After Monday being a nice day doing the holiday things, pub lunch a bit of shopping in St Mawes, we knew Tuesday was going to be wet and windy from the east so had chose to say put and wait for the weather to change.
The forecast for Wednesday was SW4-5. Motoring out of the Precuil River I set a reefed main, after passing St Mawes I rolled out all the genoa and we sailed across Carrick Roads to Pendennis Point before tacking and heading south. We tacked again about a mile south of Pendennis and headed west again, we were making 5-6kts and healing hard so I rolled one reef in the genoa which never slowed us any but took away the hard healing. Just south of Swanpool Beach we tacked again to the south making 6-7kts and the hard healing was back, I estimated the wind to be SW5 gusting 6, water was running down the side decks as Elektra punched forward. Having reached the Nare Point, we didn’t want to tack again and decided motor the last 1/2mile into Gillan to charge the batteries. The GPS was telling us our fastest speed was 7.9kts. Elektra had covered the 8.5nm in 1.5hrs having slowly motored the first mile down the Precuil while I got the decks clean and main sail set.
On entering Gillan and trying to pick up the mooring, we got the pick up chain around the prop, seeing we were having problems a chap came over in his RIB to help but was unable to free it, he helped us attach a warp to another mooring to take the strain off. His friend was on the beach and had sub-aqua gear, so he went in for his help. We got busy with the jobs while we waited, sure enough out he came again with diver. It wasn’t a simple job but he was able to free it after a bit of work. I asked how much? The low amount he asked for, I gave twice as much with my thanks. Having sorted out the mooring and attached it to the right end of the boat, I started the engine again, that seemed ok but in gear we had a knocking noise. We are going to dry out Elektra and check the stern gear before we go out again.
Elektra was dried out on Tuesday 25th, our engineer inspected the damage, it was found to be a bent rope cutter which he managed to straighten the blade and fit two new barrings, apart from that no other damage had been done, “Elektra” is ready for sea again when time and weather allows.
Love Sailing 