Reluctantly dropped the mooring at Ile aux Moines as we had really enjoyed our stay in the Golfe, we could have spent another week here, but time to move on. We shot out of the Golfe de Morbihan on the outgoing converyor belt, with the speed under sail and the tide we were moving along at over 11kts.
Set course for Pornichet……the wind blew up stronger than forecast to 30+knots offshore on a lovely set of about 40-45 off the bow…as we were about 5 miles offshore a short sharp chop came across the bay…..Shar wasn’t happy and we had about 5 hours of this, so we turned back. It seemed to be easing so we put a reef in and reduced headsail, turned around again and resumed course….same thing…but interesting to note we got the same speed from a reef and 70% headsail as we did full rig….8.5kts….she just ran flatter with the odd bang from the chop……Shar was not a happy camper.....turned around again and pulled into Crouesty, just outside the entrance to the Golfe. This turned out to be a rather functional day….catch up on emails…the blog….did the shopping and went for a long walk in the afternoon.
The French don’t seem to be afraid of putting some money into sailing and trying new things….they are on the leading edge of sailing….it is a big industry here and they are the hardcore of sailors that make up the Vendee Global, the Velux 5 oceans, Trans-Atlantic races and several other high profile sailing events. Their top sailors are as well known as football stars are at home. I have put a number of photos in this section as some of the designs are a bit outside the norm and quite unique.