Summer cruising.......

adrianb

adrianb

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So, another week with winds, read gales, and thoughts turning to the summer and holidays. We're a shade under 16m with 1.1m draft.

Lots of thoughts on destinations, across the channel - but I'm thinking of being a bit more adventurous this year ! New boat and all that !

In Guernsey last summer, rafted outside Victoria, got talking to the couple next door - they had just come back from Camaret, within a south coast based 2 week holiday. Couple of long days they said - but fantastic area to go to.

Any thoughts on this ? Anyone been "round the corner" ? I'd go straight to St. PP then Treburden probably, but then where ?

Certainly need a safe haven if conditions got too bad, any suggestions, with experiences ?

Thanks - give me some ideas - where to go, where not to ? help plan my tentative itineray !
 
Yes, last year I took a two week cruise to Lezardrieux (superb), Camaret (good), Benodet (superb), Golfe du Morbihan( unbelievable) and then returned substituting L'Aberwrach (very pleasant) for Lezardrieux. Round trip 600 NM. Careful planning required for Chanel du Four and Raz de Sein
 
Like Lord John have been down. Indeed family holiday to this area on sailboat for 10 years or so. Echo all he said and add that the various islands off are magical - the Glenans off Benodet/Concarneau are lovely, Belle Isle, Houat and Hoedic further south very beautiful. Prevailing winds mean a bit of slog for the corner and also slog back against previaling SW wind until you turn the corner for home, good tidal planning through Chanal and the Raz important (particularly avoid wind against tide, tidal rate almost irrelevant in fast Targa, better to go against tide but with wind and tide in same direction).

Lots of intermediate ports great for short stops, good marina at the entrance to Morbihan (Croesty). Villaine river worth a look.

Wonderful crusing area, weather improves as you round the Pointe de Penmarche and enter the Anse de Benodet.

Benodet and Sainte Marine (other side of the river from Benodet) lovely but strong tides so care needed for mooring. Sainte Marine slightly easier for larger boats when I was last there but may have changed. Lovely to motor up the Benodet river past Chateau, can get to Vannes on the tide. Or take a river cruise if you dont need the hastle and explore Vannes - lovely cathedral city.

Sorry to go on. My ambition to get back there in my own boat. However Targa 34 too small for extended cruise like this so am working on an upgrade now!
 
[ QUOTE ]
My ambition to get back there in my own boat. However Targa 34 too small for extended cruise like this so am working on an upgrade now!

[/ QUOTE ] Why not go through the canal from St Malo to Arzal in Brittiany ?

http://www.rib.net/forum/showthread.php?t=11311&highlight=malo

This years hols were spent in La turballe, superb cruising area and Belle Isle and Heodic now favourites.

Pete
 
was looking at exactly this for 2007, probably cheating by towing the boat down - but that's the advantage of a 25ft'r!

however, and in the company of jhr, we (pretty much the whole family for the first time in many years, have ended up in the Aegean for a couple of weeks on a slightly different boat.........

I raise this as it probably guarantees the weather for 2007 on the suth coast in August /forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif /forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif /forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif
 
Been down that way the last few years. It gets better the further south you go. From the solent our normal route is out to the west country then cross to cameret from devon or cornwall, we went across from falmouth last year, dartmouth the year before. then come back via the CI's. Doing it this way there are less tidal gates. and you dont end up in the same places twice. it works out to be roughly the same distance.
 
We've holidayed on land in Southern Brittany several times (though not this summer, as already mentioned). It is a fabulous part of the world. What follows is therefore from a shore based perspective. "Robin", a regular on Scuttlebutt, goes there every summer and will tell you lots.

Of the places mentioned I'd certainly second Golfe de Morbihan (and Vannes in particular, though it's lively and bustling - i.e. noisy). Auray is more peaceful and also worth a visit. Personal favourites include the Belon River (incidentally, Chez Jacky is a fabulous fish restaurant at Port Belon, and well worth a visit) and further East, La Roche Bernard on the Villaine River. I'm not wild about Concarneau but that may be because I once spent a hot afternoon hobbling around the old town, with a gammy leg, a raging thirst and a wife who was Hell-bent on shopping.

Benodet is beautiful and there are a couple of peaceful hidey holes further up the Odet which were covered in an article in Yachting monthly a few months back.

Pilotage looks, erm, interesting in some of these places and I once spent a fascinating hour at Le Croesty watching people trying to get into the Golfe de Morbihan against the tide. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

But go: you won't regret it.
 
Hi Adrian

I just tried to reply to your PM but your mailbox is full apparently so I've cut and paste posted a few questions here!

It would help to know how long a break you can take and maybe safe range between refuelling points plus what you look for in your ideal destinations. Do you want shops, nice restaurants and overnight in marinas or nice cosy anchorages off delightful beaches or a blend of both. South Brittany is absolutely delightful, the north coast is nice but not in the same league!

Robin
 
Robin,
Messages sorted now !

In breif, 14 days, 150 miles would be plenty, yes, a blend of both, it's just the 2 of us this time so no ankle biters !


Hope that helps, look forward to your response/reply. Many thanks
 
Two weeks is a bit limiting as there are so many good places to go and it would be a shame to cram in too much in a first visit. I would suggest that the best way is to get to the start of Southern Brittany, say Camaret (bottom of Chenal Du Four, near Brest) in two biggish hops and probably aim to return likewise because that will allow more relaxed cruising in the nicer bits, probably the Morbihan/Quiberon and the islands offshore would need more time.

OK, there are two possible 2-leg routes from the the Solent to Camaret, either via St Peter Port or via Dartmouth. With a sailboat we use Dartmouth on the way down (it gets us a bit upwind in the prevailing westerlies) and we use St Peter Port on the way home, but with fuel as a consideration you might want to use St Peter Port both ways for cheaper diesel.

So a suggested itinerary might be:-

Hamble to St Peter Port, I'm sure you know that trip, then St Peter Port direct through Chenal Du Four to Camaret. St PP to Camaret is probably around 140 miles from memory and Camaret has easy refuelling on the outer wall of the marina. Other ports between St PP and Chenal Du Four will lose you days with no real advantage unless you really want to divert into them and the obvious one of L'Aberwrac'h at the top of Chenal Du Four doesn't have a fuel berth for your size of boat.

Camaret is quite a pleasant place as well as the usual stop for boats going to and from South Brittany proper. It has an inner small visitors marina and a bigger one as you arrive that has spce for bigger boats, if necessary on the new outer pontoon. There are also visitor buoys and there is space to anchor, these are in some ways better options as it is easier to dinghy ashore to the shops than it is to walk from the outer marina. I think your boat is too big for the inner marina visitor berths. There is a good supermarket plus an 8 to 8 mini market and lots of small restaurants.

From Camaret the next hop is through Le Raz De Sein and into South Brittany proper. Time your passage for slack water at the Raz or with wind and tide together. After the Raz it is round Penmarc'h and you have a choice of Benodet or Concarneau as the main ports with marinas, plus Port La Foret and Loctudy and the Isles De Glenan about 10 miles offshore. Maybe for a first short visit head for Concarneau first, it has a delightful walled city and the visitors marina is under it's ramparts, lots of good reataurants and an OK supermarket. Concarneau has fuel but in a tight corner and not at all tide states. Camaret to Concarneau/Benodet area is around 60 miles.

After Concarneau go out to Isles De Glenan, beautiful islands in the rocks and easier than it looks in the pilots, lots of places to anchor or there are buoys now in the main pool off Isle St Nicholas called 'La Chambre'. There are no shops on the islands only the Glenans Sailing School and a few cottages, plus a couple of bars that serve food. One of these converts to a restaurant at night and serves excellent seafood but you have to book and order your meal before midday. There are huge lobster tanks where they keep lobsters destined for Paris reaturants - after the restaurant here has had 1st pick!

Benodet has 2 sides, the St Marine side to port and Benodet proper to starboard, both have marinas but only Benodet has fuel, which is easily accessible. The village of St Marine is small and Benodet town is not big. The main supermarket is inconveniently on the edge of town and a long walk. The real joy of Benodet is the river itself not the marinas and it is well worth going up for a daytrip, the fact that they run big tripper restaurant boats up there shows how nice it is considered.

After Benodet you might need to start north again, instead of Camaret you could stop at Morgat which is delightful IMO, with sea caves and spectacular cliff walks, but unfortunately only a very small 8 to 8 shop. Fuel is available, not at LW though. From Morgat unless you could go up through Le Four and into North Brittany stopping or not as you chose at L'Aberwrac'h (buoys, the marina is too small) or Trebeurden or even Perros Guirec then St Peter Port and home.

There are lots of really nice places farther south than Concarneau/Benodet, like the Morbihan but especially the islands off Quiberon, Belle Isle, Isle De Houat, Hoedic, and beyond there still more but 14 days puts them out of reach realistically.

I hope that helps a bit, ask if you want more information.

Robin
 
The fuel at camaret delivrs max 90 litres - but if you ask the man he will turn off the limiter.

Brest is rather a dump - they rebuilt it assuming the russians would win the cold war. On a rather over-adventurous dinghy expedition I managed to get in to the secure basin with dinghy and rippy engie and didn't get shot at though,but other than loads and loads of oldish military gunboats bit boring. There's no nice riverish bit in the town,it seems. In fact hardly any nice bit of brest. sorry.

Roscoff will only let you stay if dire emergency, like busted engine, ahem.

The chenal du four and so on isn't that bad, really. also the raz de sein sounds arg and scary, and it is ok too.

the fishermen run the wrong lights, red, flashing orange, anything they fancy. Don't go near them imho. no1_moose saw them and i agree that they do look like a 747 has come down with hundreds of liferaft things perhaps, but usually there is no 747 in the water.

other than this i haven't stopped over much.
 
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The chenal du four and so on isn't that bad, really. also the raz de sein sounds arg and scary, and it is ok too.

[/ QUOTE ]

Just to add a few comments for newbies to the area:-

These passages are different from the point of view of a large mobo versus a saily boat because there is the option to take wind and tide together even if that means making the transits against the tide. The tides in the Raz can top 8kts, OK if you can do 25kts not so OK if max speed is not much over 7kts.

The Four is a bit like the Solent, strong tides but wider than it looks on the chart except in a couple of spots, notably towards the bottom, where the waters flow fast and choppy like they do at at say Hurst. Fog can be a frequent problem on this NW corner of France, fortunately in daylight in summer it tends to burn off in the Four itself. Pointe De St Mathieu signal station at the bottom of the Four has a very powerful radar and if asked will talk boats through, we were advised and offered this once by Ushant Traffic Control after I called and asked if they had a visibility report from the Four as we had 25m only whilst 12mls offshore. We have very well tested routes set up on our plotter(s) plus radar so are confident enough of finding our way through, just hate the hundreds of little fishing boats that are milling around regardless!

The Raz is very much like a French equivalent of Portland Bill or Alderney Race, easy enough if given respect, horrendous if you get it wrong. We have been through Le Raz De Sein under engine with no wind and taken a green sea over the deck that tore the sprayhood, just one rogue wave from the tide being against the swell direction. We have also sailed through with F6 and had it flat calm. A frequent occurrence at the Raz is thick fog which appears from nowhere as the tide changes and cold water is thrown up from the depths. We have many times had the Pointe Du Raz in sight from over 12 miles away only to have it vanish into 25m visibility just as we got there with the new tide. Passing the Raz in fog isn't a problem with GPS, plotters and radar and I seriously doubt you could hit it if you tried because the tides sweep you away, at least if approaching from well chosen waypoints. However the inevitable gaggle of small boats off there which are highly unpredictable in their course/speed do make it 'challenging' and when this happened again last year we took a wider circuit around them all to lessen the stress!

Swell is a big factor and is given in the French forecasts for that reason, 'La Houle' and it's direction is worth considering. The NW corner of France, North of The Four and Ushant is subject to large swells on occasion. Most of the time (certainly at raggie speeds) the swell isn't a problem but it can be spectacular as it breaks on the rocks or over the lighthouses, we give Le Four light a wide berth for sure when the swell is about. Fortunately Ushant protects the Four channel from these ocean swells but they reappear again off the Raz.

A final comment on fuel. Certainly up to last year French fuel pumps will NOT accept non-French credit cards, so you need to plan refuelling in normal opening hours. There were rumours last year that some harbours were changing the software on the pumps to accept other cards so we live in hope. At busy times (we are there in August so really busy) the battle to get on the fuel berths can be frightening, they do not stand in line politely like Brits and often the fuel berths are in tight corners making waiting traumatic. If they will accept UK credit cards it will make it much better, refuel during Le Lunch hour or in the evening and have the place to yourself!
 
Totally agree

[ QUOTE ]
We have very well tested routes set up on our plotter(s) plus radar so are confident enough of finding our way through, just hate the hundreds of little fishing boats that are milling around regardless![ QUOTE ]


We left the abers last year to go to cameret, vis was 20 metres all the way. not much on the radar. but amazed to see what was actually around us when the fog lifted. Damm french fishing boats
 
The little French fishing boats seem totally unphased by fog even though they come out through the rocks from the little harbours around Portsall, I mean little boats too, no more than 15-20 foot with long lines trailed astern and completely unpredictable.

We went into L'Aberwrac'h 2 years ago in thick fog with a really strong cross tide, navigation traumatic but again feasible with well tested routes but then we met the local ecole de voile, 20 or 30 Hobie cats tacking up the channel in 25m visibility!
 
Thanks to everyone, especially Robin, very thought provoking response - and the others all give something to consider - can't wait to get to the boat at the weekend to get the Almanac out and work the tides and estimating times ETA, departures etc etc.

Many thanks - I'm full of admiration and impressed, again, with the depth of knowledge within these Fora.


Adrian
 
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