Wednesday, August 13, 2008

Guernsey and Sark

Jaime writes:

Well, hello again. This time I'm writing from a different point of view, as since becoming a mum I'm more of a passenger than a sailor and now have to take orders from the skipper! Painful as this is, he does seem to be doing a good job.

On July 31st we slipped our mooring in Braye Harbour at slack water in order to catch the start of the Southwesterly current down The Swinge. Tidal currents run hard here, in fact there are plans to install a one gigawatt tidal turbine to harness the power. We tacked our way south to Guernsey and down the Little Russell channel in the company of a few other sailing boats, passing a large cruise ship anchored at the entrance to St. Peter Port.

A lovely Dutch sailing boat followed us out of Braye

Huge ship being painted by a man with a surprisingly small brush

Victoria marina was full thanks partly to an influx of motor boats. We saw them racing past us several hours earlier while we were happily making way on the breeze without the need to burn hundreds of litres of diesel! The waiting pontoons outside the marina were filling up fast with sailing boats and we had to find a place quickly. Unfortunately Lewis woke up and made it quite clear that he wanted feeding. Trying to find a berth while avoiding other boats criss-crossing everywhere to the sound of a screaming baby was a little stressful. Eventually we found a place and coincidentally another Sadler 34 from Brighton came and rafted up next to us a few minutes later.

'Snap'!

Busy dinghy pontoon, St Peter Port

The next day we set about exploring Guernsey. For the princely sum of 60p we were able to catch a bus around the whole island. On the way we stopped on the Southwest corner and took a stroll up to one of the many German observation towers. These are really quite scary concrete structures that dominate the landscape with a commanding view of the coast. Guernsey, like the other Channel Islands was heavily fortified due to its strategic position, both by the British during the Napoleonic wars and the Germans in WW2. The latter occupied the Channel Islands from 1940 to 1945, the only British soil to be invaded. The islands were to be part of Hitler's "Atlantic Wall". I had never really appreciated how close the Germans got to the UK during the war. Earlier, in Fecamp, just a 10 hour sail south of Brighton, I was struck by just how close we were. Having visited the brilliant occupation museum in Guernsey it would appear that as long as you were born on the island, didn't paint 'V' for victory signs on rocks or release carrier pigeons, you would be treated fairly well by the occupiers. However, a grim fate was promised to non islanders and those who engaged in sabotage who were deported and interned in camps on the mainland. 12,000 troops were stationed on the island and an army of slave workers from across Europe and Russia were brought over to construct the numerous military installations including the underground military hospital. Here we found 75,000 square feet or 1.25 square miles of concreted tunnels excavated from granite. In the end the hospital was only used for about 3 months to treat casualties resulting from the D-day landings in 1944.

Lewis learns to navigate on land

Pezeries Point, SW Guernsey

Rocquaine Bay

Pleinmont Tower SW Guernsey

Coastal Watch Tower SW Guernsey

Despite all the military history, Guernsey is beautiful, with a lush rural landscape and contented looking cows. We took a stroll through country lanes to find the Little Chapel which is very pretty, decorated entirely with shells, pebbles and broken china. On our way we bought lovely tomatoes and beans from one of the honesty stalls which can be found outside many people's houses. Speaking of cows, the milk here is 4.8% fat and is really rather tasty. Likewise the butter is a delicious creamy yellow colour. We have a theory; that this fat content is partly due to the fact that rather than being penned in by a fence, many of the cows are chained by the horns to a spot, and don't appear to walk around very much.

Little Chapel

Little Chapel alter

Well, it was time to leave St. Peter Port. As far as marinas go, it is quite pleasant, but feels a bit like living in a carpark after a while. So after croissants baked at the Victor Hugo Boulangerie we headed over to the Island of Sark. We used the strong tidal currents in the Big Russel channel to whip us past Herm and up to the northern tip of Sark. At one point we were pointing at least 90 degrees south of our destination in order to reach it with the tide pushing us north! We picked up a mooring buoy at La Grêve de la Ville on the Northeastern side of the island. This was only after, rather embarassingly, we had dragged our anchor in the deep water and drifted back towards another anchored yacht with their anchor line caught between our rudder and keel. Ouch. This could have gone horribly (and expensively) wrong, as we were effectively attached to the other boat and pulling it.. Of course at this point Lewis decided he was hungry and thought he would excercise his powerful lungs. We were lucky their anchor didn't drag too. However after some quick thinking by the other boat, they swiftly launched their dinghy which they rammed in between our boats, like a big fender. We then managed to get their taught anchor line under our rudder and prop and we were finally free. Eventually we snapped up a mooring buoy, after a race to it with a power boat. You may have noticed it is much busier down here than what we encountered in Scotland last year.

Sark is a little island with only 600 inhabitants. It is still a self-governed feudal state. Wonderfully, there are no cars; transport is by foot, bike or horse. Although tractors also seem to be allowed. We even saw one towing an ambulance trailor. Funnily enough, tractors and horses are forbidden to use the unsealed roads on Sundays. Order is kept by one constable and his elected deputy. We landed on the beach in the dinghy in the pouring rain and shelterd in a cave until it passed. Meanwhile a couple of middleaged British women thought it would be a fantastic idea to go for a swim. Mad. Lewis seemed to enjoy the attention he got, in fact he seems to get a lot of attention from most of the women, and some men, who see his adorably cute face poking out from the sling we carry him in! We enjoyed the beautiful scenery around Sark and checked out the other anchorages around the island which afford protection from most wind directions. However it is hard to get away from the uncomfortable swell, created by the strong wind and tide, which refracts around the island. We found that in the bay that we were in, the tide frequently positions the boat side-on to the wind and waves and it can get quite rolly, in fact it was very hard to sleep. Lewis didn't seem to mind, and slept, well, like a baby. Two nights was all we could bear and Craig prepared our next passage South to Jersey.

Baby Ayesha ashore at La Grêve de la Ville

La Coupée links Sark with Little Sark

Havre Gosselin anchorage and Brecqhou Island

View from La Grêve de la Ville

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hello to the THREE of you! Congrats on the addition to the family. Just finished looking over your blog and what's been happening. Life is good, which is excellent! Quintana is on the hard as I write this, and we'll be leaving to visit family in the states within the week. All is well here.Cheers,
Christine and Paul