Howth to Carlingford Lough

Julian backed Robinetta out of the narrow berth in Howth Yacht Club Marina as red light from the rising sun reflected off the clouds in the eastern sky. By 06:15 we were motoring northwards along the west side of Ireland's Eye, in a glassy smooth sea.

I raised the main and staysail, but there was no wind for them to use, and George went on duty, steering a course towards Carlingford Lough. We needed to maintain a steady four knots to reach the Marina at Carlingford before the tide turned against us and made progress into the Lough impossible for Robinetta.

By 0830 I could feel a breeze on the back of my neck. It was very light, but worth letting the main sail out to catch, so I rigged the preventer so we would not gybe if any swell got up, and we motor sailed for a couple of hours.

There was very little sunshine and the breeze felt cold, despite being a southerly. We kept the engine on to keep up the speed and let George do the steering as we headed for Skerries. We were off the islands there by 09:15, and I had to take over the steering for a while to avoid a host of crab pots. Some were very obvious and new, but others were weed grown and half sunk, so invisible until we were too close for comfort. The Skerry Islands themselves were dull lumps of rock fringed grassland, rounded and featureless. Julian had wanted to go between St Patrick's Skerry and Colt Island, but decided not to bother when he saw how featureless they were.

Once we were well clear of the Skerry crab-pots Julian decided to have a go with the mackerel line, so we turned the engine off for quarter of an hour. Without it we were moving at 2.5 knots, an excellent fishing speed, but not for passage making! Nothing had bitten when he hauled the line in, and we were travelling much too slowly, so the engine went back on immediately.

Soon after Julian's attempt at fishing the wind died completely, so I took the preventer off and centred the main sail to stop it flogging in the slight swell that had built up with the following wind. It seemed we would not be sailing today...

After an hour of just motoring the wind came back, but this time on the starboard beam. It built to a comfortable force 3 Easterly and suddenly we were reaching through the water at 4.5 knots. The engine went off, and we sailed the rest of the way to the Lough entrance with George on the helm.

We had chosen to enter the Lough through the Hoskyn Channel, but this turned out to be guarded by a field of pot markers, so Julian took over the helm so steer a careful path through them, and past four anchored sports fishing boats with rods and lines out.

Haulbowline Light House

As we turned to leave the Haulbowline lighthouse to port the wind became on the nose, and we had to turn the engine on for 5 minutes, but as soon as we joined the main channel we could sail again, and did do all the way up the Lough. We were making 4.5 knots with the tide, through beautiful scenery, and once we were clear of the tide race in the entrance the sea was totally flat; more like sailing in a lake than on the sea. Julian was enjoying the sailing so much that he brought Robinetta to within a cable off the Marina entrance before turning the engine on so I could lower sail.

We were moored up by 1715, having done 44 miles in 11 hours. We only maintained that cruising speed by using the engine in the first part of the day, but the afternoon sail had been lovely.