Friday 6 May 2011

DAY 15 : Electrical Storms and Pilot Whales

DAY 15 Departure

A long day, almost 13 hours of mixed paddling. We left Port An Port which is about 4-5 mile north of Glen Colomb Kille and had to work against the Webb tide for the next six hours, but with a following wind and quartering swell the Tarans made remarkably good headway. 

We passed Aran Island and started to cross the channel still pushing the tide when we experienced the first of four heavy squalls, one of which was accompanied by loud thunder and very scary lightening. I've only ever been afloat once before during an electrical storm, back in Japan with Hadas - it bought back vivid memories of how vulnerable you are at sea. Luckily Harry was there today and we rafted up together and proceeded to get blown out towards Tory Island. Harry asked me 'what are you supposed to do in a lightening storm at sea'. I said 'just keep your head higher than mine and close your eyes mate'.


Luckily for Vaughan we managed to get all of this on film, so it will be fun looking back on the day. Anyway, apart from further wind woes we are now camped on a small boulder beach on the west side of the Fanad Peninsula, not sure exactly what distance we covered today, but I think it's in excess of 100 km. We have more bad weather coming in on Monday and Tuesday so trying to get round past Rathlin Island before that kicks off. 

Although we tried to rack up some mileage today - our mission did not obscure our view of the Donegal Peninsular. The remoteness of the coastline is spectacular - stretches of sandy beaches encapsulated amongst tremendous cliff formations. Just to top the day off - we also had a visit from a pod of pilot whales. Incredible. 
Both dog tired - off to bed. 

Cheers
Jeff and Harry
Camp for tonight

2 comments:

  1. hi jeff,loving the blog sounds like its going well more power to you!
    ill sponsor you a quid a km for your longest day..
    Steve Sellman

    ReplyDelete
  2. Jeff great advise about the lightning,I'll try to remember that one :-)

    ReplyDelete