Page 32 - Yachter Autumn 2021

32 CRUISING REPORTS
AT THE MERCY OF THE WEATHER WHEN SAILING THE FRENCH COAST – SUMMER 2007
This little article describes how the best laid plans of mice, men and yachties can go wrong. In this case the three Cs; Charlie, Coralie (Hammonds) and Callisto of Wem (Murrays); had a plan in the summer of 2007 to go to Brest and possibly further. Basically, it all went wrong when the weather decided not to allow us to do it in the time available! The charts here show what actually happened.
We initially went to Cherbourg for the usual essential supplies and then on to Guernsey where we stayed for some time, persuading Rosemary to leave there was always difficult. We then set off for Trebeurden on a foggy nearly windless day. It was a fairly long trip and we kept in line about 200m apart with Charlie leading because I had a computer running Seapro on board. Remember this was before all the fancy chart plotters that are common now. I could only see both boats behind occasionally but the radar performed perfectly, as did the radars on the other two.
We arrived at Trebeurden without incident the boats having followed the pre-planned route in Seapro, I had it set up such that the autopilot did as it was told by the computer.
We had a pleasant time in Trebeurden, but as we were about to leave for L’Aber Wrac’h Rosemary appeared with a piece
of paper from the Navtex saying a bad gale was coming, so we wanted a more sheltered spot. Looking at the options we decided we had time to get to the safety of Morlaix. I therefore programmed into Seapro the route shown on the chart here from Trebeurden
to Morlaix. It was only used as a guide on this trip as the visibility was good. Indeed, a few years later Rosemary and I went to Trebeurden by motorhome when touring