By Andy Lund
Ed note - This is the fourteenth installment of a multi-part series by Andy Lund on his first year of cruising on board Resolution , the Nordhavn 46 he took delivery of in February 2004.
July 3
We slipped into Falmouth on the rising tide, and tied up at Port Pendennis Marina at 6 20 AM. There wasn’t a soul awake, except Falmouth Coast Guard, to whom I reported arrival by VHF radio. It took two days of steady phoning around southeast England to find anyone at Customs and Immigrations who were interested in our arrival. We filled a Customs form designed for boats departing the UK, and faxed pages from our passports down to Immigrations in Plymouth, who faxed back entry stamps. All rather casual, I thought, especially in light of the tragic bombings in London a few days later.
The marina was right in town, with everything within walking distance. We had a great arrival dinner – fresh scallops for starters and superb fresh mussels for the main course - at a bistro under a pub/bar just across the main street from the Cornwall National Maritime Museum. The place was so new they weren’t even set up for credit cards yet, so we almost had to wash the dishes – but between the three of us we mustered enough cash.
The folks at the marina were great, and we felt really very welcome. They arranged for Bob Orchard from Lucas Electric to come down and solve the shore power problem. Turned out that the engineering was just fine, but the connecting plugs weren’t wired correctly, so the power wasn’t flowing. After some experimentation, we were in business. Hurray!
Advice for those who follow – before you leave the USA, buy a US 50 amp, 125/250 volt female shore power plug (and plastic boot) – at West Marine - plus a two foot length of 30 amp shore power cable. Then that can be wired to an EU 16 amp (240 volt) connection, sold in Horta for less than five dollars. Plug the US end into your US 240 volt shore power inlet, and the EU end into a 25 meter EU shore power cable, and you’re in business, assuming you have the isolation transformer and 50/60 cycle charger plus 120 volt 60 cycle inverter set up as is on “Resolution”. You won’t get a lot of power, but the batteries will stay up, and ship’s systems will work fine. Anything needing 60 cycle, 240 volt power – for us only the watermaker and the air conditioning – will require running the generator. But in northern Europe I doubt we’ll need air conditioning, and we only run the watermaker at sea anyway.
Tuesday afternoon I rented a car, and early Wednesday morning we made the 170 mile drive northeast through the green countryside of Southwest England to Bristol Airport. Zack Blum’s girlfriend Anna Deck got off the same Continental flight from Newark that Mike McFadden took back to the USA, and on to Seattle. Anna will be aboard for two weeks, then Chase Kaufman, another friend of Zack’s, joins us in Glasgow as Anna flies home. Mike will return in late September, rejoining in Amsterdam.
July 9
At Sea in the English Channel west of Falmouth
We left Falmouth at 1020 this morning, British Summer Time 0220 PDT) for the 265 nm overnight run to Dublin (Dun Laoghaire - pronounced "Done Leary"). The sea is glassy, and the sun is out, with no wind - a rare and beautiful day. The weather up the Irish Sea is forecast to stay this nice through tomorrow, with north winds under 10 knots. We should round Lands End (the SW tip of England) around 1400, with the flooding tide carrying us northbound.
Falmouth is a superb town, and the Port Pendennis Marina was great, and welcoming. Everything is within walking distance, including a very good chart outlet and chandlery called "Marine Instruments". I picked up some charts for Norway and a Norway cruising guide there. Rob Orchard from Lucas Marine Electrics solved our EU shore power challenge, which is a huge relief.
Anna had a fall yesterday, and needed stitches. The support from the EMT people and the Truro Hospital was superb. She's now fine, if a little bruised.
The papers and the radio are full of the sad news of the London bombings, but it's had no affect on us. I still plan to winter over in London at St Katherine's Dock, near the Tower of London.
July 10
Dun Laoghaire, Ireland
We arrived Dun Laoghaire (suburban Dublin) this evening at about 8 PM, after a smooth 245 nm trip up the Irish Sea from Falmouth. Tidal currents were quite strong, giving us speeds ranging from 4.5 to 9 knots at the same RPM.
We are in the Dun Laoghaire (pronounced "done leary") Marina, next to the terminal for ferries to England. The weather is dry and sunny, with twilight at 1100 PM. There is a suburban rail system with a stop right outside the marina to take us into Dublin. We'll be here for three days.
July 18
We arrived Oban, Scotland (Dunstaffnage Marina) this afternoon, on a sunny, showery, blustery - typical Scottish - day.
We'll be here three nights, taking Anna Deck to Glasgow for her flight home, and picking up Chase Kaufman, both on Wednesday the 20th.
July 22
We bid farewell to Anna Deck and welcome to Chase Kaufman in Glasgow on Wednesday, then made a huge Costco run. Just as good as the US ones, and really good Scottish beef. Yesterday we toured the Oban distillery, and yes, they give samples. Really good stuff!
We've entered the Caledonian Canal, which cuts across northern Scotland from Fort William on the West to Inverness on the east. Part of the canal is Loch Ness, which we transit from one end to the other, so we'll keep an eye out for the monster.
We passed through 12 locks this afternoon, covering two miles in two hours. Tomorrow we meet up with Mark and Melanie Attrill and kids. Mark is a Royal Air Force officer friend from my NATO days in the late 1980's.
July 25
Inverness, Scotland
We arrived Inverness this morning, at the north eastern end of the Caledonian Canal. We'll be here for a couple of days, then head north and east to Stromness, in the Orkney Islands, and across the North Sea to Bergen, Norway, arriving Bergen approximately 2 August. We'll then meander down the Norwegian and Swedish coasts to Goteborg, and probably cross Sweden via the Gota Canal.
Yesterday we cruised the entire length of Loch Ness, which makes up part of the Caledonian Canal. Sorry to report there were no sitings of Nessie, the legendary Loch Ness monster.
Zack has now become quite adept at navigating the boat into and out of canal locks, and we've turned Chase into a very competent line handler and deck hand. Tonight they'll have a run ashore at the local pubs.
The weather is now cloudy and drizzly, after some lovely sunny days.
July 28
Stromness, Orkney Islands, Scotland
We arrived here about 1030 AM after an overnight run from Inverness up the NE coast of Scotland. Stromness is a fishing and trading town on the principal island in the group, called "Mainland". It is just west of Scapa Flow, the Royal Navy's main northern anchorage during the two World Wars. We sailed in through Scapa Flow, a big open roadstead, dotted with "wk" (meaning wreck) on the chart. Seems the German navy was interned there in late 1918, after the Armistice ending World War One, and they scuttled all their ships - 23 if the number of charted "wk"s is any indication.
Crossing the Pentland Firth, the eight mile wide strait between the southern Orkneys and the top of Scotland, takes some planning and smart timing, as the tide rushes back and forth between the North Sea and the Atlantic Ocean at up to nine knots. We gained a three to four knot advantage but had to crab our course at about 40 degrees because of the side thrust from the tidal current as we crossed.
We'll be here in Stromness a day or two, then make the 300 mile crossing of the North Sea to Bergen, Norway. We're at 59 degrees north latitude now, about the level of Juneau, Alaska. Bergen is at about 60 degrees north, just below the level of Anchorage. Stromness is a grey stone town, facing south on a nice harbor and nestled against a high hill sheltering it from the northwest winds.
Chase has now made his first overnight passage, and did just fine except for a mild bout of seasickness. The seas were actually quite benign, but the first ofshore stretch can unsettle anyone. Anna had a bit of queasiness just out of Falmouth, but Mike, Zack and I have been quite lucky - no seasickness on the whole trip from Puget Sound.
July 30
We had tentatively planned to leave Stromness for Bergen, Norway today. However, based on advice from Commanders Weather, who provided us such good routing and forecasting service across the Atlantic, we're deferring our departure by 48 hours. Seems the North Sea will be quite rough over the weekend, with seas in the 10 to 12 foot range and 30 to 35 knot winds. No need to endure that, so we'll stay here. We now expect to reach Bergen Wednesday afternoon, August 3rd.
The Stromness marina is quite modern, very sheltered and comfortable, and right in town next to the ferry terminal serving Scrabster, on the mainland of Scotland. Zack and Chase stayed out late last night and met a bunch of the locals in a close-by watering hole. We all took a bus over to Kirkwall, the principal town on the island, yesterday, and visited St Magnus Cathedral, dating to 1150. Early gothic and very beautiful.
All is well, except for a broken forward head - too much toilet paper from mopping up a bout of seasickness. Repairs to be made in Bergen.
