Route: Brest – Loctudy – Lorient – Pornichet – Joinville – La Rochelle
Date: 29.07-07.08.2022
Miles / hours: 301Mm/64h
29-07-2022 Friday Brest
A new crew is coming. Together, we make a shopping list, take two trolleys and go shopping by tram. Unfortunately, you cannot buy tickets other than single-ride tickets on the tram. We get off at the next stop and try to buy a group ticket, but it is not on the ticket list, so we buy one-time tickets. We get off at the big Carrefour. Shopping takes about 2.5 hours. As a result, we have both trolleys full (one for water and the other for the rest of food) and a full bag of bread. We go back to the port, unpack our shopping and go for dinner to a nearby pub. After lunch, Wiktoria and Adrian go sightseeing, and we return to the yacht. In the evening, we have safety training and after then we go to sleep.
30-07-2022 Saturday Loctudy
Breakfast in the morning at 6:45 and we depart at 7:55. We go through the bay on the engine, because there is little wind and it is straight from the direction when we go. After leaving the bay, we change the course and set the sails. There are plenty of dolphins and seagulls scuba diving everywhere. The weather is rather cloudy around 19ºC. We pass picturesque rocks and after 65 NM we enter Loctuda at 21:30. We moor at the longside guest quay. The pontoon has the letters PL – as if it were special for us. The marina office is closed now, but the men in the bar gives us a code for the shower. While it’s still light, we’re going for a walk around the city. The town is not big but very nice. After the walk, in the dark, we return to the yacht, bathe and go to sleep.
31-07-2022 Sunday Lorient
We pay for the marina in the morning – it is extremely expensive for such a small port. We leave at 9:30. We start the engine for the first hour, and then set the sails. It blows 10kn, we swim at a stretch, and dolphins pass by every now and then. We enter the Kernevel marina in Lorient around 5 pm. We embrace the yacht and go for a walk around the city. We buy ice cream on the way, but they don’t have violets. We go back along the beach.
1-08-2022 Monday Lorient
Breakfast in the morning, but not at dawn. Then we go to the stop to drive to the submarine garages, but the stop has been moved so we go on foot. We come to the center of Eric Taberle. We buy tickets to visit the interactive sailboat museum (various games, remote-controlled models, knots) and then we go to visit the K3 bunker for submarines. Unfortunately, you can only visit with a guide and the guide speaks French so we don’t understand much. The whole visit takes 1.5 hours. I think if I knew French I would learn a lot of interesting things.
Coming back, we go to Geant’s for additional shopping and return to the yacht by bus.
For dinner, chicken with mushrooms and spaghetti pasta. We go out in the evening. It blows quite well, we are semi-windy and the average speed by the end of the day is 6.7kn.
2-08-2022 Tuesday to Pornichet
At night, the wind weakens and changes direction. We are sailing slowly admiring the sunrise and the field of windmills under construction. Pancakes with chicken and spinach for dinner. We enter the marina at 4:30 pm. We pay for 2 nights. The marina is full, so we stand longside to a Frenchman (this is how the port management sets us up). I go to shower, Tom goes to sleep and the rest of the crew goes to the beach. In the evening we go for violet ice cream at a nearby ice cream shop.
3-08-2022 Wednesday Pornichet
After breakfast and ice cream (€ 5 for 2 balls), a trip to Saint Nazaire. A 2-hour bus ticket costs 1.8€ per person. The plan is to visit the submarine and walk around the city. We take bus 13 and then change to the “He” line.
It turns out that the tour of the submarine had to be booked in advance (now the closest date is 17:30). We quit. We go out to the observation deck, admire the bridge across the bay and go to the tourist information. It turns out that apart from pretty pre-war houses, the city has nothing to offer. We are trying to eat something, but it’s 1:45 pm so all pubs are already closing. It ends with pancakes. We return to the stop through a district with nice tenement houses.
In Pornichet we go to the ice cream and return to the yacht. We turn on the washing. In the meantime, our neighbor repaired the engine, so he moves to another place and we stand by the quay. We rinse the deck of salt, eat dinner (chili con carne), in the evening we do a slide show.
4-08-2022 Thursday Joinville
In the morning, we roll up the laundry and a little rush our longside neighbors to our side. We leave at 10 o’clock. We sail off the wind. We arrive at Joinville at 18:30. We are standing as the 6th yacht in a raft. We tie to the yacht next to it and to the Y-boom on the opposite side. It’s tight. We get a discount for not standing at the pier. We check the weather and decide to go out in the morning.
5-08-2022 Friday to La Rochelle
We leave at 9:30 with the help of the port boat. It protects us very nicely from the side of the boats standing at the pier next to the stern to us and then helps us to turn. We swim in a baggage, and the wind reaches 20kn (a good 5B). The yacht’s speed reaches 9kn. The waves reach 1.5 m. We are sailing on the grotto and the seal. Full beach. We take out the seats and the men sunbathe on the deck, and we sit in jackets and long pants. This is the difference in thermal comfort. After lunch, we notice that there is a net buoy with us. We take it out, but it turns out that the rope from the buoy got caught on the bolt. We swim to the island on the way and hide in its shadow.
We are lowering the sails. We drop the anchor and Tom puts on a diving suit and dives. Fortunately, the rope from the buoy was only hooked to the screw blade, so you don’t have to untangle or cut anything. We are on the engine, we still have 10mm left to sail. We enter the marina in the dark at 22:30. We moor to the nearest front of the pier.
6-07-2022 Saturday La Rochelle
In the morning, the marina staff comes in and shows us a different berth after payment. It’s in the Y-booms and the resident area right across from the toilets. We get a card to toilet and a wifi code. After coffee, we start to explore the city.
Lots of marinas, prison towers and vantage points, an aquarium, old yachts in the maritime museum. We enter Carefour for baguettes and return to the yacht.