Return from Stornaway-Part 2

[Brian]

At the end of the BIBOA trip, Cyanide was left in Inverkip Marina (to the east of Glasgow) as bad weather had arrived.
A few weeks later I returned with Martin Collins to take her back to Torquay.
The weather out of the window of the hotel didn't look too promising

[Brian]

Anyway, off we set in the pouring rain on our first leg down to Pwhelli in north Wales.
Photo shows a glowering Ailsa Craig with rain clouds whipping around the summit.
After a fairly hard ride we entered Port St. Mary on the Isle of Man for a brief rest and sandwich but unfortunately broke the gear change cable and backed gently into their brand new RNLI lifeboat. This did not impress the locals. Fortunately Eddie Allen of Yachthaven Marine quickly came and disconnected the control mechanism. Showing us how to change gear manually he pushed us off with a cheerie "Only 3 gear changes to Torquay, lads".

[Brian]

We arrived at Pwhelli in the middle of the evening and had a relatively early night.
Set off the next morning on what turned out to a long day. After amusing all the locals with our gear change antics- to change gear, the following actions need to be performed
1. Unlock and open engine box, disconnect safety catch and lift lid
2. Invert humanoid such that both legs are in air, head 2 to 3 inches from throbbing 320hp engine
3.Helmsman calls for gear to be selected i.e. forward, neutral, reverse
4. Humanoid to perform said action, (if he can hear you!) by yanking on metal lever in bowels of engine box
Repeat above for every dock, undock or refuel

Passing through Ramsey Sound we spot one of the Ocean Dynamic boats carrying tourists out to the Bitches.

[Brian]

At about 15.00, and some 40 miles S/W of Milford Haven, we suffer the failure of our Raytheon navigation system. The boat had done about 4000 nmiles since new by now, and some bits of kit were beginning to feel the strain.
Instead of looking at the charts, our compass and our reserve GPS systems, we decided to "wing it" for the experience.
We figured that if we kept going, keeping the sun slightly to our starboard, we would approach some part of the north Cornwall coast. all we had to do then was turn right, go round Land's End, and "feel" our way along the south coast.

Photo of some dolphins who came alongside while we considered the advisability of this course of action.

[Brian]

Well that all worked, but by the time we rounded the corner of England, all the B&B's in Falmouth, Fowey etc. seemed to have filled up. So after bobbing up and down off the Lizard for 30mins or so, making fruitless phone calls, we shrugged our shoulders, put the hammer down once more and headed off for Torquay where we arrive about 21.30 hrs. About 350 miles, 14 hours at sea.
Total journey about 650 nmiles covered in 2 days.

Photo Cyanide safely tucked up in bed in Torquay Marina