From last morbihan For the last week or more the Azores high has sat serenely over NW France giving rise to the sort of summer weather we can normally only dream about – calm nights , warm mornings and delicious sea breezes in the afternoon and evening. If there is a nicer place to take […]
It is now a week since we arrived in France from the Azores. Bryony has gone home and the weather is much nicer down here in South Brittany than it appears to be back in the Channel. There is no reason to rush home so we decided to take our time and enjoy all those […]
Meteorology is an inexact science with an almost infinite number of variables contributing to the final outcome. The classic apocryphal tale to illustrate this is a butterfly sneezing somewhere in central America , which subtly changes its micro-environment . This change gradually feeds into the mystery that is local , regional and eventually worldwide weather […]
Technical difficulties are preventing the regular updates from the good ship Festina. Normal service will (hopefully) be restored tomorrow. All are well at a position approx 100 miles west of Belle Isle, at 1700 UT today.
Close , but no cigar Yesterdays challenge was to cross a ridge of high pressure into the Northerly winds on the other side that would take us reaching in to South Brittany. With this in mind we were much quicker than usual to pile on sail after the previous nights blow but despite splendid progress […]
We had a long debate last night whether we should change down to the trysail. The wind was only 22 knots and we were sailing along in splendid comfort with the 3rd reef down , and the latest grib didn’t show the increase we had previously been warned of. Eventually caution overcame valour and we […]
Festina continues to make good progress home with a gradually increasing SW wind ( currently averaging 22 knots) under her belt. There is a fair old NW swell giving a considerable cross sea , so we have definitely left our calm conditions behind us. Actually a “cross” sea is a very good description and as […]
Yesterdays pessimisms has so far proven to be unfounded. We did have the occasional shower but they were so light it was scarcely worth putting oilies on – all we had to do was go below for a cup of tea and it was dry again! The wind has behaved impeccably , gradually increasing and […]
Yesterdays wind arrived right on time, at noon , and we have been pottering downwind under kite ever since . The wind was initially WNW which gave us a tight angle and good speed , but it has gradually backed so that we have to sail high of the course to keep the speed up […]
Our delicious breeze ran out at 1500 yesterday , and we have been chugging over glassy seas all night. The indications are that we have crossed the centre of the ridge as the pressure has dropped by 1 mm and there is now a faint breath of wind from the W. We tried sailing at […]
On our return to Angra do Heroismo after Bryonys graduation we found that the crowds had dispersed and it was back to its slightly sleepy, attractive old self. The sun was shining and it would have been very easy to stay for weeks , chatting to the fellow sailors that were lapping up the warm […]