Looking at Scotland.

I’m sitting in the cabin listening to the rain coming down. The tent* is up again. Both have been the usual experience for Vagabond in Ireland so far. It rained stair rods on Wednesday, when I tried to return from the Titanic experience – it was so bad I asked the cafe manager in the place to let me have a big plastic rubbish bag – he looked a bit askance as he produced it and went wide eyed when I cut a hole in the bottom of it and put it over my head.  It worked, keeping the upper half of me dry at the expense of a few raised eye brows. Eyebrows were also raised at a local restuarant where I had a reunion with an "ex" **. She's just 40 and we had an excellent dinner together in the Boat House. The food and converstaion were excellent. The staff were a bit confused about our relationship and we parted at the gangplank promising to see each other more often (it had been about 8 years...). She roared off into the night in her convertable - she assured me that the kits car seats and buggies all fitted and SHE WAS NOT GETTING A PEOPLE CARRIER.

At least it’s no longer blowing hard.  We had a full gale yesterday in Bangor and it was still blowing quite hard at 07:00 this morning. As forecast, it had calmed down a bit by mid morning when we set off to do the short hop (22 miles) to Glenarm, a small marina tucked into a little bay somewhere along the Irish coast of St George channel.

Dodging Ferries

It was misty and damp, with a cloud layer that looked menacing. When we had departed the marina and raised the sails, the wind dropped even more and we motor sailed across the mouth of Belfast Lough, dodging two out-bound ferries and an in-bound freighter.

Once we were past Black Head, the wind freshened up and veered slightly to the West. The sky brightened and Vagabond picked up her skirts to fly to the North. At one point we registered over 8 knots over the ground – probably at least 2 of which were from the tide.

We ran into patch of really awful sea – it was clearly a set of waves set up by the tide rushing north as it passed a headland – once down tide of the headland, the sea smoothed out and we had a really pleasant sail. The verdant coast of County Antrim slid past.

The verdant coast slide past

The mist cleared to the North East and there was the Mull of Kintyre looming over the sea. The last time I had seen that had been at night, with the Viking, when we were taking part in the Scottish three peaks race.



Beacon



Also to the north appeared  a couple of beacons, both showing their lights to mark  a series of nasty rocks about 3 miles from the coast.

Round the last headland and there was Glenarm – but where was the entrance? As in Ilfracombe, a yacht chose to leave the Marina just when I was looking for the entrance; this gave me a pretty good indicator of the hole in the breakwater. We drifted in – I called the marina master on his mobile, only to find it had been diverted to another numbers voice mail....

Suddenly I could see him – gesturing to a space on the pontoon, not on a finger, or the pontoon, but sandwiched between two yachts who were on their own finger pontoons.

And so the day drew to a close. The sun shone – the rowing club went for some exercise and the Paps of Jura stood out to the north, whilst dark clouds gathered from the South.

Rowing club and the Paps

I began to wonder if we could make Port Ellen (on Islay) in one hop tomorrow. It would get me a day nearer to Oban or Croibh Haven, where I could leave Vagabond and take the train home before next week end.

The Owners Agent insists on it.

It would all depend on the weather and the tides......

In the meantime, it's stopped raining - I'm off to the pub to find an internet connection (of course, any Guinness will be incidental.)

* The Flautist wanted to know where I erected a  tent in the Marina. It fits on a frame over the cockpit and reminds me of the hood on the elderly Morgan Plus 4 that I had once. I sold it to pay for the honeymoon with the Owners Agent....
** Boss - I don't know what you were thinking.