Zorts Lives: Waiting out the easterlys

We've returned to Falmouth, leaving the Isles of Scilly behind (somewhat sadly...), and we have settled in -- briefly -- to Port Pendennis Marina. We've had a couple of days of strong easterly winds, a somewhat unusual, and unwelcome, occurrence in this neck of the woods. I will take advantage of that to catch up on the past week of sailing.

After leaving our mooring between Tresco and Bryher Islands, we motored around the corner to St. Helen's Pool, from whence we could visit the islands of St. Helen's, Tean, and St. Martin's. The first two are currently uninhabited, but have some nice walks, and the latter has a small full-time population. I've mentioned St. Martin's in my post about making pesto.

After two nights in St. Helen's Pool we sailed to an anchorage south of St. Martin's and among the Eastern Islands. This anchorage was a great base from which to explore. We put the kayak back in the water and rowed around Great Ganilly Island.

The eastern shore of Great Ganilly Island hosts a colony of seals. We found them mostly lounging around on the beach, though many seemed as interested in us as we were in them.

Northerly winds were forecast, so after two nights we moved the boat to a new anchorage in Porth Cressa, on the south side of St. Mary's. This also gave us access to groceries; we were running a bit low on some staples. It also put us in some very calm water, so I put on a wet suit top and braved the ocean water to do some hull cleaning and inspection. I found this wrapped around the prop.

I was happy to get out of the water.

I wasn't the only swimmer in the water; there was a "'round St. Mary's" swim that day, and we had a ringside seat for the start of the last leg.

From Porth Cressa we motored, very carefully, across some very shallow water to an anchorage off of Samson Island. We walked around Samson, then moved the boat later in the day to a spot just off the coast of Tresco, close to where we have previously moored. The next day we did some shopping on Tresco, and had a really delightful late afternoon walk to the east coat of Tresco.

We spent our last night in the Isles of Scilly anchored on the north side of "The Bar" between Gugh and St. Agnes, close to our arrival point in the Scillies. On the way in and out, we passed the rock called "The Cow".

We took one last walk on St. Agnes, hoping to get a pint at The Turk's Head, the "most southwesterly pub in the British Isles". Unfortunately, they were closed.

We wound up motoring all the way back to Falmouth; there was absolutely no wind. We intended to anchor up the River Fal, but as we were passing the entrance to the Helford River we spotted a massive fog bank settling over the mouth of the Fal, so we aborted and spent the night anchored in the Helford River.

The following morning there was a decent north wind, and we were able to sail from the Helford River to Falmouth. We were able to deploy our gennaker, for the first time in a long time.

Unfortunately, the furling mechanism jammed as we approached the busy Falmouth harbor. We headed back out and managed to unjam the furler. We stopped using the gennaker and switched to the staysail for the rest of the day.

We knew that strong easterly winds were on the way, so we originally planned on spending a few nights anchored up the Fal, or perhaps on a pontoon, near Truro. The sail up the Fal was fascinating. Just past the King Harry Ferry, there is a deep water mooring for large ships that was occupied by a couple of car carriers.

However, we didn't like the looks of the pontoons, and rather than anchor in the middle of nowhere, we headed back down the Fal to ride out the winds in Port Pendennis.

This put us next to the Falmouth train station, so we decided to take the opportunity to take the train back to Penzance to visit St. Michael's Mount.