Summer Breeze

In a jovial bustle of activity, Dieppe's catch is landed on the quayside. Lorries and boats complete a complex ballet. Creating order from apparent chaos with, seemingly, no more than a brief exchange of ribald words and lusty laughter.

Stargazer, just arrived, has a ringside view. In the evening sun, the harbour is a riot of colour and activity. I secure our lines and clamber ashore to investigate. 

Airlily graceful period buildings tower above me. Once they would have belonged to merchants. Their homes and places of business. Now they are bars, restaurants and apartments. Places of nonchalant relaxation. 

Deeper into the port, the shops and bars become more modern. They do their bit, to keep up with their illustrious forebears, with washes of warm colour.

Stargazer left Boulogne in the still of the summer dawn. The heat of the rising sun promising a sea breeze before long.

Our sails fill off Le Touquet. The silvery song of running water, the first ripple of a bow wave, is at first barely audible. Steadily the tiny sound rises to become a rush of running water. A summer sea breeze is setting in from the south west. Fifty degrees off our starboard bow.

That's ten to fifteen degrees too far forward, for us to fly the cruising chute. We can still play the apparent wind game, however, as we slip along the shores of the Baie de la Somme. Just a different permutation, to the one we played crossing from Dover to Boulogne.

Today the tide is pushing us into the breeze, creating an apparent wind. Stargazer picks up speed, further raising the apparent wind. Soon we are throwing a fine white bow wave out across the sparkling blue water. The heat of the sun is helping us along too. As the land heats, the wind strengthens. The summer breeze building steadily through the day. Filling Stargazer's sails. Hastening us south.

Helping hands emerge, from boats already in. Stargazer settles comfortably into her ringside seat, on the nonchalantly bustling Dieppe harbour front.