The next morning, we said farewell to Scotland and headed towards Rathlin Island off the northern tip of Ireland. We sailed past the Rathlin West Lighthouse which is also known as the upside-down lighthouse because the light is at the base of the tower. The lighthouse stands high on a cliff and the top of the tower is often shrouded in fog. Hence, the light is more visible from the tower’s base.
In the morning, I let Roman sleep in and I went out for a hike. I used the AllTrails app and found a trail that took me through the center of the island. I passed the ruins Kelp House where dried kelp seaweed was burned to extract chemicals such as iodine and soda for glass and soap manufacturing. The trail took me through pastures where the sheep were as determined to use the trail as I was. They scurried down the trail in front of me, but one was too intent on grazing to follow the flock. The lone sheep made it very clear that she wanted to rejoin the others, so I stepped off of the trail and encouraged her to pass. I enjoyed my hike and was sure to check my shoes before getting back onto Flight as there was so much sheep poo it was impossible to avoid it. My shoes were evident that I had been over hill and dale, but it was nothing that a hose in the marina could not handle.
The town of Rathlin was small and featured one pub named McCuaig’s Bar. We stopped in for a pint then learned that the pizza trailer was soon opening for the evening. We ordered a margarita pizza which was effectively just a cheese pizza, but it was tasty, we did not need to bake it ourselves, and we felt good supporting the local economy.
We made a series of day sails down the east coast of Ireland revisiting some of the ports from our trip north – Glenarm, Bangor, Strangford and finally Dun Laoghaire which is just south of Dublin. Cell phones have made the iconic red telephone boxes obsolete and Roman delights in checking the handset to see if there is a dial tone. Often these days, there is neither a handset or a telephone. I took an early morning walk in Glenarm and found a beautifully restored telephone booth that had been turned into a little library.
We spent the weekend visiting with our friends Greg and Diane in Dun Laoghaire whom we met on our way north and promised to let them know when we were heading south. They invited us to their boat on Friday evening for charcuterie and wine, and we brought veggies and Roman’s chocolate mousse (Julia Child’s recipe – Delicious!). We had a lovely evening! On Saturday, Roman and I went to the movies to see Odysseus then we met Greg and Diane for dinner at The Fish Shack. On Sunday, we joined them at the Royal St. George Yacht Club to watch the Men’s ILCA World Championship. ILCA is the International Laser Class Association which is a type of small, fast, one-person sailboat. A Hungarian sailor won and we watched the crowd carry him in his boat around the marina in celebration.
We had been watching the weather all weekend and knew that our best chance of making good progress south was to leave on Monday. Although we wanted to visit some more locations in Ireland such as Waterford and Cork, the prediction was for the wind to shift and blow from south to north which was the opposite of the direction we were headed. Another issue for our passage was a meeting of EU leaders just south of Dublin along the coast and there was an exclusion zone through which no vessels were allowed to pass extending six miles offshore and 12 miles from north to south. As we sailed, we had fun listening to the Irish military on the marine radio kicking both fishing boats and private yachts out of the exclusion zone which was well publicized, but heavily ignored.
We knew that our passage would take approximately 48 hours and the first 24 hours went well with good winds and slight seas. On the morning of day #2, the winds and seas picked up and shifted against us. Given our slow progress, we were going to miss the favorable tides and currents around Land’s End (the westernmost point of mainland Britain), so we decided to divert to St. Martin in the Isles of Scilly to rest and await more favorable winds. We anchored for two nights and then had a lovely and fast ~60 nautical mile day sail to the Helford River, just south of Falmouth. We spent Friday and Saturday nights on anchor in the river and I took advantage of a beautiful sunny day to inflate the paddle board and do some exploring.
On Sunday, we headed to Falmouth as we had an appointment to consult with a sailmaker about a new mainsail on Monday morning. Gavin, our sailmaker, let us know that he would be a few minutes late as he was consulting with the skipper on Adix, a 65 meter superyacht berthed in front of Flight. Adix is owned by the Satatander banking family and has been one of Gavin’s customers for 30 years. We had a great and informative meeting and are awaiting the estimate.
As a blow with 25 knot winds was expected on Tuesday, we opted to spend an extra day in Falmouth doing boat chores and going to the Cornwall National Maritime Museum. Our propane cooking system had a faulty connection in the safety solenoid that Roman diagnosed and fixed. We spent a few hours in the museum learning more about the history and importance of shipping and trade in Cornwall. Tomorrow, we will continue to sail east toward Portsmouth, stopping at several ports along the way.
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