Arcachon

One thing we have always been quite sure about in our adventure is that neither of us particularly enjoys night sailing and we would avoid it as much as possible.  How I found myself pre-empting Chris’ suggestion of sailing past Royan into the night for Arcachon I do not know!  But that is just what I did.

We had left Minimes at La Rochelle with the intention of arriving at Royan, on the Gironde estuary, late that evening.  The wind was fairly brisk but with a reef in we were more than coping and I had helmed us close hauled and through several tacks out of the bay, around the edge of Oleron and out to sea.  That took us a couple of hours after which we had to head quite a long way out, to avoid confused sea over an uneven bottom, before we could turn south towards the Gironde estuary.

With George on the helm Chris found himself with time on his hands and began to peruse the tide timetables.  He casually announced that we could be stuck in Royan for a week, waiting for a suitable tide for a day-sail down to Arcachon, which has to be entered in daylight.  We both mulled that over for a while as we continued on with the favourable wind and weather.  Although Royan is apparently a nice enough port of call it was not somewhere we had envisaged spending a week.  Barry and Ann on Cromwell had confirmed our decision not to sail all the way up the Gironde to Bordeaux with their reports of floating trees and dirty water.  So here we were, in good conditions, facing the thought of being in one place for “too long” again.  I bravely voiced my thoughts, “So, are you thinking that it might be a good idea to sail onto Arcachon overnight and arrive in the morning?”

Chris didn’t hurry with an answer and we had several hours to make up our minds.  There was much to consider.  We were both very keen to go to Arcachon because the largest sand dune in Europe can be seen there.  My reluctance was mainly due to the description in the almanac,

“The approach and entrance to Arcachon must be considered very difficult…the entrance is continually changing and is impassable 60 days a year…”

as well as having to pass through the French test firing area.  We listened to further weather forecasts and Chris tried radioing and phoning Royan and Bordeaux to confirm the firing times explained in the pilot, to no avail.  It was Saturday though, and the pilot was quite clear that firing does not take place after 1800 on a Saturday and not at all on a Sunday.  Added to which there is a three-mile wide strip down the coast in which you can sail anytime. 

Armed with all this knowledge we made the decision to continue…a night sail!  We needed to get into the three-mile zone for our own satisfaction of safety more than anything so Chris went below and did the necessary chart work, also programming in new waypoints for George.  It was early evening and we had not seen another yacht since rounding Oleron.  It was going to be a lonely night.

The wind continued to work with us but, to be on the safe side, we put in a second reef so that Chris wouldn’t have to be woken if the wind got up on my watch!  We ate a late supper, diligently cooked by Chris, at 8 o’clock and split the night watches into two-hour stints.  I wanted first watch while it was still a bit light but Chris couldn’t really sleep and after only half an hours rest down in the saloon he came back up to the cockpit to watch the sunset.  The rays beamed down in straight lines from behind a cloud, reminding us of the Japanese flag.

Chris’ first watch was starlit.  He saw the first of many oil-rigs and by midnight we were almost abeam the lighthouse which was our chief landmark.  It soon clouded over and my 0200 – 0400 watch was black.  I had kept an eye on the glow in the distance, which Chris had pointed out as an oil-rig.  Content that we would not hit it I maintained watch.  For a while I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me as a whole row of flickering, flashing blue/white lights appeared ahead.  Anxiously I focused on them, but could not tell what or where they were.  I had wanted Chris to have a good sleep but finally I succumbed to waking him for his opinion…and only just in time.  It must have been an oil-field!  We had to change course to avoid them and I was relieved that we manoeuvred round them all safely.

As dawn broke, we were off Cap Ferret and the sand dune was visible in the dim early morning light.  We needed to start our approach into Arcachon about three hours after low water, approximately 0830.  Through the binoculars we had spotted a fishing boat, which seemed to be hanging around the fairway buoy marking the entrance.  We furled the jib so that we literally just ambled to the buoy and we watched the fishing boat begin his entrance.  He was going very gingerly, we thought, and he was a little earlier than our pilot suggests entering.  All the same it was useful to see him pass the red and green buoys.  When we thought the time was right, we headed in.  Our charts and pilots surrounded us as I gripped the binoculars tightly, frequently looking for the next mark and reassuring Chris of their colours.  You could certainly tell where the sandbanks were from the breaking waves and they seemed extremely close at times.  It was unnerving to see so much sand just two or three boat lengths away but the depths were fine and we were fortunate that it was such a calm morning.

The Bassin d’Arcachon is a large inland tidal lagoon.  There are numerous small harbours, many of which dry at low water so we headed for the marina, which is dredged regularly and is also home to the sea fishing vessels.  The basin was littered with small fishing boats and we had to dodge many homemade lobster pots and take care not to go near the highly prized oyster beds as we steadily motored into the harbour.  We had only used the engine for the final approach on the whole trip.  Chris had run it for half an hour the previous evening to top up the batteries ready for the night passage but otherwise the complete 24-hour voyage had been under sail.  We felt very pleased with ourselves as we tied onto the end of a pontoon, with the largest “trip”  (over 100 miles) recorded so far on our log!

We longed to just “veg out” but we needed to sort out our berthing arrangements since there was no obvious visitor’s pontoon.  After a bit of a fiasco with the harbourmaster telling us one place, it being taken and then the boat, whose berth we were occupying returning, we eventually had to moor alongside a fishing boat until it left and then we had pride of place, opposite the fishing port, on the end of the most rickety looking pontoon I have ever seen!

After a much-needed sleep, a bite to eat and a visit to some very good showers we both felt much better about the place.  We were disappointed not to have electrics but we have got Charlie, our wind-charger, and it was an incentive to sort out the solar panel fittings; the sun was now bright enough, consistently, that we had become self sufficient electrically.  The wind and solar power had been continuously pushing between two and three amps into the boat for most of the day.

In the cool of the evening we wandered towards the town and found a small, family run restaurant for a meal.  It was quite late and soon we were the only remaining customers and to our amusement the waiter was setting up a TV in the bar area.  Of course… it was the France v Spain semi-final.  The waiter’s eyes sparkled when we showed an interest (and of course we knew most of the French players because they play for Arsenal). By half time we were on our way back to the boat and fell asleep listening to the second half on Radio 5 Live which we could still pick up!

Taking things easy was the agenda for the next day but by the afternoon we had itchy feet and found ourselves heading into the town centre where we found we could get a bus to the sand dune, Pyla.  Since this was the main reason for our visit we couldn’t resist and soon found ourselves in a mini bus with a number of other holidaymakers, heading out of the town.  The bus dropped us off a short walk from the sand dune and once we found our way in we could not believe our eyes!  From the boat it had looked like a sandy cliff face but here, with it towering above you, it was truly amazing.  Slowly, actually very slowly, in the heat of the afternoon sun, we trudged up the side.  If this is what it is like journeying through a desert then I certainly don’t want to have adventures of that sort.  It was quite exhausting, and the sand was so hot under our feet.  Reaching the summit was worth the effort though, and the views across the basin and back towards the pine forests were spectacular.  It also afforded us an excellent view of the tortuously narrow and twisty entrance we had negotiated successfully the previous morning.  I much preferred the trip back down the sand dune, as gravity helps you slide each step a little further.  Chris went striding off and at the steepest point with each step he descended his own height!  While we waited for the return bus we had a bit of a paddle in the sea, feeling very English in our shorts and t-shirts, not prepared for a beach visit!

Our visit to the town also revealed a regular train service to Bordeaux.  It was partly due to improving the profitability of the railway that Arcachon became a holiday resort.  At its centre is Ville d’Hiver, Winter Town, with villas dating back to the mid nineteenth century.  We discovered that it was designed by physicians who wanted to send their wealthy patients somewhere healthier for winter.  With this in mind, we checked out the timetable to the “unhealthy” city and noted the times of the morning trains and decided that since we hadn’t made the famous city a port of call we would voyage by SNCF instead.  We rose early (for us!) the next day and by 0905 we were sitting in a train compartment, whistling past the small towns on the edge of the lagoon.  It seemed strange to be travelling at such a high speed!  After three months at five miles an hour screaming along at eighty miles per hour seems staggeringly fast.  In forty minutes we were in the bustling station of Bordeaux, navigating our way through busy travellers instead of sandbanks!  It made a change though and we ambled out of the station to find a map.  We had thought it would be a good idea to follow the river to the town centre but the road was thick with traffic and in full sunshine.  Instead we meandered through some back streets and soon found ourselves in a market square admiring the tallest freestanding belfry in southern France.

We followed the suggested route from our France travel guidebook, taking in most of the tourist sights the city had to offer.  We were keen to take a trip to a Bordeaux wine Chateau and we had day dreamed of wine tasting at Haut-Brion, or Cheval Blanc at St Emilion.  On the day we had chosen, however, there was no tour from the Maison de Vin.  We continued our sightseeing in the city instead – we had a wine box waiting for us on the boat anyway!

We needed a days rest after all this tourist activity and began to contemplate our next move.  We were very restricted by tides here and still had the firing ranges to consider.  We were in for another night sail, but not as far this time!  The people in the capitanerie were helpful in phoning to find out the firing times and by night sailing we would be perfectly safe!  We could negotiate the tricky departure in daylight and arrive in Hendaye in daylight the following morning.  Perfect.