River Fal, Cornwall

The weather has again kept us in Falmouth so we decided to explore the beautiful River Fal. We managed to find a floating pontoon mooring near Ruan creek. This was followed by a trip to the Smugglers Cottage for lunch and Trelissick House gardens (National Trust) for an afternoon walk. Both events proved to be a very pleasant way to spend the afternoon.

Helford River

The weather forecast last night suggested that easterly winds of force 3 to 4 were to be expected. That is on the limit of what we like but we planned to take the first of the east flowing tide that, along with the wind, would give us a lift to the Scilly Isles. In the Helford River, you have to swing from a buoy because there are no marinas suitable for Jomima at 12 metres long. This is normally not a problem because we simply drop our dingy down from the davits and motor to shore for food etc. Unfortunately, the forecasted easterly wind of force 3 to 4 arrived in the early hours of the morning as a force 4 to 5 gusting to force 6 and was due to last for several days. This woke us early because we were moored near the mouth of the river and it faces east. This meant a change of direction and a move to Falmouth. Unfortunately, even that did not go to plan. Ann noticed that the cooling water coming out of the port (left) exhaust was decidedly erratic. Time for Stuart to get his hands dirty. This involved dismantling the water filter to find a strip of polythene sheet lodged in there. This did not actually totally cure the problem and meant a trip on one engine into Falmouth. When the starboard engine is doing all of the work, Jomima has a natural tendency to turn left and requires a large amount of starboard rudder to go straight and to actually turn right to any degree is nearly impossible.

At Sea

Today we plan to travel from the River Yealm to the Helford River near Falmouth. As you may be beginning to realise, we like the smaller friendly places rather than the major seaports. The Helford River is particularly beautiful and if you have read any books by Daphne Du Maurier then it will already be familiar to you. Jomima is able to reach 22 knots (25 mph) if we open the throttles right up. However, at that speed, we only manage 1 mpg (yes, one mile per gallon!). Fortunately, legally, we are able to use the pink diesel that the fishing boats use at ‘only’ 50 pence per litre. However, we are in no rush so today we travelled at 10 knots and achieved a whole 2 mpg. The sea was calm. There was virtually no wind and the sailors were using their ‘iron sails’ (engines) and all was well with the world – for us not them.