Tuesday 22 September 2009

Tuesday 1st September 2009

Although we only stayed overnight in Dun Laoghaire the marina was one of the best on this trip. It was spacious with good facilities. We set off not quite early enough to get the full flood down to Tuskar Rock just off Wexford which meant a change of plan and a diversion towards Milford Haven and Padstow. The original passage plan was to sail straight to Falmouth. We had pretty fast sail across the Irish Sea during the night averaging around 8 knots. Once we made the turn at Milford Haven and headed across the Bristol Channel escorted for the 10 hours by dolphins. I am sure that we were going so fast they fancied a race either that or they knew we were about to have some engine problems.
We had just got Padstow so decided to start the engine and get ready to drop the sails when once again the engine started to increase and decrease in speed. We managed to limp into Padstow where once again we changed the fuel filters and checked the lines.
Padstow offers a warm welcome and the best organised Harbour wall facilities of our journey so far we were very impressed. Thinking all was well with the engine after checking most things I could think of and then several more items after speaking to the Resident Diesel Expert (Thanks Dad your advice is always so helpful) we set off. We managed to fuel up and then hit open sea before the engine decided to stop completely. Unfortunately Padstow is not somewhere that you can sail into with a boat our size. We already had the sails up so the decision was easy to continue and had around to Penzance under sail. During the voyage we made repeat attempts to start the engine however as we started to drain the domestic batteries we refrained from trying again. The passage was made in pretty good time until we round Land’s End when we hit the doldrums. As the light faded we managed to get a tow from a passing yacht before the rope breaking and the yacht leaving us to continue by sail. We pushed on towards Falmouth at 2 knots until about 0100 when the wind increased from F2 to F6 very quickly. When we tried to reef in the Genoa, we couldn’t which meant a visit up on the deck in complete darkness and mounting seas. We hove to for the next 4 hours, 8 miles out to sea from the Lizard drifting at 2 knots and then managed some shut eye on a short watch system 1 hour on 1 off. Day light came we sorted the sails and headed towards Falmouth making good progress until the tide turned and the wind dropped once again. Tacking slowly towards Falmouth at a speed of 2 knots, 15 miles seemed to take so long. We managed to get to within 2 miles of Falmouth before losing the wind again at which point we were able to organise a tow. The 12 hour passage to Penzance turned into 34 hours to Falmouth where we have now had the engine looked at fuel tank cleaned and all running OK.
Tuesday 22nd September we set sail for Plymouth only to get 30 minutes out before the engine started to play up once again. Creeping slowly back we managed to tie up once more. As I type the Engineer is back on board and after several checks the Fuel pump/governor is coming off and going to be checked and serviced (1 week) I seem to remember the Expert (Dad) saying some weeks ago when this first started that it sound like the governor was sticking looks like you could be right.

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