Race 13 - Day 3
Crew Diary - Derry-Londonderry, Northern Ireland to Den Helder, Netherlands
20 July

A frustrating, yet beautiful, moonlit night of light winds off the north Scottish coast marked our furthest point north in the entire circumnavigation - N 58 46.466. Dounreay nuclear power station was brightly lit, visible ahead and to our south in the three brief hour of near darkness. When the wind returned in the morning we had fared poorly and found ourselves amongst the back markers of the fleet. It then became a question of where we were in the phases of the tides through the Pentland Firth. We watched in frustration as boats on AIS to our east cracked along at twice our speed and who we knew were easily going to make it through the Firth before the tide changed.

Morning brought bright blue skies with wisps of cirrus cloud. As we tacked south-east, to our front, then north, lay the smooth, dark peaks of the Orkney Islands, to our right and south the rugged coastline of Dunnet Head and the Scottish Mainland. The Old Man of Hoy, a famous sea stack stood out. We sailed in company with Unicef, IchorCoal and Da Nang – Viet Nam, whilst four miles ahead was Garmin. To the south-east, taking the inner channel, between the low, flat, island of Stroma and the Mainland was Mission Performance. On AIS, we could see the rest of the fleet steaming through the Firth at ten knots on the tide.

We approached Stroma from the west, hemmed in by Nantucket, a westbound 250,000 tonne laden tanker, barely making the tack to the north past the lighthouse but assisted by two knots of tide. Immediately ahead of us, Unicef suddenly tacked and we saw that a tidal race was dragging IchorCoal back towards Stroma, so we also tacked north behind Nantucket to escape the grasp of the eddy. Ahead, Garmin had also it too fine and were being dragged backwards towards Stroma. With no small amount of glee, we watched as they were drawn back into the eddies on the western shore as we sailed through the middle of the main channel. Behind us, IchorCoal had managed to come out of the edge of the eddy northwards. Once around Duncansby Head and John O'Groats, we headed south-eastwards into the North Sea, looking back towards Garmin, still Stromatised and having to wait until the tide turned.

I was happy to see the Pentland Firth in this state, relatively flat seas, bright sunshine, light winds, even if a full moon was driving high tides.

Smooth pools of water marked where the tide and currents welled up from the depths, bringing weed, jellyfish and even swimming scallops with it.

Clouds of gannets plummet for mackerel, almost too heavy to take off as we approach, getting airborne with an ungainly flapping waddle. In the North Sea, winds are from the south east and the direction of Den Helder so the tackathon has begun.

Simon Rosbottom