Places visited since last post: Inishmore (Aran Islands), Roundstone, Inishbofin, Inishturk, Clare Island, Broad Haven
After a fairly lengthy radio silence we are back in reliable internet territory again. We have made a lot of progress since our last post from Dingle, and are now making our way west along the north coast of Ireland. Life for the past week or so has become considerably windier and more remote, and we have spent many days sitting out strong winds and gales in places with very little to find ashore. This has tried all of our patience at times - 31 foot is a reasonable amount of space, but it soon starts to feel pretty small when there is no hope even of going ashore because it is just too windy.
The most remote place we stopped at was Ballyglass "Harbour" in Broadhaven Bay, Co Mayo. We have noticed that the definition of a "harbour" in these parts is not always what we Brits would have in mind. Small Irish islands exposed to huge Atlantic swells usually have no more than a single pier jutting out from the land on their most sheltered coast, and a handful of small fishing boats moored in the "harbour" near to the pier which defines it. Mainland "harbours" are usually situated in vast inlets or bays, and are very exposed, compared with what we are used to at home. The anchorages are usually in amongst a bunch of moored fishing boats, and although in certain places there are council laid visitors' moorings, their existence does not always tie in with what the pilot books would lead one to believe. Often these "harbours" do not give much shelter, either from the wind or the swell, which in hindsight probably explains why we have not encountered a single other cruising boat since we left Inishbofin (a bona-fide sheltered deep water harbour, rather than one of the pier-in-the-ocean varieties) a week ago. There is definitely a reason why there are not many people cruising the north-west coast of Ireland!
Broadhaven Bay, with Ballyglass "harbour" nestling on one side of it, although lacking any facilities at all, looked like a reasonable place to sit out a force eight southerly gale which had been very accurately forecast for days. After a stunning twelve hour passage up the coast from Clare Island, navigating inside numerous islands and reefs to allow ourselves the rare treat of sailing in completely flat sea, with the tide whooshing us along as an added bonus, we made it to Broadhaven in moderate wind and glorious sunshine in good time at 5pm. It was probably our best day's sailing so far on this trip, but the wind was forecast to freshen that evening, with a full force eight gale expected in the early hours of the following morning. Two of our three books mentioned eight visitors' moorings at Ballyglass, which would be ideal for us to tie up to in a gale, although ominously our most up-to-date book did not... There are no harbour masters in these places, and in the absence of any local pub or shop, there is no way to phone ahead and check. I tried calling the coastguard a few days earlier, but all they were able to do was read me the information from the same pilot books that we have on board, and give me the phone number for the lifeboat station at Ballyglass. As the lifeboat station is unmanned, this was little help. Needless to say, we discovered that there are no longer any visitors moorings, so we were left facing a gale at anchor. We motored around Broadhaven Bay for a couple of hours trying to work out where we might get the best shelter - by this time there were already waves with white horses starting to form in the whole bay, including Ballyglass harbour itself, and we eventually settled on a spot just north of the harbour. This gave us a bit of shelter from the pier, flat sea, and the reassuring knowledge that there were no moored boats to swing into, and if our anchor didn't hold, we would be taken offshore into deeper water. Ironically, the nearest boat to us was in fact the all-weather lifeboat, which was the other side of the pier. (We did debate tying up alongside the lifeboat, to prevent us having to call them out to rescue us in the gale, and we figured we could just borrow their mooring if they were called out for someone else...)
In fact our anchor held beautifully, although we swung around so much in the gusts that our anchor alarm went off a couple of times overnight. With the unsettled feeling of being in our first gale at anchor, Angus and I barely slept, never mind the noise of the wind howling through the rigging. Eloise took it all in her stride and didn't wake up at all. The following day the gale continued, and we worked our way through all the on board activities we could think of. By mid-afternoon we all had our faces painted. It was just too windy to inflate the dinghy, nevermind trying to launch it, risking the outboard engine not working and being unable to row against the gale, and risking leaving Snow Goose unmanned at anchor... On the second evening the wind settled a little, but then a big uncomfortable swell started up, so just before dark we moved to the other side of the pier (even closer to the trusty lifeboat!) and re-anchored. The wind was a little quieter that night, and in the morning we were at last able to blow up the dinghy and go ashore. There was absolutely nothing ashore except a locked lifeboat station, a water tap on the pier, and some sheep and cows. We were completely out of fresh food by this stage, so Eloise and I decided to go crazy and splash out on a 25 Euro round trip taxi ride to the nearest town, where we found a fantastic park, had a good pub lunch, and did a supermarket shop.
With the wind a bit lighter (force 4-5, occasionally 6, easing later) for the following day only, we felt we had to press on before the next strong wind arrived. We planned a 94 mile passage across Donegal Bay, around the next major headland, ominously named "Bloody Foreland". The waves were pretty big - about 3m - following two days of gales. It was a big swell for a nine metre boat. We were sailing downwind, and the waves were really pushing us along - we were surfing down them at times, and at others when they caught us awkwardly we rolled rather wildly from side to side. The wind was strong and the boat was heavy to steer, so we did not risk entrusting it Susan, our wind-vane self-steering. Eloise was up on deck for quite a while - she now much prefers this to staying below and getting sick - but we rather lost our nerve when a massive wave broke hard against the side of the boat, soaking Angus, filling the cockpit, and fortunately just splashing Eloise a bit. After that we kept her down below, and amazingly she didn't even seem to feel sick. I think it was the first time on the trip when both Angus and I questioned whether we were wise to be doing the passage, with our small child and my ever-growing bump. The words of the taxi driver from the previous day, when Eloise and I proudly pointed out Snow Goose to him, rang in my ear, "Bloody hell, that's a small boat, I wouldn't want to sail from England in that!". Happily, as the day progressed, the wind did what it was forecast to and eased a little, and with it the waves seemed a little smaller. We went so fast that we arrived six hours earlier than we expected to, meaning it was 3am rather than 9am. It is tricky to arrive in the dark and we do not plan it that way.. Luckily it was an easy entry into Sheep Haven, which is a big open bay, so it was safe to do in the dark using GPS to guide us. Even more amazingly, when we finally reached Downings Harbour, after much motoring around and hopeful scanning with the searchlight, we found a lovely yellow visitors' mooring waiting for us. And that is where we have sat out the force 6-7 winds which began yesterday afternoon, creating impressive waves which bounced us up and down all of last night. (We were definitely what Eloise calls "a little bit stopped and a little bit going"...)
Tomorrow we are leaving at 3.30am to catch the tide around Malin Head, the most northerly tip of Ireland, and if all goes according to plan we should arrive in Portrush, Northern Ireland, tomorrow afternoon. The tides are said to run at up to 4 knots around the headland (which is not far off our usual boat speed), and we are at the top of spring tides (full moon = biggest tides = strongest currents) so it should be pretty fast and exciting, as long as we have planned it right and the tide doesn't turn against us before we reach our destination... Luckily there is not too much wind forecast so it shouldn't be as hairy as our previous sail. We will register our passage plan with the coastguard when we leave here, which is standard practice in these waters as there are so few boats about - we saw just one fishing boat on our previous 94 mile passage, and have not seen another yacht at sea for a week.
Signing off now for bed as the alarm will be going off in four hours. This is excellent sleep-deprivation training for the arrival of number two in December..
Love and fair winds to you all,
Laura, Angus and Eloise xxx
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