I stayed a second night at Isla Toxa and on Monday walked across the small island and causeway and onto the big island to the fishing village of ‘O Grove’ to stretch my legs. I had decided to head to Combarro in the Ria de Pontevedra that afternoon but while checking my emails just before leaving saw the permit had come through allowing me to visit the national park island of Isla Ons.  That island was enroute to the next ria and the weather was still good so decision was made. The pilot book suggested two possible anchorages the first off the main mole midway down the east coast and the second just off the beach ‘Playa de Melide’ about a mile to the north. I decided on the beach which the pilot book also described as ‘being favoured by nudists’…

The nudists must have seen me coming or perhaps it was too early in the season. Either way the beach was deserted and I anchored close in. The dinghy was inflated and I rowed to the shore with a wine glass and half bottle of Rioja that needed finishing. I underestimated the amount of swell and nearly flipped the dinghy as I landed but despite half filling the dinghy with water and sand no harm done. Really amazing location as the sun set and I had my own private sandy beach with Fathom swinging at anchor in front of me. Definitely the highlight of the trip so far.

The next morning I went ashore and walked round the island which took the best part of three hours. Incredible scenery, flowers and wildlife. I didn’t see another person until I got to the only village where I stopped for some lunch. The only trouble was I had left my phrase book on the boat and no one spoke two words of english. That was until a man came out from the kitchen and introduced himself as Winston from Ghana! Apparently he used to work on cargo ships and after arriving in Vigo eleven years ago jumped ship and has been working in the cafe on Isla Ons ever since. Winston had immaculate English so I had no problem ordering fresh crab which he told me had been caught that morning.

The anchorage had been a little rolly due to the swell so I headed off to Ria Pontevedra on Wednesday afternoon. The wind was again very light only blowing 6 to 7 knots from the west but it was enough to sail so I unwound the yankee (foresail) and Fathom made her way into the Ria at a sedate 3.5 knots. Too lazy to take the sailcover off and hoist the main but what’s the rush?! I made the decision to anchor off the beach ‘Playa de Silgar’ which is between the village of Porto Novo and Sanxenxo on the north shore of Ria de Pontevedra. This area of Galicia is a major tourist attraction for the Spanish and the beach was rammed.

Thursday I made my way to Combarro at the end of the Ria and anchored off the small marina. The old fishing village is very picturesque especially the old quarter with its narrow alleyways  and sea houses. There are about thirty Horreos (raised granaries) still existing from the 18th and 19th centuries which were used to store food. Certainly interesting place to visit.

Playa de Melide

anchorage off Isla Ons

anchorage off Isla Ons

looking at Isla Onza from Isla Ons

Isla Ons

a gull surveys his kingdom, Isla Ons

Combarro

Combarro

After best part of a week at sedate anchorages and quiet villages I was in need of some civilisation so have spent the last couple of days at Sanxenxo where there are many bars and quite a bit going on. It also gives me a chance to catch the England football game this evening and do some laundry and fill up the water tanks. The marina is ridiculously expensive so I will leave tomorrow. Current plan is to spend about a month in Ria de Vigo and Baiona and visit the national park Island of Islas Cies when there is some settled weather. The forecast is a bit more unsettled for this coming week.

The next destination after Ria de Muros was Ria de Arousa which at 8 nautical miles wide and 15 nautical miles long is the largest of the Galcian rias and apparently one of the most interesting.  As the weather was so settled I decided on taking the shorter route into the ria though the narrow Canal de Sagres and weave my way through the rocks and shallows. No dramas and decided on anchoring for the night in a pretty bay to the north west of Isla Arousa. It was so nice in fact that I had the first swim of the trip.

I’d read a lot about Santiago de Compostela and how a trip to the old city and one of the greatest shrines of Christianity couldn’t be missed when in this area of Spain. So on Friday morning I motored over to the marina at Vilagarcia and caught the train to the city. 8 Euro for a return trip and it only took 20 minutes each way. Since the discovery of the tomb of Saint James at the beginning of the 9th century, the city has been the focus of thousands of pilgrims. On entering the hugely impressive cathedral I joined a queue which I assumed was to get into the centre of the building. We slowly shuffled through a doorway and up some stairs. It was only then that I realised I was in a queue of pilgrims who were passing through the ornate baldachin and taking turns to hug the statue of Saint James the great behind the altar. We were in such a narrow space that I couldn’t pass by or go back and not being religious I was feeling increasing uncomfortable as I got closer. When it was my turn the best I could do was give him a quick nod of respect and dart off. I’m sure I heard a couple of murmurings from behind. Anyway the cathedral is a magnificent building (see photos) and the old town built of local granite with its narrow alleyways is definitely worth seeing and i’m glad I made the trip.

first swim of the trip

Cathedral at Santiago de Compostela

Cathedral at Santiago de Compostela

anchorage east of Isla Toxa

anchorage east of Isla Toxa

anchorage east of Isla Toxa

I was keen to go back to anchor and on Saturday morning motored over to A Pobra do Caramiñal and put the hook down off the beach. I had been reading up on the best anchorages in the ria and one in particular, to the east of Isla Toxa, stood out. The pilot book described it as ‘a chance to stray off the beaten track, however the approach has numerous shallows, rocks and fields of viveros and the area is prone to silting’. In view of the calm settled weather I decided to give it a go and early afternoon on Sunday approached the shallows on a rising tide just to be safe. A few interesting moments when the water depth suddenly went from 15m to 2m but Fathom weaved her way past the shallows and we made it to the anchorage. Slight drama yesterday afternoon when I realised I had run out of bread. There are no shops around these parts so I resorted to baking a loaf onboard which turned out surprisingly well. The only trouble is i’ve eaten it already.

Decided to go ashore and stretch my legs yesterday evening so pumped up the dinghy and fired up the outboard for the first time since last August. The Island of Toxa is very well groomed and contains a golf course, couple of hotels and a health retreat. As I walked around I couldn’t help feeling it was all very artificial and aimed at the smart set. Got chatting to a couple and their daughter from the only other boat in the anchorage who set off from France a few weeks ago in their large catamaran and are aiming to arrive in Greece in September. Their widescreen TV is so large that after it got dark yesterday I could see that they were watching an episode of Game of Thrones.

As I type this Fathom is surrounded by a flotilla of small workboats who have anchored with divers down searching for shell fish on the seabed. I am waiting for a permit to come through giving me permission to visit Isla Ons and Islas Cies which are protected national parks. The weather has been extremely settled for the last week with the wind never rising above 5 knots from the SW. I hope this continues for another week so I can visit the national parks which have exposed anchorages. After Isla Ons I intend to enter Ria de Pontevedra and visit Combarro and the historic town of Horreos which come highly recommended.

Towards the end of last week I was trying to decide whether it was time to exchange the busy city of A Coruña for some dramatic scenery and quiet anchorages. I woke on Saturday morning to the sound of heavy rain pelting down on the cabin top so didn’t rush. The forecast was for a brighter afternoon but with the potential for headwinds towards evening. I made the decision to head 35 miles west to the small fishing village and port of Laxe. After departing Coruña just before noon we flew along (for Fathom that is) at 5 knots for a couple of hours and I took the opportunity to rig the trolling line and try and catch some late lunch. By mid afternoon the sky’s had darkened again and one particularly menacing cloud delivered a squall of 25 knots and torrential rain forcing a couple of reefs and reduced headsail. The south east wind then veered to the south west forcing a change of course away from the coast. Another yacht crossed our path and clearly had a similar destination and we tacked back and forth in close proximity for several hours. The anchor went down just off a great looking sandy beach at 21.30,  a whole 15 minutes ahead of the other boat (i’m clearly not fully into cruising mode yet). As I was flaking the main sail onto the boom I grabbed a handfull of sail only for an 8 inch tear to appear down the leech (see photo). Very surprising and slightly worrying as I had the sail checked over before leaving the U.K.

Sunday was spent stitching the tear back together and patching it. As the weather was showery and the sail needed to be dry for the patch I took the sail off and brought it into the cabin which was a right palava when single-handed as all the reefing lines had to be untied and the sail slid out from the groove on the boom. The repair took most of the day and by early evening the sail was back in position and packed away. The repair should be a good temporary fix and I will get a sailmaker to check it over when I get to Vigo/Baiona. Laxe looked very pretty but I didn’t have the motivation to pump the dinghy up and go ashore. The church bells seemed to ring most the afternoon in conjunction with near continuous rockets being fired into the air producing huge bangs. I couldn’t work out if this was because a fishing boat was approaching with full catch or if it was the norm for a Sunday. Sunday also marked two weeks since the start of the Jester Azores Challenge in Plymouth. Seems an age ago.

Fathom had been the only boat in the anchorage Sunday night so decided to leave Laxe on Monday morning and head 23 miles south west to Ria de Camariñas. The wind was very light so forced to do a fair amount of motoring. I put the fishing line out again only to notice after an hour the line had gone limp. After pulling it in there was no lure on the end. Either I had caught a big mumma who bit through the line or my knot came undone. I think the later is more likely. After entering the Ria at 15.00 decided on mooring at Camariñas over Muxia. Went ashore for a shower and couple of beers. Camariñas is a very attractive harbour and took advantage of the local supermarket to stock up on some fresh grub.

Yesterday was by far the best day of sailing since leaving the U.K. The sun was shining and the wind was from behind meaning a run and then broad reach down the rugged coast to Ria de Muros. It piped up to 24 knots for a short time and whilst surfing down a wave I noted a speed over the ground of 7.6 knots very briefly which must be a record for Fathom. This coastline and in particular Cabo Finisterre have a rather fearsome reputation but the sail along the coast past Cabo Toriñana, the most western point of mainland Europe, was great. If the wind had been from the west a lot of sea room would have been needed but as the wind was from the NE we set a course fairly close in. Despite changing lure still no luck catching fish…

Entered Ria de Muros just after 17.00 and was greeted by a pod of dolphins who dived around Fathom for a good 20 minutes. They are very entertaining to watch. Muros itself is a fantastic little fishing village and i’ve decided to stay here a couple of nights. 8 or 9 visiting boats are in town including some Irish who sailed non stop from Cork.

A huge congratulations to Julien on ‘Bula’ who was the first to arrive in the Azores couple of days ago. Amazing effort and from what I have read from email updates he is on cloud 9. Another two have arrived in the last 24 hours so well done all!

tear in the main sail

flying south with Cabo Finisterre just in shot ahead

Cabo Finisterre

this chap was having better luck catching fish than I was

welcome party entering the Ria de Muros

Camariñas with Fathom moored left of picture

I’ve had an enjoyable few days here in La Coruña and the Biscay crossing seems an age ago. Despite only speaking three words of Spanish I got ‘chatting’ with some locals over a beer last night and then got given a tour of their favourite bars in the old town. Recipe for sore head this morning but well worth it.

Learning languages does not come easy to me. I was lucky to scrape a C grade at GCSE French. But as i’ll be in Spain for a while I thought I should make an effort to learn some Spanish phrases. I have been surprised at the little English people speak outside the harbour area. I’m well aware that talking very slowly and emphasising each syllable in English while pointing is a poor substitute for some local lingo. Today I found a bookshop and purchased for five euros a lonely planet guide called “Inglés, Para el Viajero”. The only downside with this book is that it is aimed at helping Spanish speakers with English conversation and not vice versa. So 3/4 of the book I cannot read without using the google translate app on my phone which rather defeats the point. Nevertheless there are several pages with English and Spanish phrases written next to each other which is much more like it. These range from useful phrases such as  “Can I order a beer please” and “I’m lost” to those I don’t expect to use such as “excuse me my handbag has been stolen” and “I think i’m pregnant”. 

As it is early in the season the marina is very quite and there are few visiting boats around mainly French and Dutch. I’ve ticked off some boat maintenance jobs including stripping and servicing the windlass in anticipation of lots of anchoring in the next weeks and soldering on a new plug to the SSB radio cable.  Earlier today I walked to the north of the peninsular and climbed the ‘Tower of Hercules’ which is the oldest Roman lighthouse in use in the world and a UNESCO world heritage site.

Yesterday I was pleased to find a shop selling the ‘Atlantic Spain and Portugal’ pilot book (IN ENGLISH!) so i’m all set to head on down the coast. Thanks to Jojo and Bol for their recommendations on places to stop having sailed the coast last year.  My plan is to leave early tomorrow for Laxe which is around 35 nautical miles to the west.

Unfortunately I haven’t taken any interesting photos since I’ve been here so will make do posting one of the lighthouse and one of the statue of Maria Pita – a Galician heroine who helped defend Coruna from attack by the pesky British in 1589.

statue of Maria Pita

Tower of Hercules

Thanks to Caitlin for the photos.

I must have upset the wind gods because instead of veering to give me a nice beam reach into Spain as forecast the wind stayed hard on the nose for the last 36 hours. The theme of the last 7 days. After crossing the shipping lanes on Friday afternoon the wind increased to 25 knots again from the SW preventing me from setting course for shore. So I hove to for the night and got some sleep whilst minimising ground lost to the east. In the morning the wind was still blowing hard preventing me from getting west enough to reach La Coruna but after consulting the almanac decided to go for Ria de Cedeira 30 miles to the east which was described as having a good sheltered anchorage and approachable in all weathers.

Beating into incessantly strong headwinds was getting fairly tiresome by this point and I was counting down the hours until landfall. Eventually at 19.00 yesterday  I motored in to Ria de Cedeira and dropped anchor in the driving rain and wind. The glass of birthday whiskey tasted oh so good.

Today was spent drying gear and sorting and tidying the boat and the sun even decided to come out and say hello. Tomorrow I’ll head along the coast to La Coruna where I can have a decent shower (its been a week since my last!).

On reflection it is disappointing I didn’t make the Azores however in view of the worsening weather and oncoming low pressure system I definitely made the right call to divert. So far I know of 11 retirements out of the 22 starters in the Jester challenge several of whom had technical issues due to the conditions encountered and the rest in view of the forecast. I can’t help be concerned for those who set off with no way of contacting land and no way of checking the weather. Hope to hear good news soon. I ended up completing a crossing of Biscay single handed which was unplanned a week ago and did it without a suitable weather window so I feel chuffed with that. Fathom and I came through some pretty touch conditions well and I have so much confidence in her ability to look after me. What a boat she is. I’m now really excited about the prospect of cruising south and exploring interesting places on the Spanish and Portuguese coasts. An opportunity I wouldn’t have had if I had reached the Azores.

0.1 knots of wind on the first morning out. It didn’t last

0.1 knots of wind on the first morning out. It didn’t last

sailing close to another Jester boat 3 days from Plymouth

big seas

at anchor in Ria de Cedeira

Quite a few of us were close together as we cleared the shipping lanes off Uscant on Tuesday morning. The wind remained light and I managed to catch up on some sleep. Others were not so fortunate and spent the night dodging fishing boats. It was then all change later on Tuesday and overnight into Wednesday as the seas built and the wind hit 30 knots. I have not sailed in waves as big but with three reefs in the main and the staysail set Fathom took it all in her stride and we managed to creep to windward at a couple of knots. Others with lighter and smaller boats were forced to heave to until conditions improved. It was difficult doing any kind of task in the cabin but I managed to heat some soup at least.

Conditions were not much better through Wednesday morning and I had only managed to take 30 minutes sleep overnight. I received several VHF calls from another Jester boat to say he had electrical problems and had enough and was turning around and heading for Falmouth. I then found out another jester boat had received an unfavourable forecast for a few days ahead and decided to retire also. I have now learnt at least two others have also retired. After receiving the long term weather grib file via satellite phone yesterday I can see that there is an active Atlantic depression forming and heading from the Azores right into Biscay early next week. Not a normal path for this time of year and right through our route. I thought about turning round but have made the decision to plug on south and pull into a Spanish port to let the storm pass. The jester rules say stops are allowed.

As I type this we are flying south hard on the wind 200 miles north of La Courna. Nearly three days hard on the wind in 20 knots of breeze means cooking is suffering and I resorted to a boil in the bag yesterday. There will be some more headwinds tomorrow so hope to arrive in Spain by end of Sunday all being well. Once there I can catch my breath and wait for the weather to settle down before getting back in the game.

I knew with the highs would come the lows. It is a disappointing that I can’t make a crack for the Azores in one go but I have made the safest and most sensible decision and there is no way I want to get caught in that Atlantic depression. Looking forward to some following winds one day soon!!

I’m settling in well and life is relaxed onboard Fathom. I have just about finished my birthday cake a week early. I tried my best to hold off for a few more days but couldn’t resist. Looking forward to getting stuck in to Heather’s fruit and brandy cake afterwards.

Conditions have been light since the start on Sunday with full sail up just about all the time. Only had the need to put a reef in once and this was shaken out after a couple of hours. Yesterday morning the anemometer was reading 0.1 knots for around 20 mins. Requires a lot of patience to keep the boat moving in the light stuff. The fleet appears to be in two main bunches the first heading out west past the Scilly’s and the second bunch a more southerly route towards Ushant. I chose to make use of the NW breeze and head more south. Those of us within range have been chatting on the vhf which has been good.

Several seem to have been unlucky with fishing boats at night and have not had much sleep. Roy on ‘Spirit of Venus’ hurt his neck and has decided to pull into Penzance to get it seen to. 15 to 20 minute cat naps are keeping me fairly refreshed and hopefully once I am further offshore I’ll be able to sleep for a little longer with less traffic around. The AIS and radar watchman alarms give me warning when any shipping gets close but it has taken some time to put my faith in these and relax enough to sleep for a few minutes with the boat sailing herself. I’ve decided to make the most of a south west breeze to get some westing in today. Conditions are due to liven up this evening with around 25 knots and I’ll probably tack then and head south. Spag boll on the menu for dinner (with parmesan of course).

After leaving Yarmouth on Monday I am now in Plymouth and in 48 hours time 23 of us will be sailing off towards the Azores a voyage of 1400 nautical miles as the crow flies.

I have entered the Jester Azores Challenge which is open to single-handed sailors in boats under 30 feet. This is my first Jester event and it has been great to meet up with the many characters in the Jester family. The challenge runs every two years and alternates between the Azores and across the Atlantic to Newport, Rhode Island. A shorter event was run last summer to Baltimore in Ireland. The idea was formed 10 years ago in the spirit of the legendary Blondie Haslar and the original OSTAR race (Original Single Handed Trans-Atlantic Race). In 1960 Blondie raced his junk rigged folkboat across the Atlantic and proved small boats can be just as seaworthy and safe as much larger ones. These days OSTAR have banned boats under 30 feet from entering deeming the risk too high.

the Jester Village

guess who will get to the Azores first?

waterline, what waterline?

The Jester Challenge exists as a low profile, non-commercial event for like minded sailors with a sense of adventure.  There is a huge amount of camaraderie between the entrants and the emphasis is on self sufficiency and seamanship rather than being first across the line. There are in fact no rules, no regulations, no entry fees, no inspections. The only guidelines are:-

*must be single-handed – no crew

*boats under 30 feet

*human power is the only acceptable alternative source of propulsion other than the wind

*stops are allowed

*there is no time limit

*the challenge starts off the Western end of Plymouth breakwater at noon on Sunday 15th May

*the challenge finishes at Praia de Vitoria, Terceira, the Azores.

My aim is to update the website occasionally when at sea via text posts (no pics) and twitter updates and my position will be updated onto the tracker map automatically every 12 hours or so. Here’s hoping for following winds and a few fish on the line.