Sailing Positive Waves

The statue in Coruña's main plaza depicts a rather fierce woman with her fallen foe at her feet. Once we made it to A Coruña on the northwest coast of Spain, it really felt like we were cruising. We weren't the only ones to feel that way. The overwhelming sentiment at the dock was one of relief and excitement. The Bay of Biscay was behind us, we were out of northern Europe, the weather was decidedly warmer, most of the lows were north of us, and we were exploring new places. Our daily and weekly schedules took on a more cruiser-minded approach: maybe one small project a day, explore the new anchorage, spend time with other cruiser friends, a few hours of school, and make plans for the next destination. Where we go next is based on longer term plans like meeting Hans's parents in Cascais in the second week of October and shorter term plans like finding the best grilled sardines and pulpo and making time for a beach barbecue or hiking to a look-out point. The weat

dolphins! The Bay of Biscay is a pretty big deal for small boat sailors. It’s about 250 or so nautical miles across and it’s a lee shore, meaning that most of the time the wind is blowing from the ocean and pushing the wind and waves toward the shore. And your boat if the weather turns bad. Conditions can change quickly and since it’s an open ocean passage, there is nowhere to duck in if the weather gets bad. You could choose to island hop along the west coast of France to the north coast of Spain, but then you run the risk of getting stuck in the bottom southeast corner with a long slog to the west coast of Spain against wind and current. There’s also a rather big continental shelf that extends south off the coast of Brittany and, combined with the tide, it can get pretty rough, pretty quickly. Best to just set a direct course and get out of dodge! For a north -> south passage, the best option for us was to sail from the Brest area of France to the A Coruña area of northern Spain.