The Celtic Sea can have many different faces. It can be a big snarly animal with red eyes and fangs that are dripping with the blood of unsuspecting mariners, or it can be as cute and cuddly as a kitten playing with a ball of wool sitting at your grandmother's feet whilst purring contentedly. Previously when we have crossed to Ireland, be this on deliveries or RORC Fastnet Races, we had to fight with the snarly animal and the cute kitten was just an enigma. We hoped that this crossing would be on the cute side of snarly but not too cute so that we would have a challenge and fast crossing.

Alarms were set for a very bright and breezy hour of 4.45. With the clocks changing the day before we then had to wait until first light. The atmosphere was akin to those 'going over the top', it really felt like the calm before the storm with the wind howling outside whilst down below was a scene of tranquillity. Iain downloaded a GRIB file to confirm the weather and the decision was made. We are a GO.

We picked our way out of the moorings at St Mawes and set the main with 2 reef's. This was the right decision as we hurtled out of Falmouth harbour into the open sea. Our course was set due south and the breeze was due east, a beam reach, the fastest point of white sail sailing. We made great time and reached the legendary Lizard Point early, we dropped the main and sailed under genoa dead downwind until the end of England. Lands End awaited us. We gybed at Lands End and started our track north. This now started to feel like a big trip, there were no escape routes, no ports of refuge, no going back. Would the Celtic Sea be the monster or the kitten.

We planned to take the inshore passage around Lands End where there is a TSS in place and then start to cross the shipping exiting and entering the TSS before it got dark. This worked like a dream, we were moving fast, we could see the shipping on our AIS and all was safe and happy. As dusk fell, the temperatures plummeted, and the sun and then the moon set, and our stress levels and the traffic increased.

TSS's are like the motorways of the sea's, they make everybody go in a certain direction at a certain speed, it all nice and controlled, what is a little more difficult is getting all the shipping organised to enter the TSS, just imagine joining the M25 without any sliproads, roadabouts or even rules as to which side to drive on. This is what the entrance and exits to TSS's are like. It is also possible to watch all this happen on our boat laptop, the laptop is even clever enough to work out which ships are a problem and how close you'll be to them. It's whilst watching this that Fiona made the quote of the trip. We were in a position whereby four ships, one of which was us, were converging on the same piece of water and Fiona said "Cool. This is just like space invaders. The only difference is that you have only 1 life and the stakes are a bit higher." You'll be pleased to know that we made it through this and a few other situations with a mixture of good technology and good seamanship skills.

There had not been a cloud in the sky all day and we'd had consistently 17-22 knots of breeze. This made for amazing fast safe sailing but the downside of this was that we knew we were going to be in for a cold night. As soon as the sun disappeared below the horizon it was going to be a waiting game for the warmth to return. The only defence against cold is kit and Fiona really took this to heart. At dusk she went below to put on some more layers, after donning 3 thermal tops, 2 fleece tops, musto mid layer salopettes, a windproof fleece top layer, a scarf and oilskin trousers she suddenly discovered that her lifejacket would no longer fit. Iain also donned kit and realised that he had some people to thank for it. So many thanks to John Bolt for the boots, Matt for the trousers, Nico for the scarf, Jan for the hat, Imogen and Matt for the gloves and finally Fiona for the base layers. You all helped keep me warm.

The only other things of note that occurred over night were going over a gorge in the middle of the St Georges Channel called the Celtic Deep and the sighting of Smalls lighthouse. As we went over the Celtic Deep the depth instruments got all a little confused as one minute we were sailing in 90 meters of the water and this suddenly changed to 5. In a sleep deprived panicked state Iain actually believed them for a while. Fiona also spotted the Smalls lighthouse and was worried we that this was going to be a navigational hazard to us. After looking at the chart we discovered that it was 46 miles away.

After spending so much time in the confines of the Solent and the commercial hive that is the English Channel it is easy to think that the oceans really are already dead and although we must do something to help the planets oceans we discovered that this is not the case out in the Celtic Sea. We have had dolphin's by the dozen playing around the boat from dawn till dusk. Again just like leaving Fowey it was a joy and a privilege to have their company. If dolphins are thriving then they must be eating something to thrive on and this means that the oceans are not a lost cause.

Tuesday dawned and it was time to power the boat up and make miles north. We had expected the breeze to drop the further north we went and the later things got, as a big high pressure system is tracking south and is currently sitting between Ireland and Wales. So it was now full main and full genoa in 15 knots on the beam. Dream sailing but would it last? The short answer to that is yes, because we were making such good speed we essentially outran the high pressure system and made it into Waterford harbour 10 hours ahead of our initial planned arrival time. We are now sitting outside the harbour walls thinking of Guinness and a nice warm soft bed after our exertions of the last 36 hours.

AOB
We've had a few questions come our way about this blog site so please bear with me.

Our track is available for download here. If you have google earth installed then you should be able to simply pick the link and open it in google earth.

If you have an email client such as outlook then you can subscribe to these blogs and they'll be delivered to you when available just like an email. You just need to pick on the orange icon at the top of the page and follow the instructions.

All the previous blogs are available from this page, you just need scroll down and on the right hand side you see a section marked 'The Story So Far'.

To comment you need to pick on the comments word at the bottom of the page and then add note. You'll be asked to enter some details and you can then comment. We look forward to hearing from you all.

Leaving Falmouth.


Goodbye England. The lands End cardinal.


Sunrise. Ahhh warmth.


Dolphins playing.


Cooking at sea.


Our first glimse or Ireland.


Sleepy Fiona. A well deserved rest.