Dartmouth Devon UK

Slipping out of the QE2 Marina

Well, we’re off and running, as they say, and so far all is going well. We left Guernsey at 1030hrs on Wednesday 14 May, after completing a few last-minute jobs first thing in the morning.

St Peter Port

High tide had been at about 0830hrs so we went south-about Guernsey and picked up the first of the favourable west-going tide when we reached St Martin’s Point. It was a beautiful day, with clear skies and bright sunshine and Guernsey looked at her springtime best as we motored along the south coast, shielded from the northeast wind by the island.

Pleinmont Point and Les Hanois lighthouse at the SW tip of Guernsey

Off Pleinmont, and out of the wind shadow, we picked up a good breeze and set course for Dartmouth, where we were planning to meet up with Neil, a friend of ours, for a couple of days.

Arriving at the entrance to the River Dart with Britannia Royal Naval College floodlit on the hill above

We had champagne sailing all day until about 1900hrs, when the wind died, so we started the engine and donked the rest of the way to Dartmouth, arriving in at about 2300hrs and grabbing what looked to be the last available space on the midstream pontoons. It was the perfect length for us, starboard side to with bows to the strongly ebbing tide and that ebb tide made it very easy to come alongside. Next morning the bloke on the motorboat astern of us asked what time we had arrived. When I told him his response was:  ‘Really? We were awake then and we didn’t hear a thing!’ Which is good as that’s exactly how we had wanted it!

Spanish Galeon Andalucía visiting Dartmouth

We had a good night’s sleep and were enjoying a somewhat late breakfast when a large catamaran arrived to take the space that had opened up on the other side of the pontoon from us. It was a little after 1000hrs and the tide was ebbing hard again. As the cat drew closer we realised that it was Maid Honour, with a couple we know from Guernsey on board. We caught their lines and then chatted. They had sailed over the day before as well but had taken the early tide at about 0530hrs. They’d spent a very peaceful night up at Dittisham and were now looking for a pontoon space closer to the town so that they too could enjoy the Dart Music Festival with local friends. Unfortunately, it turned out that the berth they were in had been reserved by the Westerly Owners Association (WOA) rally; there were already 4 WOA on the pontoon, 5 more were expected later. Happily, there were still 2 berths on one of the other midstream pontoons, so we went across to the pontoon and paced out the space – just enough room. And there was just enough time to take their lines before we need to head up the hill for our rendezvous with Neil.

It was lovely to see Neil again and also his younger daughter, Sophie, who is 6 months pregnant, and who was also visiting. We haven’t seen Sophie since she was a teenager about 20 years ago, so it was lovely to catch up with her too. We spent a lazy day in the garden, enjoyed a delicious BBQ in the sun and made plans for the next day before we all walked down the hill to return to BVoS.

Views of the Dart.  Blue Velvet in the centre of the picture

Views of the Dart.  Britannia Royal Naval College by day

Views of the Dart.  Looking down river towards Kingswear

On Friday 16 May we spent the morning on admin and emails before heading ashore and back up the hill to see Neil and Sophie. After a frittata lunch, we did a walking circuit down to the upper ferry, across the river, along the footpath beside the steam railway track and into Kingswear where we stopped in at the Darthaven Marina chandlery before crossing back to the Dartmouth side on the lower ferry.

The Dartmouth Yacht Club was the perfect spot for a beer in the sun and then we dropped Neil’s and Sophie’s dogs at the house before heading back into town to enjoy the opening night of the Dart Music Festival.

Neil had been keen to see ‘Riviera Dogs’ (an 80’s tribute band), and they were excellent, sounding almost exactly like the performers whose music they were playing.

A pizza dinner followed and then we headed to the Guildhall to listen to a band touted as ‘blues’ but which was actually quite heavy rock with a blues undertone. Not quite what we had expected but the performance was still excellent.

All the while we had had one eye on the weather forecast with a view to heading onwards towards Ireland. The long-range forecast had some very strong westerly winds whist the shorter range ones suggested that we would be spending more time motoring rather than sailing. The best option appeared to be to set off on Saturday. We’d miss part of the music festival but we would catch the last of the helpful sailing wind. Saturday morning dawned grey and overcast. We had been going to have breakfast with Neil at an open-air café in the park, but as it was so chilly we decided to go for an indoor café instead. We had a final couple of hours with our friend before saying our goodbyes on the embankment where we headed for our dinghy and he to his car.

Castle Point to starboard as we left the River Dart

We got underway a little earlier than planned, at 1130hrs and, from the off, had a reasonable sailing breeze – better than had been forecast a couple of days previously.

Dartmouth, Devon, UK