Page 22 - Yachter Spring/Summer 2021

22 CRUISING REPORTS
take a day excursion to The Lizard.This obviously required calling in to all the coves, crooks and crannies on the way, setting off down the passage inside the Manacles to Coverack for a lunch.
Then on down to Housel Bay, a small sandy cove between the Lizard and Lloyd’s Signal Station. It is marked as an anchorage, but surely limited to settled conditions
only! We returned via Church Cove (of Serpentine Lighthouse fame), Cadgwith, more porpoises and possibly a thresher shark, looked into Gillan Creek before finding a vacant mooring off Helford village.
With all eating so far aboard, we were running out of provisions again, so a quick pitstop off Falmouth town marina to re- stock.Tina (the boat’s quartermaster and to be feared) was coming down to check on us, a swift clean-up and a presentable menu was of the order, good impressions had to be made! Returning to St Mawes we embarked Tina and Major the sea dog.We ambled up the Fal looking into Restronguet, Pill, Feock and ashore for a walk around Trelissick, finally anchoring for the night just upstream of the Tregothnan pontoon – a wonderfully quiet spot.
by the day, and with the outlook having named gales on the way, we thought it wise to start heading back East. By midday Tina was dropped off earlier than intended in St Mawes, and we were on our way, heading for Dartmouth with a handy 15kt south westerly breeze.With the spinnaker up, our course took us just south of the Eddystone
making good progress with more visits from porpoises, tuna and a sunfish. Finally, the wind ran out near Prawle, so we motor- sailed up Start Bay with a fabulous sunset, finally anchoring in the Dart at 21:45; not a bad time for 65 miles.The quiet conditions of the Dart seemed incongruous, bearing in mind a forecast of south east 8/9!
It blew hard during the night, but the anchor held well, we finally ventured out mid-morning to find a few RSYC boats
in port for the Mayflower 400 celebration. We met up with Allan and Gillian Beswick aboard Twister of Mersea just leaving to fulfil a M400 engagement at Brixham YC, then we found Graham Tracey continuing with the westward engagements of the M400. With a forecast of gales continuing and our onboard shower having run the water tank low, we opted to go alongside having spied a recently vacated berth. It was a struggle to retrieve a well dug-in anchor, requiring a little over running to trip it out.We stopped in Dartmouth for three days as a
The weather forecast was deteriorating