Sinking pontoons and a twisted knee

John Latham experiences an inauspicious start to his cruise from Dublin to Northern Ireland when hit by gale force winds in harbour

- John Latham

Following a two-year pause from cruising habits in our Jeanneau Sun Odyssey 349, Scoundrel, we were ready to set sail again.

The hiatus was partly due to me being overseas in Malaysia and also because of the Covid-19 pandemic. We'd enjoyed a very successful cruise to the Scottish Western Isles and the Island of Harris in 2019 so in 2022, co-owner John McQuaid and I decided to head north again, but remain to the western edge of the North Channel.

Tory Island was our goal. We had visited that most remote of our offshore islands in 2018 during our round Ireland voyage but because of impending bad weather reports, we stayed less than 24 hours. Eager to spend more time exploring Tory and also keen to investigate other interesting harbours and anchorages in Donegal, we planned our cruise.

Our preparations included servicing the engine ourselves and having our liferaft and lifejackets serviced. The start date for our cruise was to have been 24 June. However, forecasts for this Friday and the following three days were for strong southerly winds blowing up to Force 7, particularly in the North. We agreed to postpone our departure.

MOB drills

On Friday, not wishing to waste the day, we decided to spend it doing manoverboard (MOB) practice. So, with a blustery southerly wind, we spent some time in Scotsman's Bay (south of Dun Laoghaire's East Pier) trying our crash tack and backing the jib technique using a figure of eight to pick-up. Neither of us was successful on our first attempt which suggests that we should practice this quite often. The following two days were indeed windy, the Dun Laoghaire Regatta was cancelled on Saturday due to a gale.