Delivery of our new Southerly 42 sailboat & first voyage from England to Portugal. Crossing the English Channel and Bay of Biscay
05/12/07 12:02
Plus
- Share the Sail: Join us for a week of cruising adventure. See our first guest's comments below.
- New DVD – Our new 3-disk classic collectible DVD, “Exploring Under Sail” now available!
- Winter cruising seminars.
Note: If you have made our website one of your favourites by bookmarking it, please remember to change your bookmark from www.searoom.com/shard to www.distantshores.ca.
Hello Everyone,
Greetings from Lisbon, Portugal, where we have just completed the first leg of this year's voyage from Falmouth, England, aboard our brand new Southerly 42RST sailboat, “Distant Shores” built by Northshore Yachts in Itchenor, England. The boat is beautiful and we are really thrilled!
We took delivery of the boat on November 21st, which was two months behind schedule unfortunately. This meant we were now trying to leave England late in the season in cold weather and when there are more frequent gales. This could hold us up further, especially for the 3-4 day passage across the notorius Bay of Biscay where we'd need several days of reliable northerly, preferably northwest, winds to get across to Spain.
Joining us on this leg of the voyage as our first guest is Gord Zimmerman of Bobcaygeon, Canada. We first met Gord and his wife Sue when they attended one of our “Outfitting and Provisioning for Cruising” seminars before they left for their 2-year cruise to the Caribbean aboard their Sidelmann 37, “Lady Simcoe”. We have kept in touch and we are now all members of the same yacht club at home. Gord is a life-long racing and cruising sailor but had never sailed in Europe and wanted to experience some longer offshore passages.
“It's not too often you get the opportunity to sail aboard a brand new half-million dollar yacht that has all the latest safety and navigation equipment installed. I'm getting to learn how to use all this gear, having a wonderful adventure, and having a great time with Paul and Sheryl,” says Gord who will sail with us as far as the Canary Islands.
Gord has been a great help to
us on this first leg since we are still cutting
our teeth getting to know the new boat and are
constantly sorting and re-sorting gear as
everything finds its place. Gord loves rigging
and has made some excellent suggestions as well
as designed and rigged a new boom
preventer/barberhauler. This consisted of a 3/8”
D-ring bolted through the caprail with strong
backing plates to secure a strop and turning
block. This is all controlled with port and
starboard lines to a block and clutch making it
safe and easy to control from the cockpit. We
are enjoying having Gord aboard as crew and are
benefiting from his input. If you would like to
join us for a week of cruising please see our
Share the Sail page.
We received a lovely farewell from everyone at Northshore Yachts who have built a beautiful and seaworthy boat for us. They couldn't do enough to make the boat as perfect as could be and even on the day when we got our weather window and were scheduled to cast off from Chichester at noon with the tide, people were still onboard “just checking this” and “touching up that” so that finally Paul had to say, “Okay, everyone. You have one minute to get off this boat!” Gord keeps checking lockers to see if anyone has stayed on board :-)
Our first sail was an overnight passage from Chichester along the south coast of England to Falmouth in the west where we would jump off to cross the English Channel and the Bay of Biscay as we headed south. We had great conditions, winds from the north, and the boat sailed like a dream. But it was cold! We were dressed in so many layers we could hardly move and the person on deck on watch was given a hot water bottle to stuff down their foul weather jacket. At midday the next day, we were headed by west winds so pulled into the picturesque little harbour at Fowey (pronounced Foy) a little east of Falmouth. We were very happy with our new Mastervolt generator so we could run our heaters and stay warm below! That night Paul's Aunt Janet and cousin, Clare, drove down from Truro to see the boat and say farewell.
The next morning conditions
were good for continuing on to Falmouth, a town
we know with lots of chandleries, hardware and
grocery stores, and cruising friends to greet us
and drive us around. But we only had 6 hours
since bad weather was in the future and if we
didn't leave by midnight we would be stuck in
England for another week or 10 days. When we
arrived in Falmouth friend, Peter Flutter, met
us on our arrival and then wisked us off to his
father's home where Peter's lovely lady, Sue,
was preparing Sunday Roast and had kindly
invited us to join in. It was just what 3 tired
hungry sailors needed – good for the body and
soul – and fueled us up for the passage ahead.
We returned to the boat and had a lovely visit from the rest of Paul's family in Truro – Uncle Chris, cousin Daniel and his 3 children who we wouldn't be seeing again for some time. Another bittersweet farewell. Then we went mad running errands including purchasing another few sets of “thermals”, thick gloves, and balaclava hats. My gosh, but night watches were cold but as we got further south each day the weather warmed delightfully. Here in Portugal we in T-shirts during the day and sweaters or light jackets in the evening.
As it turned out, a high pressure system moved in and remained settled throughout our whole voyage south to Lisbon. After a couple of hours of sailing we had to turn on the motor and so it continued most of the way across the English Channel and Bay of Biscay. As we rounded Cape Finesterre where there is always wind, it was so flat calm the stars were reflected in the water!
One of the new Raymarine
navigation systems we have aboard “Distant
Shores” is AIS which stands for Automatic
Identification System. All large ships broadcast
information including their name, size, course
and speed, destination and the system will
calculate the closest proximity to you and give
the time of this closest contact. It took away a
lot of stress in the VERY busy shipping lanes
along our route. It was especially helpful when
we wanted to contact an oncoming ship since we
could call it by name. We'll be writing more
about this in our New Boat Blog as well as
details on all the latest high-tech equiment we
have installed on our new boat.
We had hoped to continue on straight to Lisbon, but due to the lack of wind we stopped at the lovely Club Nautico in Portosin, Spain, in the Ria Muros to get fuel, before continuing south to Lisbon on December 1st.
We are now prepared to cast
off from the Marina Cascais, near Lisbon, to
make the voyage to Gran Canria in the Canary
Islands. There is a thick fog so as soon as it
clears, we'll be on our way again. We'll update
you again when we arrive.
Before we sign off we have a few announcements:
New “Exploring Under Sail” 3-disk DVD now available!
Just in time for the gift-giving season we have released a new DVD of our very first TV series, Exploring Under Sail, which we produced in the late '90's with Peter Rowe Productions. Follow along on a voyage from Toronto on the Great Lakes of Canada, through the Erie Canal and Intracoastal Waterway to Florida in the USA, then to the Bahamas, Bermuda, the Azores and arrive in the Mediterranean through the Strait of Gibraltar (where our Distant Shores series begins). In Exploring Under Sail we also filmed some additional episodes about race weeks in Antigua and St. Martin, Newport to Ensenada, and the LYRA race on Lake Ontario, as well as Georgs Kolesnikov's record-breaking voyage around Cape Horn. To order this and any other of our sailing DVDs please visit our store:
http://www.distantshores.ca/sailingdvds/sailingdvds.html
New DVD prices – Canadian and US dollar at Par
Due to the current exchange rate on the US dollar, we are lowering the Canadian prices on our DVDs to be at par with the US list prices just in time for the gift-giving season. Check out our complete DVD collection in our online store with new money-saving prices for Canadians.
http://www.distantshores.ca/sailingdvds/sailingdvds.html
New Boat Blog
Paul and I will continue to update the New Boat Blog with notes and thoughts on the use of the new boat, how it and the equipment we have installed live up to our expectations, and articles of interest on the cruising lifestyle aboard a new shallow-draft Southerly 42 sailboat.
http://www.distantshores.ca/boatblog/boatblog.html
Sail with Us in the Caribbean
Join us aboard the new boat for a week or so to experience relaxed cruising in the tropics or to participate in one of our off-shore training passages. With the new boat we have lots of room for guests and beautiful accommodations to make you feel right at home. (See this month's newsletter for our first guest's response to the boat and new experiences at sea). Several times each year we will be running our new Share the Sail program in exotic locations along our route and look forward to having you aboard to share the adventure of this year's voyage. For more information and to view the dates still available:
http://www.distantshores.ca/sharethesail/sharethesail.html
Seminars
Although we've got a packed itinerary of destinations to explore this year, we will be taking time out to conduct our annual “Outfitting and Provisioning for Cruising” seminars. We really enjoy helping others fulfill their cruising dreams by providing guidelines for safe and happy experiences on the water. For times and locations, please check the Seminars/Events page on our website:
http://www.distantshores.ca/seminars/page20.html
Wishing you all the best for the season and health, happiness and prosperity in the coming year!
Sheryl and Paul Shard
Aboard SV Distant Shores
Marina Cascais
Lisbon, Portugal
Click here to check out our DVDs for more cruising adventures and tips!
Sign up for our newsletter
[Listen to a Distant Shores podcast]
- Share the Sail: Join us for a week of cruising adventure. See our first guest's comments below.
- New DVD – Our new 3-disk classic collectible DVD, “Exploring Under Sail” now available!
- Winter cruising seminars.
Note: If you have made our website one of your favourites by bookmarking it, please remember to change your bookmark from www.searoom.com/shard to www.distantshores.ca.
Hello Everyone,
Greetings from Lisbon, Portugal, where we have just completed the first leg of this year's voyage from Falmouth, England, aboard our brand new Southerly 42RST sailboat, “Distant Shores” built by Northshore Yachts in Itchenor, England. The boat is beautiful and we are really thrilled!
We took delivery of the boat on November 21st, which was two months behind schedule unfortunately. This meant we were now trying to leave England late in the season in cold weather and when there are more frequent gales. This could hold us up further, especially for the 3-4 day passage across the notorius Bay of Biscay where we'd need several days of reliable northerly, preferably northwest, winds to get across to Spain.
Joining us on this leg of the voyage as our first guest is Gord Zimmerman of Bobcaygeon, Canada. We first met Gord and his wife Sue when they attended one of our “Outfitting and Provisioning for Cruising” seminars before they left for their 2-year cruise to the Caribbean aboard their Sidelmann 37, “Lady Simcoe”. We have kept in touch and we are now all members of the same yacht club at home. Gord is a life-long racing and cruising sailor but had never sailed in Europe and wanted to experience some longer offshore passages.
“It's not too often you get the opportunity to sail aboard a brand new half-million dollar yacht that has all the latest safety and navigation equipment installed. I'm getting to learn how to use all this gear, having a wonderful adventure, and having a great time with Paul and Sheryl,” says Gord who will sail with us as far as the Canary Islands.
We received a lovely farewell from everyone at Northshore Yachts who have built a beautiful and seaworthy boat for us. They couldn't do enough to make the boat as perfect as could be and even on the day when we got our weather window and were scheduled to cast off from Chichester at noon with the tide, people were still onboard “just checking this” and “touching up that” so that finally Paul had to say, “Okay, everyone. You have one minute to get off this boat!” Gord keeps checking lockers to see if anyone has stayed on board :-)
Our first sail was an overnight passage from Chichester along the south coast of England to Falmouth in the west where we would jump off to cross the English Channel and the Bay of Biscay as we headed south. We had great conditions, winds from the north, and the boat sailed like a dream. But it was cold! We were dressed in so many layers we could hardly move and the person on deck on watch was given a hot water bottle to stuff down their foul weather jacket. At midday the next day, we were headed by west winds so pulled into the picturesque little harbour at Fowey (pronounced Foy) a little east of Falmouth. We were very happy with our new Mastervolt generator so we could run our heaters and stay warm below! That night Paul's Aunt Janet and cousin, Clare, drove down from Truro to see the boat and say farewell.
We returned to the boat and had a lovely visit from the rest of Paul's family in Truro – Uncle Chris, cousin Daniel and his 3 children who we wouldn't be seeing again for some time. Another bittersweet farewell. Then we went mad running errands including purchasing another few sets of “thermals”, thick gloves, and balaclava hats. My gosh, but night watches were cold but as we got further south each day the weather warmed delightfully. Here in Portugal we in T-shirts during the day and sweaters or light jackets in the evening.
As it turned out, a high pressure system moved in and remained settled throughout our whole voyage south to Lisbon. After a couple of hours of sailing we had to turn on the motor and so it continued most of the way across the English Channel and Bay of Biscay. As we rounded Cape Finesterre where there is always wind, it was so flat calm the stars were reflected in the water!
We had hoped to continue on straight to Lisbon, but due to the lack of wind we stopped at the lovely Club Nautico in Portosin, Spain, in the Ria Muros to get fuel, before continuing south to Lisbon on December 1st.
Before we sign off we have a few announcements:
New “Exploring Under Sail” 3-disk DVD now available!
Just in time for the gift-giving season we have released a new DVD of our very first TV series, Exploring Under Sail, which we produced in the late '90's with Peter Rowe Productions. Follow along on a voyage from Toronto on the Great Lakes of Canada, through the Erie Canal and Intracoastal Waterway to Florida in the USA, then to the Bahamas, Bermuda, the Azores and arrive in the Mediterranean through the Strait of Gibraltar (where our Distant Shores series begins). In Exploring Under Sail we also filmed some additional episodes about race weeks in Antigua and St. Martin, Newport to Ensenada, and the LYRA race on Lake Ontario, as well as Georgs Kolesnikov's record-breaking voyage around Cape Horn. To order this and any other of our sailing DVDs please visit our store:
http://www.distantshores.ca/sailingdvds/sailingdvds.html
New DVD prices – Canadian and US dollar at Par
Due to the current exchange rate on the US dollar, we are lowering the Canadian prices on our DVDs to be at par with the US list prices just in time for the gift-giving season. Check out our complete DVD collection in our online store with new money-saving prices for Canadians.
http://www.distantshores.ca/sailingdvds/sailingdvds.html
New Boat Blog
Paul and I will continue to update the New Boat Blog with notes and thoughts on the use of the new boat, how it and the equipment we have installed live up to our expectations, and articles of interest on the cruising lifestyle aboard a new shallow-draft Southerly 42 sailboat.
http://www.distantshores.ca/boatblog/boatblog.html
Sail with Us in the Caribbean
Join us aboard the new boat for a week or so to experience relaxed cruising in the tropics or to participate in one of our off-shore training passages. With the new boat we have lots of room for guests and beautiful accommodations to make you feel right at home. (See this month's newsletter for our first guest's response to the boat and new experiences at sea). Several times each year we will be running our new Share the Sail program in exotic locations along our route and look forward to having you aboard to share the adventure of this year's voyage. For more information and to view the dates still available:
http://www.distantshores.ca/sharethesail/sharethesail.html
Seminars
Although we've got a packed itinerary of destinations to explore this year, we will be taking time out to conduct our annual “Outfitting and Provisioning for Cruising” seminars. We really enjoy helping others fulfill their cruising dreams by providing guidelines for safe and happy experiences on the water. For times and locations, please check the Seminars/Events page on our website:
http://www.distantshores.ca/seminars/page20.html
Wishing you all the best for the season and health, happiness and prosperity in the coming year!
Sheryl and Paul Shard
Aboard SV Distant Shores
Marina Cascais
Lisbon, Portugal
Click here to check out our DVDs for more cruising adventures and tips!
Sign up for our newsletter
[Listen to a Distant Shores podcast]