The Southern Ocean. Newlyn and a walk to Mousehole

 With a rather nice sunrise behind us as we left the pontoon at Fowey we headed off south down the Lizard Peninsula. 

There was almost no wind as we left harbour, 'a little' for the middle third of the stretch down the east side and full on reefed sails, leaning boat, and for gods sake dont let go of that tiller stuff until the turn westwards.  As we turned downwind, giving Lizard Point a healthy respectful distance of about 3 miles, we reached the southern most point of our journey in a most undramatic wind from behind and rolling around manner.  

Lizard Point, most Southerly point.  With pointy rocks

It was then a straight downwind 15nm / 3hour slog into Newlyn across Mounts Bay.  Newlyn is primarily a harbour for fishing vessels but fortunatley accepts yachts, I say fortunately as the only local alternative is Falmouth.  And as Falmouth has tidal access then getting back out at the right time to round Lands End is not possible without anchoring somewhere.  Before entering Newlyn I had to confirm that there were no animals onboard and I was directed to a pontoon close to the entrance.  Getting moored was interesting as the pontoon I was asked to take had a side wind pushing me off so I needed some speed to ensure I wasnt blown off into the very nice German flagged Ovni on the other side. The German crew kindly came to assist my parking but my brummy accented shouting of "for gods sake just  put the rope over the cleat and let it go before you lose your fingers" got to quite a high volume before she let go and I hauled the looped rope in to park quietly and safely.  Honestly, foreigners eh.  I thought I might have to fetch an umbrella to start poking them with.

Moored at Newlyn

I found the harbourmasters office (and was cheefully relieved of £31.50 inc electricity) and retired back on board for dinner and plan the following day.  Decisions needed to be made as the weather forecast for the following day suggested some strong winds "later". 

Newlyn Harbour. 
St Michaels Mount and cruise ship Hebridean Sky in the distant mist

Having decided to stay in Newlyn for probably a couple of days to let weather in the Bristol Channel pass through I rose early and walked into the lovely adjacent harbour village of Mousehole. Its rather difficult to get your daily steps target done if your world is 31' long and 9'6" wide.   On the way into Mousehole (pronounced Mouzle by the way) I passed the still maintained but 40 year empty lifeboat house at Penlee.  In December 1981 the lifeboat Solomon Browne launched to assist a vessel in heavy seas and neither the boat nor crew came back.  By the end of the following day two entire crews of local men had volunteered for service.   There is a memorial next to the station where I spent a few reflective minutes.   

Mousehole is a very picturesque harbour that dries and has a very narrow entrance and worth the walk from and to Newlyn which also passes coastal world war defences dating from both mk1 and mk2 variants

Mousehole Harbour

s

A garden near Mousehole
sort of a cross between the film "Coco"and Gardners Question Time

When I returned from the walk I found that all of my fellow arrivals from yesterday had departed except one.  I believe to ports further up the channel rather than past Lands End.  I saw the the one remaining boat was readying to depart and they confirmed that they were heading to Scotland via Milford Haven.  After discussing the weather with them, and re-reading all the forecasts I could find I decided to follow them out, albeit two hours afterwards as that would be the optimum time for the inside passage at Lands End. I then spent some time readying (tidying) the boat for the passage, checking and topping up fuel and checking and rechecking my weather and Nav.   

Join me next time for 'The Big One' when Tzu and I become cross (Bristol) channel migrants 

Leg : 53.3nm
Trip: 209.6nm