Ardglass to Bangor

When we left Robinetta in Ardglass we put things away carefully, wrapped in plastic to stop them doing mouldy. The first thing I did was unwrap everything! I think it was a useful exercise, but by the time I had finished that, collected Worm from the yard, put the cabin back together, and got the bowsprit out I was ready for bed.

This morning, with a planned start of 8am there was still a lot to do. Getting the whickham martin gear to work seemed to take a long time, and it was half eight before we came off the pontoon. Alex made bacon sandwiches for breakfast, and I finished mine as we left Ardglass behind in bright sunshine.

There seemed to be enough wind to sail, so I got the main up. We had left the reefs in, and I could not pull them out. Somehow, when I put the topping lifts/lazy jacks back on the boom they had fouled the main sheet, so the boom would not roll properly. I ended up having to leave the reef in. Julian has been doing all the sail hauling in the last two years and I have lost the knack. The sun went behind the clouds at this point, and did not come out again, making it a cold grey day.

Once I sorted out the problem with the lazy jacks I had another go at taking the reef out, but the sail still did not want to budge. Luckily I had decided on the no 2 jib, so the sail plan was balanced.  We took the inshore course, leaving South Rock to starboard. The only other yacht we saw on the same Ardglass to Belfast route went outside South Rock, and showed how must longer it was very clearly. She was about 2 nm behind us as we passed Butter Pladdy, and did not catch up until we were past Portavogie, at which point she quickly disappeared ahead.

The tiller pilot did not want to behave. It reacted very slowly, with the result that our course varied by up to 60 degrees for no real reason. In the end I helmed most of the day, with Alex taking over for short periods. I only turned the engine off for ten minutes, early in the day as we passed the entrance to Strangford Lough, but we really weren't going fast enough, so we motor sailed until the wind went very light after we passed Portavogie. I furled the jib, but we still got a bit of lift from the main until we reached Dronaghadee and what there was was heading us. At that point I got the main down and we motored through Dronaghadee Sound.

After that it was passage under motor all the way to Bangor Marina, were we were tied up by 1645. This was when the sun came back!

Very little birdlife today, and no seals once we left the Ardglass locals behind. A decent passage making day all in all.

Peter from the Northern Ireland OGA came by and gave me some advice on getting to Ballycastle tomorrow, then I had a long chat with Julian to sort out the details.