Set out in the drizzle, but with a good forecast. Within an hour the north-easterly wind picked up nicely, then the sun came out, and we sailed faster and faster. The only fly in the ointment was a knocking noise outside the port hull which had me worrying whether anything important was breaking.
On we sped, past all the rias altas – which are beautiful but which we’d visited before, round Punta Candelaria where we now headed south-west, with a F6 straight up our tail. We rolled up the jib and stayed within 20 degrees of dead down wind, thundering past a monohull broaching all over the place. Luckily, the entrance to Cedeira provided shelter so that we were able to round up to drop the main without any drama. I swam under the boat to find we had a fishing line with a weight caught round one of the keels.
This was the first day of real summer, with the Azores high at last reaching into Biscay to give steady noth-easterly winds.
Cedeira is the most perfect anchorage I know. It comprises a lagoon with no view out to sea, with a reasonably deep entrance, but acres of anchor space in about 3m. Inside, whatever the wind is up to, the water is smooth. The hills around are mostly wooded and beautiful. Sadly, the town has only a small remnant of its historic part, and that had all its roads up as part of the Spanish make-work refurbishments. The new town is pleasant enough, with adequate shops, but not worth any detour. When we returned from our run ashore, another British Prout came in. Breezer had just come direct from Audierne with good north-easterlies all the way.