La Rochelle

On our last night in Bilbao we were plagued with mosquitos and I am glad to
be able to report that we have left them in Spain.

We left Spain for France as soon as we could pay our bills which was 8am UK
time and were underway in a flat calm. When sailing one always listens to
channel 16 which is the VHF channel on which to make distress calls and to
contact other boats. Misuse of this channel brings down the wrath of God
from the authorities. So at 9 am we heard to our complete amazement a
trumpet being played beautifully on channel 16. Tina thinks that it could be
the Basque national anthem and I am in no position to disagree.
The crossing was in flat calm but with about 1.5 m of swell. Now sailing or
motoring against the swell is a bit like bicycling up hill, the down hills
never make up for the effort of going up hill!
So our speed was down from the 6.0 knots I had hoped for down to only
4.9kts. that meant that the 200 miles we had to do would take quite a bit
longer up to 7 hours longer.
Eventually the swell subsided and we regained most of our speed.
We had to motor for 33 hours and sailed the last 3 hours and arrived at La
Rochelle at 8pm tired and ready to sleep.

In Spain we never had a clue as to what was being said so now we do have
some idea and it is rather nice to know what is going on around one!
In a posh marina we ate at the restaurant and on the menu were 'Grilled
Knives' and some other gems which I regret I have forgotten.

Since leaving Spain we have met several yachts that have said that 'the med
was too hot, too crowded and either no wind or a gale' So I for one am happy
to have retreated.
They did however say that the Algave and South Atlantic Spain was lovely, so
we leave that for another day.

So now it is short trips up the French coast and then along the N Brittany
coast to Guernsey and then home by August