Wednesday 12th July Ref: 2017/15
A late decision to cruise from Honfleur to Le Havre and probably not the best one but we managed it. I awoke this morning to the sight and sound of rain outside and this was to last for quite a while off and on until it started to brighten up. Our boating neighbours on both sides wanted to leave by the 10.30am bridge lift opening this morning and so I agreed to do the same thing and followed them out to try a passage today rather than tomorrow. I waited as long as I could for the calming weather to arrive but then missed the last of the free-flow through the Honfleur sea lock and had to wait a while and be locked out with two passenger vessels.
The inner Sein estuary was not too bad but the seas deteriorated from slight to moderate the further out we went and this made for the most uncomfortable trip that we had experienced for a while. It was safe and manageable but not of the sea state that I had been aiming for in recent times and so I should have waited until the calmness of the following day as I originally planned to do. The winds were at the upper end of F4 (around 16knots) and against the tide for some of the time which was also more than forecast but, as I had predicted and explained to one of our neighbours, the sea would take time to calm down from the previous winds anyway and that was another factor. We made the passage all right despite by boating computer deciding to reboot and reset mid passage after an update was received and the only casualty of the trip was Kathleen’s special soup. She had worked hard to make this soup and was very much looking forward to enjoying it but it had been left in a saucepan in the galley fridge which fell to the floor when she opened the door after the passage! We found a nice berth in the inner Angedo Regattes marina close to the Capitanari after taking on £200-worth of diesel at the outer Anse de Joinville basin upon arrival.
Temp 20>25 deg C, RH 76>48%, Pressure 1015-1017mb rising slowlyy, good viz, slight/mod seas at upper end of F4 with breeze mainly Nly up to 16knots
