Seaward Bound
- clairesedgar
- Dec 17, 2024
- 7 min read
The sails were on, the boat washed and there was no excuse to delay our departure for any longer.
There was a bit of concern as we weren't too sure as to how Sprocket would react to the sailing, and the Golfe du Lion is known to be a very windy area.
Two winds dominate along this bit of coast, the tramontane blows from the Pyrenees as far as Sete, and the notorious mistral which blows down the Rhone valley out the mouth of the Rhone and over the coast.
Apparently these winds should not be underestimated and can build up very quickly, oh good I was so looking forward to that!
To be fair, we had great sailing weather along this coast, and it was interesting to hear the French sailors attitude towards this area. Whilst the majority of foreign yachts turn east along the coast towards Nice and St Tropez and down to Corsica, many then travelling on to Italy and Greece, there are a lot of French who use the Golfe du Lion coastline as there are numerous marinas and the wind is generally always good and thus guaranteeing the ability to actually sail.
In the 1960s the French government decided to construct purpose built tourist cities and huge marinas along this coast. This enabled us to day-hop between marinas along the coast as the distances between are as little as twenty miles.
We set off and the sea was very lumpy and it was quite windy, and we were heading into the wind, something we had agreed that we would not do! We did know that this would change once our direction changed and I was assured a nice down wind sail to our destination of Port Gardian.
Finally we turned, the wind was 12 gusting 20, the sails were up and we had a great afternoon sail, this was what we had signed up for 😊
And Sprocket had been incredibly relaxed, what a star!
Now we were on the sea and sailing, the surprise was that we were covering ground much quicker than when we were travelling on the inland waterways.
As we had always wanted to enjoy our trip, and not be rushed, we had never set a final destination although we were keen to get to the Balearics, and we could now see that this may become a reality.
The sailing days were quite similar...
Usually rising at sunrise as I would walk Sprocket mainly along the beach and would need to do it before others arrived, he loved this and was quite noisy as he liked to be swimming and rushing around chasing balls, stones or sticks!
Breakfast and boat preparation, cast-off and generally sail to our designated marina, perhaps with a stop on the way along one of the Camargue beaches where we would drop anchor, lunch and swim.
From Port Gardian, we went to Port Camargue and then quickly arrived at Sete. The coast was not dramatic, but pleasant and with great beaches stretching all along.
Somehow we managed to enter the wrong channel, oops!, and had to sail along the commercial port!
It was very hot, and we were pleased once we moored up at Sete.
The marina here is great, close to town, a little beach over the mole and good facilities, we decided to stay for a few days.
Sete is an interesting town, previously colonised by the Greeks and later the Romans. With the building of the Canal du Midi, it became the eastern terminal and had built canals bisecting the town which gives it great character.
It is a working harbour with trawlers based here and travelling as far as the Atlantic for tuna fishing.
https://www.icij.org/investigations/looting-the-seas/part-i-mediterranean-feeding-frenzy/ An interesting and somewhat alarming article on the fishing industry in Sete!
The other industry is oil, with a huge petrol-chemical complex around the eastern side of the Etang de Thau, and not intruding at all on Sete town.
It is also known for its jousting and whilst we were here there was jousting every afternoon and most nights, which was fantastic to watch.
The jousting school is also next to the marina and it was fun to watch the children learning how to play.
This was the first place on our trip we had use of the tender. Once pumped up we realised that there were a few too many badly repaired punctures and that we would have to purchase another. There was a U-Ship at the marina in Port Napoleon and we had bought one there, though I had somehow managed to loose one of the oars into the sea before we had ever used it! I saw it go in, and before I had time it had completely sunk, not sure that's supposed to happen?
Sete was great for exploring by tender as there are lots of little canals to travel along, and it was much easier to do our shopping using the tender than walk into town and lug everything back.
Eventually we had our fill of Sete, it had been lovely to visit and great seafood restaurants but being in the marina was hot, really hot and airless. We had bought a cockpit shade whilst here and this was one of the best investments made for our comfort. The original one we bought was too small, they need to be large enough to cover the cockpit, some of the coach roof and also to extend down to the guard rails so as to provide shade from direct sun. There was alot of French shrugging and grumbling when we took it back, and they repaid us in cash!
Our decisions as to where to stay were made using the Imray guides, Mediterranean France and Corsica Pilot for this leg, and the weather forecast and sea state.
It makes a huge difference to be sailing with no agenda, as we can fit our journey pretty much according to the conditions in which we want to sail. Also, the availability of frequent and cheap marinas along this coast make it easy too. People had been quite disparaging generally when we had said we were going this way, but we had been surprised in a good way.
Today the conditions allowed for a lovely beam reach sail and after six hours we arrived at Narbonne Plage, a very typical French seaside town.
The scenary is begining to change, hills are to be seen in the distance, we are approaching the Spanish border.
The next day we had a lively sail to Carnet-en-Roussillon, we had to use the reefing lines, two and then one! This caused some annoyance to Mike, who was wondering why he had given up on yachts with 'inmast furling'.... although the mainsail was by now becoming less stiff and much easier to drop and pack away than when we had first used it!
There are a few harbours on the Cote Vermeille before the Spanish border, and Mike and I had differing opinions as to where we should stay.
He tends to look at the rufty tufty sailors advice, whereas I take the view that some of them are just GOMs and will deliberately not like a place because it is touristy!
Generally speaking, nice places are touristy for a reason... they are nice!
The problem with travelling for a prolonged period of time, is that one can become a little overawed with the sites.
ABC= another bloody church/ castle/cathedral....
If one is travelling longterm it becomes a necessity to have facilities generally as a priority over views and tourist attractions. We had first noticed this at Langres in France, a really interesting medievil town but perched atop of a steep hill. There were a couple of other boats moored with us who didn't even enter the city and just stayed moored at the bottom in the canal which we had found extraordinary at the time, but could now see the understanding.
I had not ever heard of Collioure, known as one of the last beautiful villages of France and often voted the prettiest.
Arriving by boat was spectacular, it is set at the base of the Pyrenees, with the Chateau des Templiers by the water, built in the 13th centuryby the Kings of aragon. It was also an artists colony in the 20th century, hosting Matisse, Dufy, Braque, Gris and Lhote.
There are twelve set moorings in the harbour, and miraculously we managed to arrive just as another boat was leaving!
We had the best position close to town, and with a water taxi able to collect us and take us into town if we called them.
Yes, the village is busy and touristy, but we had a woderful mooring and lots to look at!
We could also swim from the boat, this was on Mikes wish list when he had his dream to sail a boat to the med and had now become a reality.
Such a pretty place, and we enjoyed being tourists here, we even caught the road train woo,woo, which meandered its way up the hills through vineyards and into the next valley with the harbour of Port Vendres (no-where near as nice but recommended in the GOM guide) and back along the coast road.
A great few days here, good food, swimming and walks before heading off to cross the border into Spain.
Brexit rules only allow visits to Europe of a rolling 90 days in 180, we had manged to get around this by applying for a French visa, which gave us 6 mnoths in France without using up any of our Schengen allowance, we would then use our Schengen allownace in Spain, if we could find somewhere to stamp out of France!!!
So far we had really enjoyed our sail along the French coast, let's see what Spain will offer ☀
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