(continued from . . .)

The weather is benign – so benign there is no wind and no sun either. The sea is glassy, the colours bluish grey, the sky and seas almost matching, the horizon sometimes clear, sometimes vague.

The engine gives a comfortable 5 knots, the distance is approximately 40 nm, I have six hours of fair tide. Time to reflect, time to look around.

(Click on image to enlarge)

There are gannets, diving, resting, flying.

Nowadays, I can’t see a gannet without thinking of Webb Chiles.

His Moore 24 is smaller and lighter than Blue Mistress. He has just sailed from San Diego to Opua in the Bay of Islands. I think of a walk from Paihia to Opua last April and raise a virtual glass to him.

As well a gannets, there are pairs of guillemots swimming companionably together.

A small pod of dolphins break the surface with the fluid motion that only dolphins know, They swim slowly and effortlessly in the opposite direction.

A submarine, stationery in the water ahead, moves seaward as I approach, then stops. There is a faint horizon, no mark to tell how far away it is. It sits there as we pass by, a sinister form in hazy light.

At the end of the day, we find a lighthouse and a castle – St Anthony’s Lighthouse, St Mawes Castle

and another castle, Pendennis Castle,

then a church in the evening

and sunshine in the early morning.

The child in me loves all this.

(All images taken by Bill Whateley)

 (to be continued . . .)