It was now time for Sipadan’s voyage home to Ireland. Flying in to Nantes, Simon, Alain and I met Fintan at the Port de Plaisance at Pornichet/ La Baule, where Sipadan lay waiting. We arrived to glorious sunshine and 28 degree heat and had a lovely beachside dinner at ‘Nina’s sur la Plage’ followed by a few pints at the harbour.
Waking early the next morning we discovered that our fine weather was but a memory and we now had mist, rain and fog. We made a quick dash to the supermarché and boulangerie for provisions and we were off! Unfortunately the dreaded NW wind was back and was now dead against our planned course.
We beat out to SW, skirting the huge Banc de Guerande Wind Farm to starboard and then tacking to beat up to Ile d’Hoedic. It was very hard going trying to make progress and we decided to take an break for dinner, anchoring off the beach on the eastern side of the island where Fintan cooked up ‘Magret de Canard’ with some fine wine, before we set off again for an overnight sail.
Sailing in the twilight between Belle Ile and Ile d’Houat was beautiful but again the wind direction made it difficult to make progress so eventually off Quiberon we rolled in the headsail and motored overnight. A very big consolation was the one of the most beautiful starry skies we had ever seen with a dramatic view of the Milky Way and the Perseid meteor shower as an added bonus!
Dawn the next morning saw, as forecast, a shift of the wind to the SW,so we got the asymmetric spinnaker up and absolutely flew across the 26nm expanse of the Baie d’Audierne between Penmarch and the Chaussée de Sein,which we opted to pass to the west of, rather than through the Raz da Sein, as the tidal currents would be unfavourable. This also gave us a direct line from there to Ile d’Ouessant, which was dead down wind. Eventually we arrived at Baie de Lampoul on the SW side of Ouessant at around 8 pm, rounding the famous Phare de Jument lighthouse (the one in the iconic photo of the lighthouse being engulfed by a wave).
We had completed 178nm, mostly directly against the wind and though we had notions of going ashore for a drink, we were all exhausted and the bed was calling. Even though sheltered against the overnight NW wind Baie de Lampoul is exposed to the SW swellls and was quite a rocky anchorage so the crew didn’t get a great nights sleep. Nevertheless, we were up early for breakfast ashore at La Duchesse Anne, a little restaurant with outdoor tables and a glorious view over the bay and the beckoning Atlantic Ocean.
We rented bikes and headed out toward the headland overlooking Phare de Jument. Looking at it from shore we were glad we had given it a wide berth as the breaking waves were enormous and right into rocks which would have cracked our little boat like an egg! The headland was fascinating as it was filled with trenches and underground bunkers from World War 2.
Our cycling done, we found that the restaurant had no food as it hadn’t been delivered! A quick supermarket run later we had lunch on the boat and we were ready for our departure for the passage from Ouessant to the Isles of Scilly.
