The cries of oyster catchers echo from the battlements, of the Ville-Close. Answered by the trills of songbirds, in the trees, whose lush canopies overtop the ancient walls. The sun sinks toward the western horizon, quietly composing itself, for a night’s rest.
This morning, Stargazer left Camaret, in the predawn twilight. Threading the Toulinguet gap, with a lobster boat, for company.
Dawn breaks. Revealing a race fleet of Mini Class boats. (Like Ouch, our overnight companion, for the Roscoff passage. Zen Again 37).
Fishing boats zig zag, beneath the cliffs, nets down, trawl wires straining taut.
Peter and Heather motor by, aboard Suive, waving. Fellow summer swallows, out of Portsmouth. We cross wakes most years, somewhere in Biscay.
Stargazer passes through a silvery smooth, lightly wind ruffled, Raz de Sein. Beneath the watchful eye of the Petite Vieille (Little Old Lady). As the lighthouse, which marks this notorious channel, is affectionately known.
Stargazer can, at last, to come off a dead run, onto a reach (a faster point of sail. Particularly in lighter winds). Enabling the cruising chute to be hoisted. To harness the full potential, of the ten knots of north westerly breeze, which we have been granted.
Through the morning, Stargazer reaches across Audierne bay. Gybing once, as the wind backs westerly and builds.
Closing on the twin towers of Penmarc'h. Visible, as nicks on the horizon, at ten to fifteen miles.
Stargazer rounds the point and so enters South Brittany: The sea breeze is in. Blowing a satisfying sixteen knots. The sun shines from a cloudless sky. The water is a deep hue of indigo. We have arrived in the Kingdom of Summer.
It is an afternoon-long run, goose-winged, scudding across, a whitecap flecked, Benodet bay. Past the Iles de Glenan, weaving through the off-lying reefs, into Concarneau.
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