Mousehole to St Martin, Isles of Scilly

Gareth Higgins

Having seen Dad off for his taxi to Newquay airport, Su Yin, Tomas and I got the boat ready for off. Though we got some lovely sailing weather across Falmouth Bay, eventually the wind shifted into an uphill slog under engine, though the weather and scenery was beautiful. Going back over the coast that we had seen made the journey feel long, essentially a delivery trip. We got into Mousehole (pronounced ‘Mowzle’). I hope there are no ‘azzles’ in ‘mowzle’, I thought to myself. Having dropped the anchor just outside the harbour entrance, it was quite late and we were lucky to get a delicious meal at The Mousehole Deli, which is essentially the first restaurant you see coming from the North Pier. After dinner, however, we had to drag the dinghy over the mud to the harbour entrance in the dark as the tide had gone out. We had the anchorage essentially to ourselves, sharing with only 1 other French boat, which was gone by the time we got up the next morning. The anchorage was quite rolly, though having seen the huge oak staves that they use to block the entrance to the harbour in winter, I dread to think what it is like in a blow. We did a run ashore in the early morning to fill 3 water cans, but the only tap was all the way up the south pier, at the public toilets, and you needed a special square key to turn on the tap (or a adjustable wrenchif you had one). Fortunately there were 2 friendly locals setting up a kids fair for later on who lent us the tools that we needed. We had beautiful weather for our journey to Scilly, but since the wind, though strong was completely against us (20kn W), there was little point in raising a sail, we motored the whole way. Once we got to Lands End the seas became very lumpy, with a large oceanic swell, so poor Su Yin took to the bed with ‘mal de mer’. Once again, there was some attention required to safely pass the TSS (Traffic Separation Scheme) with lots of big tankers passing, in addition to the ‘Scillonian’, the passenger/cargo ship that is the lifeblood of the Isles of Scilly. There were also lots of helicopters passing overhead, bringing the wealthier tourists to the archipelago. As we approached our intended anchorage in St Martins Bay, off the east coast of the island of St Martin I began to lose my nerve as I saw the maze of rocks I had to negotiate to get inside. In addition, given the huge swell, it didn’t seem possible that there would be adequate shelter in the anchorage. In the end, I decided to duck in to see, and once past all the rocks, which were thankfully all mostly visible as it was low water, we found a stunning anchorage with lovely calm water. It was relatively crowded with French boats but there was still plenty of room to swing. Anchor down, we relaxed for the afternoon after which we went ashore for a swim at the pristine sandy beach with beautiful clear water. After our swim we went for a hike to air dry and found ourselves at the one of the most quirky and cool bars ever, the Seven Stones. We stayed for a couple of pints and a great meal and Tomas even found some kids from the campsite to play with. As usual we had to drag the dinghy quite a distance when we got back but we had a restful night despite some overnight swell.