit and that helped some, but not enough.  In calm conditions, I can roll in the genoa without the winch, but at sea with the sail flapping, I can’t budge it.  We’ve tried changing the angle of the furler line between the drum and the cockpit, but it’s still not easy.  We’ve called the dealer and asked to have someone look at this. 

Other problems:

1) a thumb-sized chunk of metal is missing from the genoa sheet traveler.  We don’t know when or how that happened.  We’ve contacted our dealer about that one, too. 

2) The top batten worked its way out of its gouset and tore the sail a bit around the batten pocket.  I fixed it with a temporary patch and tightened the screws but it will need to be fixed properly. 

3) When sailing close hauled into the wind with the mainsail sheet pulled in tight, the mainsheet downhaul rubs against the back of the dodger.  We didn’t notice this until we found a hole in the canvas.  We’ll patch that one temporarily, too, but that’s just bad design.  I suppose we’ll have to move the downhaul forward a few centimetres but I’d prefer to have the dealer do it.

4)  One of the latches of the swim platform broke.  The other one holds well and has a spectra cord and jammer to hold it in as well, so we’re not in danger of the platform opening unexpectedly.  Still, needs to be fixed.

Patrick and I disagree about the spray hood.  I like it, he doesn’t.  It’s big enough to stand under without having to bend down, there are large panels everywhere (even in the roof) to give you excellent visibility (including looking up through the roof panel to see the mainsail as you’re winching).  I was concerned in the beginning that the side panels didn’t extend a bit into the cockpit to offer protection to a crew member trying to get out of the wind, but the spray hood so high and wide that the wind passes over and creates a shadow zone on either side.  With the helm on autopilot, the watch keeper can shelter under the spray hood on either side or lean against the cockpit table with a 360 view of everything that’s going on.  If your ass is small enough you can even sit on the table with feet braced on the companion way.  Patrick thinks the spray hood is too high.  He wants it optimized to just pass over his head.  This would reduce windage and maybe make port manoeuvres a bit easier, but I think the advantages outweigh this problem. 

One complaint is the lack of organization of all the lines under the spray hood.  We tried to keep each line neatly coiled and ready for use, but they invariably ended up looking like a big pile of multi-colored spaghetti.  We bought some organizers (those hook-type things) to keep the mainsail sheet and genoa furling line out of the mess and so far that’s helped keep things a bit more manageable.         

The false teak decks (made of a wood called iroco) is lovely and comfortable for bare feet but a bit slippery.  This is getting better with time.  It was probably treated with something that is slowly washing off. 

Interior:  We’re in a 5 star hotel here.  It’s beautiful, functional and spacious (relatively speaking, of course). There is lots of storage space although getting to some of the lockers requires patience and yoga positions.  The forward cabin is a huge open storage space (read: unholy mess).  I don’t like that situation but there’s no good solution.  We’ll have guests soon so we’ll have to spend a ½ day relocating all the stuff that has accumulated there.  Patrick’s tv and stereo systems are impressive.  We’re having torrential rains today and there are no leaks!   No complaints and neither of us misses home at all. 

Overall score: two enthusiastic thumbs up !  I had my doubts and snobberies early on about buying a production boat, but for now, we can’t imagine a boat that would meet our wishes and needs any better than the SO 379.

Jersey Ice Cream: worth the trip !

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Brittany's Pink Granite Coast

Allow me to begin this post with a lament: I’ve been forced to accept that I don’t have the patience or skills to be a photo-journalist, and even in the informal realm of the personal blog, I am woefully inadequate for the task of describing the beauty of the “Granite Rose” coastline of Brittany.  At times, it’s so frustrating that I think I shouldn’t even try, damning the place with faint praise, etc.

Testing the (cold) waters in Ploumanac'h.

We’re currently anchored off the south coast of Brehat Island, one of the jewels of this coastline.  One could walk along its narrow lanes taking photos of one breathtaking scene after another: charming cottages and gardens in full bloom, old stone manors perched on cliffs overlooking the sea, quaint churchyards, old stone walls that wind like scaly serpents through farmland dotted with grazing cattle the same color as the reddish-pink granite along the coast.

West coast of Brehat Island

One of many manors of Brehat.

Dinghy with motor baptism at Brehat.

A local farmer's stand using the honor system:  take what you want, leave your money in the drop-box.

Mooring off Guerzido beach, Brehat.

Rose Granite at the northern tip of Brehat.

The Paon lighthouse, northern Brehat.

One could.  But one doesn’t.  At least this one doesn’t.  After 15 minutes, I realized that the camera was constantly between me and reality, which I found that a bit pathetic, and I had to force myself to put away the camera (okay, it obviously popped out again from time to time, but I can assure you, the above photos are only a measly overview).  How can I enjoy the splendour of the place and at the same time transmit it to friends and family back home?  I can’t, at least not with the time or energy I have at present to contribute to the task.

And with that as an introduction, here are a few photos of our last week of travels, from Trebeurden, Ploughmanac’h, Port Blanc, and Brehat Island.  On the night we arrived in Ploughmanac’h (Ploo-man-ac) we were treated to a fireworks display.  The next morning we learned that Ploughmanac’h had been voted “most beautiful village of France 2015.”  In keeping with my lament theme, I have no pictures of the village since we never actually made it that far.  The port areas were cute and touristy, but the reason Plougmanac’h is so spectacular is the coastline, and I have quite a few photos of that. 

Ploumanac'h panorama (I think if you click on the image you can get a larger version... still new at this.)

Entrance of Ploumanac'h channel.

Trebeurden

Trebeurden port.

Port Blanc entrance (yes, there's an entrance, right between those big rocks...)

As far as actual sailing goes, we haven’t done much of that lately.  There’s been no wind for the last week, so we’ve been taking it slow, motor-sailing in 10-15 mile hops, enjoying the scenery.  The light winds will stay with us for another few days at least, and a Brittany heat wave is predicted for mid-week (that means low 80s).  We may celebrate and put up the bimini !

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High and Dry on Batz Island

We beached ! 

The anchorage was a bit crowded (a weekend in June on a “must visit” island) and we re-anchored 3 times before deciding where to settle for our first beaching, or drying out.  We arrived at high tide with 8 meters of water, and as the tide went out, we settled into the hard sand / mud mix.  

When we arrived...

...and the next morning...

I worried that we would swing with the incoming tide and end up too close to the beach incline or too close to the small fishing boats next to us, but the anchorage was so well protected that we barely budged.  As Mareda settled, she creaked and cracked intermittently like an old house on a hot day, but the second beaching was quieter… or maybe we were just used to it and slept through it.

With a bit of water remaining from an outgoing tide, we pumped up the dinghy and rowed ashore.  The problem with rowing ashore in an outgoing tide is that you have to wait until the water comes back again to get back to the boat.  We visited Batz for over 6 hours.  We walked all over the island.  Twice.  And had a long boozy lunch.  And waited some more.  We walked out to Mareda but the mud became ankle deep and we had to turn back.  Trying to haul a dinghy back to the boat over the mud would have been quite a spectacle for the tourists sipping drinks on the terrace.

Another beaching discovery:  if you want to flush the toilet, you have to add water from your freshwater tank or think ahead and have a bucket of seawater handy.  The sea-water intake for the toilet is also high and dry.

We’re still in a state of wonder with our new boat and everything she can do.  Having a lifting keel changes everything and opens up so many more anchorage options, especially here in Brittany.  We’re eager to give it another go!

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Inside Mareda at Lands End

Greetings from Aber Wrac’h on the northwestern tip of Finistere, or Lands End in French.  We’ve had a beautiful couple of days sailing around the tip of Brittany, including two tricky tidal passages (Raz de Sein and Four Channel) that were unbelievably smooth.  

Local tradition says that when you round the Raz de Sein and align two light houses (the Plate and the Vielle), you take a swig of rum.  Not ones to snub tradition, we had rum from Guadaloupe ready and waiting.

almost aligned...

lined up

 

aaaaaand swig !

On the day we rounded the Raz de Sein, the French marine traffic control reminded sailors in the area to make way for the Solitaire de Figaro race.  I quickly jotted down the latitude and longitude positions and estimated that they were a few miles west of us.  I couldn’t see them but when I looked at the Automatic Identification System (AIS) on the chart plotter, it wasn’t hard to tell where they were.    

anyone seen the Solitaire de Figaro around here?  (That's us in the Raz de Sein)

We’re really thrilled with the boat, inside and out.  The performance and stability of the boat are really impressive.  With the currents in the Four Channel, we hit 8.9 knots with just the mainsail and the genoa.   

It has taken us awhile to post photos of the interior of Mareda, since I was waiting to have everything neat and tidy.  I realized after 2 weeks of living aboard that things will never be as photogenic as I would like, so without further delay, here is the interior on an ordinary day.

The interior is comfortable, spacious, and chic.  It’s hard to refer to such interior spaces as the galley, or the head, or the cabins.  On Mareda, we have a kitchen, a bathroom, and bedrooms.  The “water closet” part of the bathroom is as big as our wc at home.  The two bedrooms have real mattresses, not foam pads.  We have more hanging space on the boat that in our home bedroom.  The refrigerator capacity is as big as our home frige.  We love having hot water on demand.  We also love our black water tank (means we don’t have to use the public toilets in port anymore).  Patrick’s “home-boat cinema” is impressive, and although we said we never listen to music in the cockpit while underway, we tried out the sound system on the water yesterday and it rocks !  On a sunny day, the solar panels charge enough for the navigation system, the auto pilot, and the refrigerator.  The table in the salon (er, uh…living room) is huge.  We have tons of storage space, although much of that space is underneath the salon seating area cushions and getting to things can be a bit of a chore.

So far, our only complaint about the interior is that the water pump is LOUD.  I don’t know if that’s normal.  We’ll have it checked out at the end of the season.  We’re still having a bit of a problem with our genoa furler.  We can furl it without the winch when there’s no strain on it, but when we want to partially roll it up during high winds, even if we let the sheets out fully, there’s still too much stress on the sail to get it to furl without using the winch.  That’s not great during a stiff breeze.  We’ve put in a call to the boatyard to see if we can have someone look at that along the way in the next week.

Tomorrow we’re headed off to Batz Island where we MAY attempt our first drying-out (echouage) with Mareda.  Unfortunately, we’ll touch down at 11:30 pm and lift off at 6:30 pm, so I’ll have to be really motivated to get out and photograph the event.

Internet is LOWSY and the blog will be delayed by a week or more as I try to catch up when we DO get a good connection.  More updates coming over the next 24 hours while we have a decent connection...

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The first week

Our first week on Mareda has been chaotic, as expected.  With no time to write a coherent missive, here is a list of happenings:

Mareda in Locmiquelic, Lorient

The first time I tried to plug in to shore power, I dropped the electrical adapter in the water and it sank like a rock.  As soon as the horror wore off, I realized it had “SPRAY” marked on it.  Mareda claims her territory.

We realized after our first night on board that we had lots of storage space for clothes, but they were mostly closets rather than shelves.  We didn’t have enough hangers. Return home to buy electrical adapters and get more hangers. 

Seen around Vannes: A traditional Sinagot.

The genoa furler was impossible to roll in without using the winch.  After several calls and photos with Jeanneau, we tried to minimize the angles between the furler, the pulllies, and the winch, with only moderate success.  Epiphany:  what if the halyard is simply winched up too tightly?  Bingo.  Problem resolved.

The gennaker is great fun !  After a few tests, we found that the best way to roll it up cleanly is to sail on a broad reach and hide the gennaker behind the mainsail, then let off on the halyard a bit.  It rolls up like a tight sausage.  We still have a problem with the breaking pulley that is supposed to only allow the furling line to operate in one direction (so that it doesn’t unroll while you’re trying to roll it up).  Forgot to take pictures… next time.

The gennaker !  Ice blue and fire-engine red.

The swing keel hums and buzzes when sailing close-hauled at more than 5 knots.  Other swing keel owners tell us that this is normal. 

The boat is HIGH in the water !!  That’s great while sailing, but in port we’ve got a lot of area for the wind to push us around, which makes things a bit tricky to dock.  And we also learned that it’s best to have the keel down as far as possible for manoeuvres, otherwise you slip sideways all too easily.

I really appreciate the “german” winch system.  We still have to think ahead when we tack or jibe, but the manoeuvres will become automatic with time.  It’s great to have all the controls near the helmsman.  The lines, however, end up becoming a pile of spaghetti if you aren’t vigilant. 

The B&G electronic system (Zeus and Triton) are excellent, too.  We haven’t fully exploited all the gadgets available, but it’s really a luxury.

And the interior is so luxurious it’s almost ridiculous.  We’re a bit embarrassed.  People stare at Mareda when we come into port (just when we’re getting ready for manoeuvres we haven’t mastered).  The downside of all this bling is that it also attracts unwanted attention.  In Vannes, we had a 1 liter glass beer bottle hurled at us.  Pictures as soon as we have time to arrange everything ! 

The lazy bag is not as big as we thought /  hoped, or maybe it’s that the sail is new and stiff.  It’s so high that it’s hard for me to stow it by myself.

Patrick cracked his laptop computer screen and is having psychological difficulties coping without a computer.  We’ll head back to Lorient to repair it before going any further.

And we had our first “too full” incident with the black water (toilet) tank.  The 80-liter capacity goes quickly with 4 people !  The leak was smelly and no fun to clean, just in case you think it’s all bling bling and glamour out here…

Stuck on Groix Island by a gale for THREE days.  But there are worse places to be stuck.

Picnic at St Nicolas, Groix island.

St Nicolas at low tide.

Hiking around St Nic.

We sailed Mareda from Groix to Lorient (7 miles) with 20 knots in the nose and gusts to 25.  With only 1 reef in the main and the genoa at 60% she performed beautifully.  She heeled over onto her chine and didn’t budge.  When the gusts hit, the sails strain but the boat stays steady and the double-rudder system means you’ve always got one well down in the water and you always have good control.  

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