Aleria's Adventures

Alex at the Fastnet Rock We awoke at 7 am, quickly got on deck and weighed anchor. We had a light westerly breeze and were able to hoist our sails and head out of Kinsale in the morning light. The seas were much calmer than the day before. It was Saturday and we wanted to get as much distance as we could muster. Sunday was forecast to have southerly gale-force winds and heavy rain, so we wanted to be tucked in somewhere safe. Our choices were Glandore, Sherkin Island, or Crookhaven. Glandore was too close so we made a beeline for Sherkin - well it was more of a triangular line as we had to tack to get there, but we were banking on a forecast southerly shift in the airflow which would give us a lift on the port tack. The first few hours were glorious. We were heading out to sea, but it was sunny and we had about a 12-knot breeze. Aleria was happy. Soon the wind started to pick up and we reefed the main. That was a good decision. Almost at Sherkin, Alex made the call that in a s

Crosshaven from our B&B We'd been in Crosshaven for a week. We'd cycled the Greenway, visited the Fort at Camden, taken a bus trip into Cork, done our laundry in Carrigaline, and made Cronin's our home away from home where we met up with OCC members from Persephone (David Ball & Trudie) and Aragorn (Robert & Caroline Jollye). We also made friends with Canadian single-hander Dirk from Footloose who will be joining OCC and Damian owner of a classic Fife yacht that he just inherited from his uncle and he's going to restore. Our lead mechanic at CBY, Hugh Cassidy, is a fascinating character. He gave us a tour of his boat, a cruiser converted lovingly from a lifeboat. He reminded me of a cross between Hugh Laurie and Crocodile Dundee. We really liked him, and he was very good and trustworthy. The guys who work for him, Dennis who worked on our boat, are also terribly nice and good at their jobs. We had landed in the right place at Crosshaven Boat Yard.

Cronin's in Crosshaven We took our laundry to Carrigaline yesterday and the kind man got it done by 2:30pm. We had to kill a few hours which we did with lunch at the Gaelic bar. That meant just a light dinner at Cronin's, the only game in the town of Crosshaven. They stopped serving at 8 pm and another couple got turned away. We squeaked in just under the wire. It was a slow day yesterday, with computer work while a gentle rain fell most of the day. We got a call this morning from Hugh, mechanic extraordinaire, that our parts had arrived yesterday evening and the guys were already on board installing the new gear. We packed up our stuff and searched out our hostess, Cathy, at the Compass Rose B&B, to let her know we'd be leaving a day early. Down the hill, with our bags, we trudged. The guys were already more than half done. For a finale in Crosshaven, we got on our bikes and rode the Greenway along the river. It turned out to be a fine day and we enjoyed the r