A Journey So Far - The travels of Nausikaa
Posted: Thu Nov 12, 2020 11:19 pm
Hello everyone
Tonight, I'm insomniac. It happens to me on land from time to time. So I figured it was a great opportunity to make a start on telling this tale. I will do it in installments, as time permits, but don't expect a chronicle. Not even a sequential account of events. I’m not that kind of writer. It’ll probably be a series of pics and short explanatory texts; my impression of places, passages, moments along the way.
So, without further ado…
The Journey So Far has been between Lowestoft, Suffolk, UK, and Torrevieja, near Alicante, Spain. I left Lowestoft on the 4th of August 2019 and managed to get to Brest, France, by the beginning of October, when the weather finally and definitely closed up on me.
This part of the journey I will relate some other time. For starters, I don’t have any graphic material of it, so I will be one long piece of text. All pics and clips I had were on my phone, and the phone is now rusting away at the bottom of the entry channel to Roscoff. Voilá!
Nausikaa spent the winter on the hard at the Moulin Blanc Marina in Brest, before heading south again on the 17th of June 2020, and arriving in Torrevieja on the 29 September 2020. Much water under the keel in all that time. All in all, 2,500 NM sailed, or thereabouts. Fifty-two harbours, ports, and anchorages visited, and sixteen weeks afloat onboard that beloved chamber pot with masts of mine. I arrived back in Brest from the UK after the winter break in the middle of May, having allocated one month to prepare the boat for the journey, to allow Joanna and I to get used to sailing together, and for Joanna to get familiar with the peculiarities of a cat ketch rig. I figured the Rade de Brest would be the ideal place to do just that. I figured it right; it was.
I must, at this point, introduce Joanna Wendrychowicsz to all that know me on the forum. Joanna joined this crazy adventure in March 2020, as First Mate, XO, and winch (or wheel, as it turned out to be) wench of Nausikaä, and Commodore of the overall expedition. No small feat, considering she was joining the company of an inveterate solo sailor, with the unenviable expectation of having to cajole an old dog into learning new sailing tricks. Hence the need to allow enough time and opportunity for both of us to crystalise into an effective and efficient crew before setting off from Brest.
In the middle of the Covid lockdown, that month was not a particularly joyous time. Still, we managed to do everything we could think of to prepare Nausikaä for Biscay, and whatever was waiting for us beyond. Brest is well suited for that sort of thing. At the Moulin Blanc marina, further up the Rade from the city of Brest, there are adequate infrastructure and technical service providers to cater for every need, and the Marina staff is knowledgeable, helpful, and flexible. Thumbs up!
Checking tides and winds, the big day was set to 16th June. Last entry on my to-do list of that day was: “Make offering and appropriate sacrifices to Poseidon” Couldn’t easily drown a horse as the ancient Greeks would have done, so we toasted the fellow with some French champagne going in the water, and begged his indulgence!
Tonight, I'm insomniac. It happens to me on land from time to time. So I figured it was a great opportunity to make a start on telling this tale. I will do it in installments, as time permits, but don't expect a chronicle. Not even a sequential account of events. I’m not that kind of writer. It’ll probably be a series of pics and short explanatory texts; my impression of places, passages, moments along the way.
So, without further ado…
The Journey So Far has been between Lowestoft, Suffolk, UK, and Torrevieja, near Alicante, Spain. I left Lowestoft on the 4th of August 2019 and managed to get to Brest, France, by the beginning of October, when the weather finally and definitely closed up on me.
This part of the journey I will relate some other time. For starters, I don’t have any graphic material of it, so I will be one long piece of text. All pics and clips I had were on my phone, and the phone is now rusting away at the bottom of the entry channel to Roscoff. Voilá!
Nausikaa spent the winter on the hard at the Moulin Blanc Marina in Brest, before heading south again on the 17th of June 2020, and arriving in Torrevieja on the 29 September 2020. Much water under the keel in all that time. All in all, 2,500 NM sailed, or thereabouts. Fifty-two harbours, ports, and anchorages visited, and sixteen weeks afloat onboard that beloved chamber pot with masts of mine. I arrived back in Brest from the UK after the winter break in the middle of May, having allocated one month to prepare the boat for the journey, to allow Joanna and I to get used to sailing together, and for Joanna to get familiar with the peculiarities of a cat ketch rig. I figured the Rade de Brest would be the ideal place to do just that. I figured it right; it was.
I must, at this point, introduce Joanna Wendrychowicsz to all that know me on the forum. Joanna joined this crazy adventure in March 2020, as First Mate, XO, and winch (or wheel, as it turned out to be) wench of Nausikaä, and Commodore of the overall expedition. No small feat, considering she was joining the company of an inveterate solo sailor, with the unenviable expectation of having to cajole an old dog into learning new sailing tricks. Hence the need to allow enough time and opportunity for both of us to crystalise into an effective and efficient crew before setting off from Brest.
In the middle of the Covid lockdown, that month was not a particularly joyous time. Still, we managed to do everything we could think of to prepare Nausikaä for Biscay, and whatever was waiting for us beyond. Brest is well suited for that sort of thing. At the Moulin Blanc marina, further up the Rade from the city of Brest, there are adequate infrastructure and technical service providers to cater for every need, and the Marina staff is knowledgeable, helpful, and flexible. Thumbs up!
Checking tides and winds, the big day was set to 16th June. Last entry on my to-do list of that day was: “Make offering and appropriate sacrifices to Poseidon” Couldn’t easily drown a horse as the ancient Greeks would have done, so we toasted the fellow with some French champagne going in the water, and begged his indulgence!