Wed 8/17

Why is it that everything happens at 2 in the morning? Woke from a blissful sleep at about 0200, the boat was quiet, but something woke me. Went up on deck and witnessed a pretty spectacular lightning show, fortunately it was out over the ocean. Satisfied that all was well I crawled back into my comfy bed.

With a chance of rain and lightning in the forecast for today we decided it would be a good day to sleep in and stay in port. The anchorage was comfortable, though a little rolley in the morning with all the boats going out. The day turned out to be sunny and beautiful, but we could see dark clouds in the distance and the weather radar showed rain in the area.

Since we were going to be at anchor for the next few stops, we decided to deploy the tender, this is no small task. I went with an inflatable rather than a RIB so it could be deflated and stored out of sight and out of harm’s way. It lives in the huge locker under the aft deck. It took a few tries to fold it in such a way that it would fit. Kudos to Suzette for having the patients and creativity to make it work. With the aft deck extended to its swim platform position there is room to shake out the tender and inflate it. I think I am glad I bought the power inflator, hook it up and let it go, it will stop at the designated pressure. With 5 separate air chambers it does take a little time, but the result is a very functional tender. It will live on the retractable davits while we are anchoring. The electric motor is pretty slick as well. It breaks down into two very manageable pieces and stows nicely below.

With tender ready we headed into Port Medoc. We stopped in to see the Capitainerie and make sure we could tie up to her dock with our tender. Ok. We also wanted to make sure the Sud Passe was open and navigable for our departure. Oui. Final question was to determine if the artillery range was clear for passage south. A shrug? We had checked the notice to mariners web site and it said it was closed for the month of August, but it seemed rather important to know this was the case from the local Capitainerie.

We walked through the little marina village. It looked like it was once a thriving little shopping village, but now just half full of odd stores and restaurants. There was a Uship and, miraculously, they had the 90’s I need to finish my grill installation. Also on the critical list was toilet paper, they had that as well. The young man spoke English well and was able to direct us to the grocery store. This made for a good walk through the little town.

Back on the boat we enjoyed the evening sundowner as we planned the route and check the weather for the trip to d’Arcachon Bay, a 77-mile run.

Thursday 8/18

Up at 0600 to get ready for the long day. We rigged the code 0 as we expected a light wind broad reach south. Motored out at 0800 under partly cloudy skies with a calm weather report. As we made our way around the point and turned south, we found the swell to be a little bigger than it was a couple days ago, 3-6’, but a longer period. We tried setting the code 0, but not enough wind and to far aft, so we motored until the wind filled in.

The wind picked up to about 15 from the NW and the sails went up. We saw boat speed as high as 11 knots, but averaged 8+. The boat sailed its self under sunny skies and a consistent breeze. The swell was quartering so it was not the most comfortable ride. We enjoyed the sail for about 5 hours until the breeze went north and the swell was creating a washing machine effect. Down with the sails and on with the engine. We could see dark clouds building as we closed on the entrance to d’Arcachon bay entrance. We had been advised by our friend Bruce that we need to ignore the charts and follow the markers as the entrance changes regularly. We made the mistake of following another sailboat in, but quickly realized he was following the chart and not the markers. We found the markers as the wind was gusting to 25 and we could see that we were passing over land according to the chart plotter. We saw as little as 4 m of depth as we followed the markers in. To top it off the markers are fairly spread out and it started to rain reducing our visibility. We managed to find our way in to deep water, as we motored in the lee of the land the sky was clearing and the waves settled down. Definitely a victory at sea moment. D'Arcachon gave us all it is known for, it is unnerving driving through a breaking surf into an unfamiliar harbor.

We found what looked like a good place to anchor, 4 m of water, protection from the wind and two other boats anchored. Happy to be safely hooked it was hot soup, a shower and early bed.