The first three days were a fight against the wind pushing us into the bay
and back to England. We had no rest, cooking was a problem although nobody felt
hungry , only on the second day I could face to go downstairs to boil some
potatoes. We saw the storms coming and going very quickly, then we would have a
sigh of relief thinking we gone through the worst. Then a bigger storm would
come in giving us no breaks. The waves were coming from all directions and
sometimes as high as eight metres as we crossed the continental shelf. After the
echo sounder went passed its maximum reading depth of 175 metres we new better
times were ahead. Dolphins suddenly appeared and started playing around the boat
our spirits lifted. The wind swung around from Southwest to West and at
last we could sail the direction we wanted. With this break we all managed a
shower and ate very well, Graham was the only one that could face beer and
cracked a can..
The night sailing was a challenge, Graham was superb keeping calm and
helping when doubts arose. During daylight we would not see a single boat
but at night time we had fishing vessels coming as close as 1 mile and even 2 yachts
missed us by less than that. It was blind sailing but our radar was our
eyes. Needless to mention about the sky full of stars, we spotted Ryan's
belt.
The West wind only lasted a day before it backed to Southwesterly but we had
gained some mileage by then and Spain was approaching. Our destination of La
Coruna was due Southwest and looking like a 10 hour struggle of tacking, when Judit
spotted Ria de Cedeira on the chart. It was only 5 miles away but South of us,
it had good shelter from all winds. So we put the engine on and headed in. As we
rounded the corner we saw a picturesque bay surrounded by trees as we were about
to drop anchor we heard the engine start to die on us AGAIN. We have been
plagued with dirty fuel in our tank but 6 fuel filters later we are getting on
top of it and we will clean it properly next week. When we realized the anchor
had bit we all grabbed a beer each, but we were all so tired we decided not to
go ashore till the next day. We all slept really well that night and moving
around the yacht was so easy..
The following day we were still feeling tired , but got on the dinghy
and went ashore. Nice pleasant little town , with sandy beach, known as the
Crystal city , because of the glass balconies on the buildings. We had a few tapas and
a siesta. It was a rest day after all.
The next day was working day again, Graham had to do a 1 hour job in the
engine that ended up in a five hours job, innumerous calls to Clive Rochfort in England.
It was another nerve wrecking day as we couldn't start the engine, and being
anchored with no engine ,is not a good situation to be in. But in the
end Graham managed to sort it out and now we were ready to leave the following
day.
Boats are called "she" for a good reason. They have a mind of their
own regardless of crew's plan. It wasn't our day to leave, this time the anchor
was the problem. It had dragged overnight and got caught on either rocks or a
cable. We tried all different methods, Graham went in the water and made a dive attempt
but we had 6 metres under us... When frustration set in we saw the Diving
club at the marina open and Judit begged a diver to help. He was superb,
took thirty minutes of his time ,we offered money, a bottle of Magno , for which
he replied "Somos amigos"and left without taking anything. Unfortunately
in the middle of the stress we forgot to ask his name, but a very big thanks for
the big hand from the unknown diver in Cedeira!!!
