An English Summer 73

 

Stargazer lies secured beneath the jauntily painted shops, boutiques and bars of the St Peter Port waterfront. The town going about its laid back business all around us. 

It has been a two stage journey to reach here.

At seventeen hundred, on Monday, Stargazer swept out of Cawsand Bay. Quickly sinking the land, Rame Head, Yealm Head, Start Point, to a smudge on the horizon. The mighty headlands sandwiched between a steely sea, flecked with prancing white horses, and a stern, battleship grey, sky.

Twenty to twenty five knots of north west wind are at our back. Stargazer is running wing on wing. Sheeting the jib, using the spinnaker sheets, lead 'outside everything,' to the stern quarter. For a sweeter set, than we achieved on passage from Helford to Cawsand. 

We run that way through the night. A half moon lighs Stargazer's boiling bow wave, as we surf and surge our way over a building sea. Until it sets at midnight. The clouds part, to reveal a dense snowstorm of stars, swirling above us, as we roll to the rhythm of the sea. Their collective glow is bright enough to reveal the flypast, of a lone passing Dolphin. It makes three large splashy jumps, as it skips by. Its white underside visible. Its black back lost in the darkness. Leaving us, forging through the night, accompanied only by the phosphorescence of our quarter wake.

We make landfall off the Les Hanois reef, on the south west tip of Guernsey, at zero nine thirty on Tuesday. Shaking the reefs out of the main, in the predawn twilight at zero four thirty. Gybing over, as we leave the steady flow of ships, steaming hard between the Ushant and Casquets Traffic Separation Schemes (TSS). Riding the fast flowing Channel Island tide south. The black dorsal fins, of porpoises, cleave the waves to either side. Their torpedo bodies silhouetted, through the clear green water, as they dive beneath Stargazer's keel.

Stargazer hardens up, onto a broad reach, making seven knots over the ground. The tide carrying us anti-clockwise around the island. East, along the craggy southern shore. With the change of course, the helm steadies, enough for me to engage the autopilot . I drop below to heat a tin of rice pudding and a pot of coffee, for breakfast.

We are off the St Peter Port harbour breakwater, by thirteen hundred. After reaching fast, up the Little Russel, in twenty five to twenty eight knots of breeze. Jib furled, full main. Allowing me to rig lines and fenders, as we go (no jib clears the fore and side decks). 

Stargazer is flying her yellow ( “ I request clearance”) flag, as we pass beneath the battlements of Castle Cornet, guardian of the port approaches. A harbour dory races out to meet us.

We are ushered onto the outer harbour pontoons. Which are currently a quarantine area, for boats arriving from outside the bailiwick. A marquee is set up on the quayside above, as a clearance centre. The formalities turn out to be remarkably informal; and purely digital. Sight of my Tracker form, via my phone screen, is all that is required. A barcode is produced, the phone automatically scans it, we are cleared into the Bailiwick of Guernsey.

We make our leisurely entrance, to the inner harbour, when the cill opens on Wednesday lunchtime. Seduced, on Tuesday afternoon, by falling into delightful conversation with a French family, out of Morlaix; and the prospect of a hot shower (my first in sixty four days) an M&S Food Hall pizza (there is one on the harbourfront) and, most of all, sleep. Therefore spending Tuesday night in the outer harbour.

A dory-man, ever present, jocular and attentive in St Peter Port harbour, guides Stargazer to her berth. "Wish I could give you a discount for wearing that jumper!" he quips. 

I am wearing my trusty sailing jumper. A venerable navy blue (mostly) Guernsey sweater.

"Not if you could see it up close," I call back "Its twenty years old, there's more darning wool in it, than original. Might treat myself to a new one, while I'm here!"