Sailing from Hartland Point to Portishead

[zlod]

I'm hoping to be sailing round from south of Hartland Point to Portishead this coming weekend.

Does anyone know whether there are any small craft moorings / mooring buoys off any of the North Devon harbours (or even better off Lundy) or are we going to have to play around with the anchor if we want to stop?

Any suggestions about how to deal with strongish tides from the Lundy area up to Portishead? The options I am thinking of are either trying to anchor or berth somewhere when the tide is strongest or to put up with it and try to find a part of the Bristol Channel where the stream is weaker.

If we go into Watchet is there any chance of making Portishead in one go from there? I suspect that the tides aren't up for this (but would need to check more thoroughly with the tidal atlas).

We can do about 5 knots under motor and maybe 6-7 knots under sail (if there is some of that wind stuff).

 

[matelot]

there are visitor buoys in Combe.

tide is easy- make sure you round Hartland withsufficient of the flood left to round Bull. Going up from Bull to Phead, you go with the flood or if you think you need the extra time, go against the last of the ebb well inshore as far as foreland and then catch the flood up. Careful of the pots at foreland - some idiot of an inshore fisherman has laid pots that have no flags and submerge by a foot or so under the tide.

 

[DAVIDO]

Seconded on the pots they are everywhere in that area and poorly marked. They had us a couple of times.

 

[zlod]

matelot> Are those Combe moorings drying? I was hoping to find some moorings somewhere that didn't dry, otherwise it probably makes sense to anchor somewhere.

Is "Combe" the same as Combe Martin / Watermouth or is it somewhere else?

Looks like it would be a good plan to try to make Portishead on that flood tide. It looks to me like Watchet won't work on a single tide (we'd be cutting it very fine if it did): which is what makes your suggestion of being able to start around the ebb pretty attractive.

 

[Severnman]

Think you will find the moorings will be drying particularly on these tides. You could anchor in the Range off Ilfracombe. Porlock another option. If making for Watchet then you will need to exit on high water, anchor well off for ebb duration and you should easily make it to Portishead on next tide. Easterly winds mind though light.....iron sail methinks

 

[graham]

There are visitors buoys in the anchorage at Lundy now.But not sheltered in easterly winds.Depending on draught you can stay afloat just inside Watermouth Cove at anchor or on a buoy if there still there.

Most of the other anchorages dont giuve you any shelter from Easterly winds.

Blue anchor Bay just west of Watchet is a good anchorage open to the East but plenty of room.

 

[zlod]

graham> Thanks for the info. Hopefully we won't have too strong an easterly and will be able to use one of those visitors' mooring buoys at Lundy: that would be a total dream.

How can it be that the one time I am sailing NE up the North Devon coast a north easterly is forecast?

I've noticed that a lot of the harbours on that north coast also have entrances that face east / NE (Newquay, Clovelly, Ilfracombe). This is a conspiracy.

 

[Allan]

How did it go? Or are you still out there enjoying yourself?
Allan

 

[zlod]

Allan> Totally amazing. We got to Portishead at about 9:15 on Monday morning after a *long* time at sea. I'm planning on writing a bit of a better post on our trip round (after work and after a trip to Portishead marina this evening to clean the boat).

 

[zlod]

We set off from Plymouth at 2am on Saturday (the late start was due to the trains and an anchor light that needed mending). Funnily enough, we were the only ones sailing. It was a beautiful moonlit night and we were motoring along with dolphins for about an hour in St Austell Bay. Dawn was as beautiful as the moonlit night:

dawn off Falmouth

We had a relaxing motorsail up towards the Lizard, getting wind a about 15 miles from Lizard. The sea was absolutely perfect: clear and calm with a nice wind filling our sails from behind:

beautiful calm conditions in St Austell Bay

We took the inshore passage round the Lizard, perfecting our gybing on the way through. It was cool being south of 50 degrees north. We were heading for Tater Du lighthouse on the west side of Mounts Bay. We really got things going well when we perfected goosewinging and we sailed straight towards the lighthouse.

passing Lizard Point via the inshore passage, gybing

A big moment for us was rounding Chair Ladder aka Gwennap Head. We saw climbers on South Face Direct. The crag looked amazing from seaward. We then tried to point out towards Longships, but Cervisia just seemed desperate to take the inshore passage between Armed Knight and Kettles Bottom. The seas were calm and the weather settled, so we just went for it and shot past Lands End on a beam reach at 6-7 knots.

Lands End

Kettle's Bottom looks a bit pointy

We had a bit of a fight around Pendeen as the wind changed from a beam reach to being close hauled. We also seemed to find a tide race that wasn't marked on the chart or mentioned in Reeds. Once out of this, we battled the waves out towards St Ives.

St Ives was the start of the second night. Once we worked out how to set the sails to best advantage, we started storming along with the wind on the starboard beam. Trevose Head seemed to take an age to appear and we passed the lighthouse in the small hours (on a watch system). I was sleeping as we passed Hartland Point and my mate Stone called me out to see the dolphins:

dolphin swimming with us off Hartland Point

Lundy: the promised land

reefing the mainsail by Lundy: that reef didn't last long!

We had to get the engine on by Lundy as we were running out of power (must get one of those masthead LED lights). We felt like we were sailing past the promised land as we passed the east coast of Lundy. It would have been nice to go ashore, but there was a nasty little chop so we carried on. We had to head quite a way north to clear the tide race around Bull Point and were fighting against some quite feisty seas (no photos of these). Eventually the tide turned and we were able to point along the South Wales coast (which by now was getting quite dark: night 3 here we come!).

We made big friends with the autohelm off Nash Point and had a pleasant run towards Cardiff with the tide:

Stone and our new best friend: the autohelm

The goal of reaching Cardiff turned to the goal of reaching Barry as we reset our tidal calculations. The thought of a cold one in a pub kept us going.

With 5 miles to go to Barry, the tide turned and boy did it turn! It was absolutely tanking it out of the Bristol Channel around Rhoose Point. From being 5 miles and 40 minutes from Barry, we were suddenly 5 miles and 5 hours away. We decided to knuckle down, put the engine in tickover and just try to hold station. We did this for about 4 hours, dodging the freighters (it all gets well exciting when you see a green and red light appear out of the distance: you then just hope that the freighter can see your little port light as you try to get out of the way as quickly as possible).

There was some fantastic sailing when the wind picked up around the Wolves and Flat Holm. It was great to be sailing again and really nice to know that there is a good interesting sailing area close to Bristol. The Holm Islands looked fantastic as they loomed out of the gloom.

We then dodged the logs and trees on the east coast of the Channel up towards Portishead, passing Portishead Point at about 9am:

sails down for the first time in 48 hours by Portishead Point

We called Portishead marina and they very kindly locked us in at 9:20am on Monday morning.

It was a great trip: really a formative experience. 260 miles and 55 hours at sea. We learnt so much about sailing and Cervisia. Well pleased with the boat. I bought a Contessa 26 basically on reputation and Cervisia totally lives up to her reputation: she's a fantastic sea going boat and totally comfortable for 2 people.

I'm looking forward to discovering the Bristol Channel now. I can't wait for some of those big trips out west. The thing to do is to just switch off the GPS, ignore speed over the ground and enjoy the sailing.

 

[damo]

Loved your account, and the pics - welcome to Portishead and the BC! Nice to chat with you the other day.

BTW Reeds does mention the Pendeen Race... "Between Cape Cornwall and Pendeen, overfalls and a race extend up to 1 1/2 miles offshore; avoid except in calm weather and slack water" You'd better believe it - I had some hairy moments there in August, south bound /forums/images/graemlins/frown.gif

 

[zlod]

Damo> Maybe we misread things in Reeds. We were giving the area west of Pendeen a wide berth until we were signficantly north. It was like a mill pond. We then got east of Pendeen and it all kicked off. Yikes! Things only calmed down a bit when we got to Bosigran. Maybe we also got lulled into a fall sense of security having had easy times of it round Lizard and Portland (where we were more wary of the races).

Looking forward to good times at Portishead. Richard at Portishead marina had an extremely good idea about going up to Chepstow. That has created a huge amount of interest: sailing to Cheppy and then running up to Tintern and back. Sounds like an excellent objective. There's clearly a lot to do in the area.

 

[graham]

Enjoyed reading that .Hoping for another visit up to Portishead in the near future so will keep an eye out for you and the boat.