It seems we have the best sails when we start at 3 in the morning. We crept out of Treguier into a moonless starry night, dodging invisible boats on their moorings and turned left into a NW4 close reaching at 5.5 kn with 2 reefs because it was dark. Past the Sept Iles glowing in the dawn, heading for either Ploumanac'h, which must be one of the most beautiful harbours in the world, strewn with pink granite boulders and with a fairy tale pink castle guarding the entrance, or Trebeurden, a modern marina. But when it came time to turn left across the wind, Marcita just seemed to want to go on, and it was still only 9 in the morning. So we decided on Morlaix, a town so delightful that they have a municipal cormorant nesting house in the middle of the river. But when we got there we were still going, so decided on L'Aber Wrac'h, another 48 miles, with foul tide about to arrive. And at that point the wind went westerly, just too close to sail our course. We didn't feel like turning back so we motorsailed the rest, except for a short hop on the way in. The sun came out and the sparkles on the waves looked like a huge shoal of silver fishes surfacing. 78 miles in 17 hours, and now only the Chenal du Four with its magnificent tides is between us and the West Coast.

L'Aber Wrac'h is a wild place on the NW corner of France. It feels a bit like the NW of Scotland with a biting wind and bleakly beautiful landscape. We're going in a W 3-4 and hope we get it right.