Joined by Jon in Saundersfoot. Great to have a buddy and knowledgeable sailor with us. Welcome sundowners...
At about 08h00 on Tuesday we got going, without a great plan but knowing we had a fast boat. A little sad to leave such a pretty place but glad to be moving again.
Jon has been a great sounding board and help.
We had a couple of snags, like a reefing line coming free, that he spotted and saved me pulling the line right through it's jammer inside the boom. An easy fix but it would have been so much more hassle had I pulled it right through. We also lost the shackle at the tack of the mainsail and some clips from the lazy bag, which is proving to be a pain.
We were off to meet Dave Sanders at Holyhead, in North Wales. It seemed like a good place for the rv for ease of transport for Dave and for pushing north for us. However, after a couple of hours of high speed it gradually became clear that we hadn't left early enough to catch a good tide. Worse the wind was pure headwind so we were making slow and uncomfortable progress. It soon became obvious that we would not be sharing dinner together. Later we realised that Dave would need to get a hotel because we wouldn't be there that evening. It was a long day and night (and next day) of frustratingly slow progress against the wind with an uncomfortable ride. As the wind built and ebbed we put in reefs, shook them out and put them in again. Good practice I suppose but it's never nice to be on the foredeck of a pitching yacht in the cold windy dark, in the knowledge that it wouldn't be good to fall. We needed to make speed because we were so late to meet our friend, so we always flew the biggest sail area that we thought was just safe, day or night.
Jon split the night with me 2 hours on/2 off. I'm slightly less intimidated by the boat so I got some sleep, for which I was immensely grateful. I love the base guitar resonance noise as the boat accelerates past 9 knots and starts planing, but the slamming upwind and crashing on a confused sea is much less happy. It was another long cold night but already the night is shorter than it was in the channel; this daybreak was 50 minutes earlier.
We eventually reached Holyhead at 13h00 today! We stopped for only a minute or 2, to load Dave, then set off. This time downwind to Caernarfon, with the happy base guitar singing noise at 12 knots boat speed in 10 knots of wind. We'd been warned by the Dock Master that the bar would be rough but, in the event, it was fine.
We missed the opening to the harbour but we settled on a mooring buoy by 17h00. Beers, shower, and ashore for dinner. A good night.
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