The good Samaritans of the Glénan Islands

When we went to raise anchor to depart Penfret, in the Glénan Islands, it was terminally stuck.  On 10 metres of water, there was little to do but call a diver for help.

So we inflated our new Achilles dinghy and went ashore.  Penfret Island is owned by Les Glénans, the largest sailing school in Europe, founded 1947, with 450,000 alumni.  The place was packed with teenagers, but asking around, we found the boss, a young woman in a rustic building.  She called the diving school in Île Saint-Nicolas, but got voicemail, so she called her friend who's friends with the diving instructors, and who told her they'd be stopping by Peregrinus after their morning class.

Sure enough, an hour later a 35-foot motorboat full of diving students came by.  A young man dove with a parachute, an inflatable bag he used to lift our anchor chain which was tightly wrapped around a rock.  

We tipped the young diver, because no one in the islands would take any payment.  We are grateful for their generosity.

The owners of this gorgeous RM 1260 kindly offered to help with the stuck anchor by lowering a line along our anchor chain and then pulling with their engine in the opposite direction of our rode; but since we knew the divers were coming, we declined.  Given the wrap the diver found, it probably would not have worked anyway.  The RM 1260, 2013 European Yacht of the Year, is made of wood covered with epoxy, a radically innovative and unique technology for a new sailboat.  Leica Typ 114, 24 June 2015.

The Odete

The Odete river is the seaway for the old Roman settlement that eventually became Quimper, today’s capital city for the départment of Finistère.  Founded a few years after Caesar’s conquest of the Gallias, Quimper's original name may have been Vicus Aquilonia.  

The Odete has been called the plus belle rivière de France.  We anchored early, between Château Kérouzien and Château Keraudren.  Kérouzien was described in the 1894 book Sailing Tours as a “comfortable-looking house.”  We all should have one such comfortable-looking house, don’t you think?

On shore, jolly trespassers enjoyed the delightful sunset just as much as we enjoyed the serenading birds.

Leica Typ 114, 7:30pm 23 June 2015

Gesocribate

The lower portion of the wall on the right hand side of the picture, above the cars, and which goes around about one-half of today's walls, was laid by the Romans around the year 290, to fend off barbarian Saxon or Frank pirate attacks.  The Roman castle held 1,000 soldiers under a Praefectus, and they called the settlement Gesocribate.  We now call it Brest.

Following the last Praefectus, the castle was occupied by the barbarians, the counts of Léon, the dukes of Brittany, the English (for 55 years), the French, and the Germans.

Today, the Préfet Maritime responsible for Atlantic France sits in a modern palace built on the castle's inner yard.  Separately, the staff offices of the French ballistic nuclear submarine command, FOST, sit in bunkers built by the Germans underneath the castle.

The Musée National de la Marine occupies the higher spaces of the east wall, above the Roman opus mixtum, and is well worth visiting.

Brest Castle: Tour Paradis in foreground, Tour César behind it.  Background: Marina du Château, home to 700 leisure boats, and to Peregrinus for a couple of days.  Leica Typ 114.

An Irish cat

For a cat, travel requires significant paperwork.  For example, when the Alférez travelled by plane earlier this year, he had to get a certificate of vaccination and rabies bloodwork from his vet, had to get this stamped and taxed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and on arrival at his destination this all was reviewed and further documents were made, stamped, and further taxed.  All these documents and taxes were still good for returning to the U.S., but only because the Alférez returned in less than 30 days; otherwise he would have had to start from scratch.  And start from scratch he did a few weeks later back in Florida, when he had his paperwork created, stamped and taxed for his trip to Ireland.

The essential problem is that international animal travel has no concept of passport.  This results in each trip being a bilateral stack of papers between two countries.  Worse yet, the origin country stamps where is the pet going, and the destination country usually requires paperwork from the immediate prior country of origin.  Add it up: in case of an unscheduled stopover, the whole stack is rendered non-valid and the poor animal could be in bureaucratic limbo.

The Eurocrats, somewhere in their immense and imponderable officialdom, have recognised this issue, and have created the European Pet Passport for intra-EC travel.   This can be issued by any authorised private European veterinarian, and in Kinsale the Alférez got one.

When we arrived in France, and even though we showed the Alferez's European passport, the Douane (customs) people got into a bit of a bother, went onto their computer, and started quoting the several laws, edicts, regulations and extra paperwork they thought applied to the Alférez.  We let them discuss among themselves in French for a while, and then we said that le chat non est Americain: le chat est un chat Irlandaise!   There was a lot of relief in the room, a lot of smiles, his subcutaneous chip was scanned, and they made a photocopy of his Irish passport and stamped it.

The Irish Alférez was admitted into France at Brest, on 22 June 2015.

In the Duchy of Cornwall

We arrived last night into Saint Mary's, in the Scilly Isles.  Called the National Yachtline of Her Majesty's government and declared two foreigners and one cat.  The cat has an European Pet Passport, issued by Ireland, we clarified.  The gentleman on the line said he'd notify Customs.  

We asked whether we should remain at the boat.  He said he didn't know when a Customs officer would be available, and that we certainly couldn't be confined to the boat, could we?  So he said we can do whatever we like.  Definitively a gentleman, as we said.

Commented the guy manning the harbourmaster's office this morning: "crazy, uh?"

Fine with us, though.  Long live the Queen!

St. Mary's Harbour.  Peregrinus at mooring, somewhere in there.  iPhone 6 Plus.  19 June 2015. 

At Mardyke Ground

We sat for a while in a home game of the Cork County Cricket Club.  Cricket has been played at the Mardyke since 1850, but the Club has only played there since its formation in 1874.  

The crew applauded politely; a lady next to us explained the sport to her daughter, and told tales of her grandfather's prowess.  The players were all elegantly decked in white.  No slobs there.

This is the planet's second most popular sport, yet it was the first game the Peregrinus crew has watched.  Provincials!

What we need

Jeremy Deller's banner at the Glucksman Gallery, University College Cork (formerly Queen's College).  Leica Typ 114, 14 June 2015.

1720

At nearly 300 years, the Royal Cork Yacht Club is the oldest in the world.   It was founded by a young William O’Brien, the 9th Lord Inchiquin, whom apparently got the sailing bug from his grandfather, the 6th Lord, and whom in turn is believed to have brought the sport from London, where he attended the court of Charles II.  There, the recently arrived king enthusiastically sailed Mary on the Thames.  Mary was a private jacht —Dutch for a swift, light vessel—, which the nederlander Seven United Provinces had presented Charles on occasion of his departure from exile.

Peregrinus stays here for a few days, doing light maintenance and awaiting a weather window for passage to the Isles of Scilly.

From the mast hangs the civil ensign club members can legally use on their boats: the Irish flag in canton on a field of blue, defaced with a crowned golden harp.

Life

Life isn't about how you survived the storm...
It's about how you danced in the rain!

Kinsale, Newman's Mall.  iPhone 6 Plus, 1/1464", 5 June 2015.

Fastnet Rock

Fastnet was known as "Ireland's Teardrop", because it was the last part of Ireland that 19th century Irish emigrants saw as they sailed to North America.

For the crew of Peregrinus, however, this was the first sight of the Old World: the top of the lighthouse, peeking from a dark sea.

Click the photo for additional images.