Just to prove the weather forecasters can get it right sometimes, the sun shone all day Sunday and we enjoyed it! With the east winds still bringing the cooling eliment, as long as we kept out of the wind the cockpit was a sun trap.
We needed to head back home on Monday, and with high water at 1015hrs and only 4″ depth of clearance under the keel in Carne Creek where Elektra needed to be because of the east winds, meant we needed to leave early. So before the end of the day, I lifted the outboard from the dinghy to the pushpit.
On Monday, I pulled the anchor up at 0735hrs, and Vicki motored Elektra back down the Precuil River and once out past the mooring at St Mawes, I just set the genoa, slow at first in the shelter of St Anthony Head, around 3.5kts we headed for Gillan, things soon hotted up once out of the shelter and Elektra was logging 5.5-5.8kts as we headed across the bay in moderate seas, Vicki said “who needs a mainsail in these condisions?” Not Elektra, that’s for sure!
Ever since buying Elektra and sailing her for the first time back in March 2017, she had impressed me. She can do 3kts though the water in 6kts of wind under full sail, she is a little tender in stronger winds and dosn’t need much sail to perform very well indeed, and fast, she will keep up with many yachts which are much bigger than her. Our last yacht a Hurley 22 was very stiff and it needed to be the top end of a force 5 before putting in the first reef, the problem with her was, in winds of less than force 4 we had to motor her, so her engine was used a lot.
Elektra crossed Falmouth Bay very quickly and we arrived in Gillan early at 0855hrs, I had woked out the earliest we would be able to get her onto her mooring in Carne Creek was 0915hrs, so rolling away her genoa Vicki motored her in slowly up the channel in Carne Creek before turning into wind towards the mooring, still only 0905hrs Elektra runs aground before we get to the mooring buoy. I tell Vicki to keep the engine in forward, all we could do was wait for her to float again, at 0915 bang on the time I had worked out she moved forward and I picked up the buoy up.
Vicki got busy in the cabin packing up and I lowered the dinghy off its davits, and engine from pushpit to dinghy. Once done used the joining line to pull the the stern strop onto her aft cleats. Then I help Vicki with the packing and lifting the bags into the cockpit. Within an hour of arriving on the mooring, we were leaving Elektra by dinghy for the shore and then home in pickup for showers.
Love Sailing 