Calamitous Channel crossing
Max Liberson suffers concussion, ghostly apparitions and crew desertion on a tiring voyage to France
Concussion, ghostly apparitions and desertion during a tiring voyage
When a client asked me to help finish his boat in Portugal, I agreed, but on one condition I wanted to bring my own boat, Wendy May. My 84-year-old gaff cutter was in need of a refit, and this way I could work on her on my days off. So instead of flying out to the Algarve, I decided to sail there instead. I had just two weeks to prepare.
Finally the departure day arrived. On 19 September I drove down from Wolverhampton to Newport, Wales, where I kept Wendy May. I left at 4am with a long list of jobs to do, having not set foot on the boat for nearly a month. When I arrived Wendy May was just starting to float on the flood tide. I began loading my gear and noticed I’d left my camera bag at home, with my passport and boat papers in.
Nevertheless, I did all I could – filling the water tank, checking the boat was shipshape; I also met Tony, a prospective crewmember, about the same age as me, who’d been in the yacht club a while. He had his own fibreglass sailing boat but had never sailed a gaff-rigger. It was in the middle of lockdown, and I explained he’d have to isolate for two weeks when we came back. He seemed happy with the boat and said he would meet me the next morning. I then climbed back into my van and drove the 100 miles back home to pick up my camera bag. At least I could say goodbye properly to my wife, Eva, my mother-in-law and our dog Luna, as they were all awake this time.
On returning to the boat, I did a shop at the supermarket and had dinner with my brother – the commodore of Newport and Uskmouth Sailing Club – and his wife. By the time I left, the tide was up again, so I stowed the food aboard and got into my comfortable portside bunk, up forward.
Sunday dawned grey and cold, and a stiff wind from the NE had me putting in the third reef. High tide was 0930. I’d just finished breakfast when Tony showed up. It was time to leave.
We hauled my small dinghy on deck and placed it on the starboard side before dropping the fore and aft mooring lines. Tony took the helm as I hoisted the heavily reefed red canvass main, then hauled the jib out on the bowsprit, followed by the staysail. We sheeted in tight, as the wind had gone more easterly, making our first leg downriver a dead beat. We made it out with just one tack, motor-sailing. Once out of the bends, I could turn the motor off, and we sailed. I made tea, then pumped the bilges dry – it took 120 strokes of the pump. Tony gave me a questioning look so I explained to Tony that Wendy leaks for the first few days of any trip but she would tighten up.
The tide was a big Spring, and we fairly whooshed down the Bristol Channel. I had set a hard target of getting to Ilfracombe before it turned against us, hoping that if the wind stayed fresh and from the NE we would be able to sail over the top of the foul tide off Ilfracombe, as it doesn’t run so hard down there. Sadly the wind fell off as the day wore on. By the time we made Coombe Martin we were only making 1.5 knots against the tide so we dropped the hook and had dinner. It was a pretty place with rolling green hills, sheep and mostly fine old houses to look at.
At 2300 I ran out of excuses for staying in my bunk and rolled out to greet the night. I fired up the engine and raised a sweat hauling the fisherman anchor with the manual windlass handle.
Tony motored us out to sea. There was no wind, but with the hard-running tide, we still made nearly seven knots across the ground at about half-throttle. We ran watches of two hours on, two hours off. I was in a hurry; the spell of fine weather was going to break with a south-westerly blow forecast in a few days. My plan was to get to Ushant and wait there for it to pass, then crack on across Biscay, hopefully finding the NE winds off Finistère.
The north Cornish coast slipped by, mostly out of sight. By the afternoon we’d passed Padstow and were slowed by the tide. Tony wanted to know where I intended to stop. I said I didn’t, as the detour to find an anchorage would take too long. He was not happy, and I should have explained things a bit better!
I dipped the fuel tank and filled it with the five gallons I had in the locker. I figured we had about 30 hours of diesel; enough to make the 100 miles to Ushant, and we might get some wind. That night I did a double watch as we were hardly making two knots against the tide. It was fun, nonetheless, as dolphins chased fish on the surface, and played at being torpedoes, zooming out of the black night to shoot under the boat. Once clear of Land’s End I went off watch for
‘Tony gave me a questioning look so I explained that Wendy leaks for the first few days of any trip’
a couple of hours and Tony took over. We made good progress while I slept.
Murky passage to Ushant
By the time I came back up at 0140, the night was murky and the barometer falling slowly. We motored on with no wind, and at 0745 we had four gallons left in the fuel tank. I estimated we’d done 18 hours’ motoring on the previous four gallons so if we kept the revs down we would get to Ushant. Plus, we might be able to sail soon as the wind was forecast to blow lightly from the SW. Gradually the wind came in from the SW – if very lightly – and with our light jib on we started to sail at three knots. It was such a relief to not have the diesel’s clatter in our ears that we didn’t mind going at a snail’s pace.
The speed gradually crept up to four knots, but then the wind backed to the south and headed us. We took in the headsails and turned on the engine. It ran for a bit then started to die with fuel starvation. I stopped it, took out the filter and found it was blocked. Opening the drain cock at the bottom of the tank brought forth a thick black slime. I messed about with a bit of wire until I had clean diesel coming out. From the fuel cock at the bottom of the diesel tank, the fuel went to a water separator. I lifted the sole above it to reveal a glass bowl that should have contained clean diesel, as it had the last time I’d looked a few months earlier. Now it was half-full of black gunk, diesel bug!
This was a problem because the last time I’d cleaned it I’d resolved to buy a replacement because the tensioner and its thread were succumbing to rust. I knew if I took it off I probably wouldn’t be able to refit it and that would mean we’d have no engine. I left the fuel separator alone, fitted a new filter and bled the system. The engine started up, but I wondered how long it would run for. I had no more diesel, but I did have a gallon of paraffin, so with a slug of two-stroke oil for lubrication, I put that in the tank, and we carried on.
Concussion
We approached Ushant in the early hours of 23 September. I wanted to go to Port du Stiff. I’d been there before – it was on the east side of the island, and was a well-sheltered little bay when the wind blew from the SW. I had the chart on my laptop and frequently checked it by ducking my head through the companionway. We were both quite tired. I remembered a nasty unlit beacon on a rock we had to get around and kept a good look out for.
Once again, I ducked my head in, just as Tony pulled the heavy oak and mahogany hatch closed hard. Thump! My head was filled with white, blue flashing stars. I fought to stay conscious, aware of not only the unlit rock but the nearby reefs that the tide would wash us onto. I managed to stay on my feet despite the nausea and pain. Not long after that we came into the harbour and picked up a buoy. Tony said there was a large grey shark alongside, but it was a big friendly bottlenose dolphin. It frolicked about the boat while we made everything secure.
My head was hurting badly, and I was feeling nauseous. Really I should have sought medical advice but the lure of my bunk was too great and I turned in.
I woke up with a bad headache, nausea and what felt like concussion. I could see Tony was less than happy. He hadn’t enjoyed the voyage so far and announced that he wanted to return to the UK. I didn’t want to try and guilt him into staying if he didn’t want to so after breakfast we launched the dinghy and I rowed him over to the ferry dock, where he was able to buy a ticket back to Brest, and from there could catch a bus to Roscoff and ferry to Plymouth. We returned to Wendy and moved her to a more sheltered buoy. The dolphin came back and frolicked around us while we were in the dinghy.
I rowed Tony ashore to catch his ferry and took the empty diesel can with me. We shook hands and parted friends. I walked off to find fuel. It turned out to be a
3.5km walk. By the time I’d lugged 20 litres of the precious liquid back to the boat I was completely exhausted. The headache would not go away so I went to bed early, and just slept.
At 0400 the next morning, the wind started to blow and there was a lot of rain. I had not stowed the jerry can very well and it had fallen over. Somehow the air cap had come undone and half of the fuel was now in the bilges!
By now, my headache had almost gone, and when the wind eased and the sun came out, I made a long list of jobs I needed to do, starting with cleaning the bilges.
Vision of the past
Ushant is a strange island. Exposed to harsh SW gales, the buildings are largely made from granite and are extremely solid. It gets most of its revenue from tourists now and the winter gales mean there are very few trees.
I walked to the village of Lampaul and stopped in a shop to buy groceries. It was more of a delicatessen, so I didn’t buy much. The street headed towards the seafront and, as my feet followed it, I had the strangest sense of déjà vu. I found a little harbour, almost empty of boats, but as I looked at it I could see a small fleet of black wooden fishing boats dried out against the wall, with the fishermen mending nets, drying sails, yarning and smoking. The women were buying fish and talking. It wasn’t there, but I could see it in my mind’s eye. My eyes prickled, and I had such a powerful sense of loss I wanted to cry.
Walking away, I came across the small village shop. I went in and bought more food. The lady serving insisted on looking in my shopping bag that had other stuff from the first shop before she would serve me. I started the long walk back to Port du Stiff. The sun was out, and my dinghy was resting afloat on the crystal clear water in the harbour, washing around with the swell, but staying clear of the rocks. I climbed aboard, stowed the food, then phoned Eva and told her about the déjà vu. “Just how hard did you hit your head?” she enquired. She had a good point.
It blew a good gale that night, a large swell got up and I was kept awake by the roar of the seas. It would prove to be a rolly old 36 hours.
Despite the motion, I tried to clean out the tank. The water separator fell to bits and the drain cock would not unscrew. There was no inspection hatch on the tank, and without a set of long-reach sockets or box spanners, I couldn’t remove it anyway. The solution was to make an emergency fuel tank out of my jerry can, but I needed a long piece of fuel hose. I went ashore to the garage in Lampaul, another 3.5km walk. The garage proprietor sold me 3m of 6mm pipe. I walked back and started work.
The next day was Saturday. I had the temporary tank set up, but it was only half full of fuel. I rowed ashore, walked to the garage, bought another jerry can and had it filled up. By the time I reached the boat I could have done with a nap, but here was a wonderful fair wind: NE 3 to 4. It would have been a crime to waste it!
I wanted to leave at high water, when the tide was slack, and it was almost that time. So, shackling the throat halyard to the rope I had tied into two eyebolts on the dinghy, I hauled the dinghy aboard and stowed it. Then I hoisted the main with the second reef in and plenty of slack in the sheet. I had the two headsails ready for hoisting. I let go the ropes attaching us to the mooring and sheeted in the main then pinned the helm on the first hole up. Sweet Wendy May slowly drew ahead, giving me time to hoist and sheet in the headsails. She sailed by herself, past all the white plastic motorboats, while I sorted the decks out, and waved goodbye to the island’s ghosts. I couldn’t see them, but I’m sure they appreciated our classy departure.
Next month Max sails single-handed to Portugal and encounters stormy weather, orca warnings and fiery locals
‘Really I should have sought medical advice but the lure of my bunk was too great and I turned in’