Plymouth to Arran(Scotland) and back in last two weeks of sept 2020 , best anchorages en route.

[JumbleDuck]

Many years ago the front cover of Yachting Monthly carried a dramatic photo of a yacht motoring out of Portpatrick Harbour. The wave's where crashing on the rocks either side of the narrow entrance going above the height of the mast. I exclaimed 'well you wouldn't catch me doing that' to which my kids responded 'no you would have the sails up dad'.
The following month in the letters section someone wrote what idiot would set out in conditions like that. YM response was - we believe it's the Cox of the local lifeboat.

My recollection is that the disgruntled letter included "What would the lifeboat coxswain think of the skipper's irresponsible behaviour?" and the next edition carried a letter from the coxswain saying "I was the skipper".

That said, it is almost impossible to overstate how foul Port Patrick is in a westerly blow. John Rennie the younger's southern pier and breakwater lasted just a couple of years before it was destroyed by storms - if you walk along the remains you can see the joddle (marble cube) and trenail (oak peg) construction which was taken from lighthouse construction and still not up to the job.

 

[Quandary]

Way back when we had the Achilles 24 we were stuck in Portpatrick and needed to get home, I ordered a taxi to take the wife and kids to Stranraer for the ferry, promised faithfully that I would wait until it settled before setting out for Larne. As soon as the taxi had gone, I started up the outboard and set off, I still think the bow was directly over the stern as we went out of the harbour, once clear I turned north and managed to get some sail on, this was in the days of hanked on jibs and main rolled round the boom, so it took me quite a while. Only time I ever had that storm jib up, I had not had the common sense to hank it on in the harbour.
Once I got the sails set it started to improve and a few miles out the short steep waves were replaced by something more normal, and we started to make headway, Mid channel the ferry passed ahead of me just visible through the spray and as it got dark everything improved I was able to see lights and to lay a direct course. I was quite pleased with myself when we got back to her mooring but the car had gone so I had to stay on the boat until Monday morning.
About fifteen years later we were doing the Portpatrick race from Bangor in our Sigma 33, we had to go to the Iron Ledges at the bottom of Arran and then beat south against the tide, It was really horrible, all the crew except one were completely incapacitated; at one stage, as it got light, I decided to shorten sail, I went forward while the great Pat Kelly steered, we were bareheaded for quite a while and I was close to drowning in the solid water coming over the bow, when I got the No.2 back to try to stow it i suddenly remembered that the damn thing had reefing cringles half way up it. Surfing in to Portpatrick harbour with 24 knots behind us seemed awfully risky but we were too knackered to do anything else. Going out is safer than surfing in with a right turn just before you hit the beach. The crew suddenly all came round and headed for the Crown as soon as we were rafted up. The wind had dropped a bit so Pat and I headed for home (he had to get to work) and left them to it, they all got back next day.
Having said all that, I really like Portpatrick.

I used to have a postcard of Portpatrick lifeboat leaving harbour in a blow, it was standing on end too.