A slow, very slow passage through Raz de Sein

Where to next?

This short passage turned into something of an interesting stuff up and certainly one for the books. We’d been watching the wind and weather for a couple of days with the vague intention of heading further south and then east along Bretagne’s coast line. It was a vague intention because we hadn’t really decided on where exactly to head to next; we had an appointment with Alubat in Les Sables d’Olonne in late September, there were more tumuli, dolmens and menhirs to be seen around abouts in the Gulf of Morbihan and we had time. But, at the same time Frederieke was beginning to feel a bit stressed by a need to get past the Raz de Sein before the next set of southwesterlies started to come through. Me? I didn’t really mind, there would be things to see and do wherever we got to.

Birthplace of kouign-amann

One option was Douarnenez. Going there would be a sort of pilgrimage, Douarnenez being the birthplace of the sometimes delicious pastry, the kouign-amann. We had discovered this little beauty in Lézardrieux and though we had never found them to be anywhere near as good anywhere else, the Lézardrieux versions were so good that we always ended up risking almost certain disappointment and trying them in other less privileged towns. We were in France, so using food as our guide seemed a perfectly reasonable approach but Douarnenez was this side of the Raz and besides, were we really serious about going all the way into that bay, a detour of about 30 nm, just for a pastry?

Planning the Raz

Ultimately, the answer turned out to be, no. In what to some might almost seem like a failure to risk the challenge of adverse conditions in favour of a potential gourmet experience we decided to get past the Raz de Sein in good weather and see where we ended up. Disappointing to some, no doubt but, well, there you go. So, with the storms in the Bay of Biscay steadily blowing themselves northward and the seas beginning to drop, we consulted the forecasts, the charts, the pilot book and the tidal streams and decided that we could leave mid-morning-ish to arrive at the Raz as it was about to turn and, hopefully, get through without too much ‘wind-against current-and-all-of-it-against-us’. Fools, that we were (and probably still are).

Surrounded by the French Navy

We set off from Camaret-sur-Mer mid-morning, a light breeze pushing us west and then south into the midst of a French Navy exercise. Warships to the left of us, warships to the right of us and probably some underneath us as well. Whatever, they didn’t seem to be concerned about us, so we let them do their thing and we did ours. A few hours later, as we approached the Raz de Sein we began to get a bit suspicious. Our speed over the ground had been low all morning but our log, which measures how fast we are moving through the water hadn’t been working since we left, presumably because a crab or some other bit of sea life had decided to set up home in the paddlewheel. This meant that we hadn’t been able to tell if we really were going slowly (though the of the water as it went past suggested that we doing at least 5 through the water) or if we were pushing against the current (which our reading of the tidal streams suggested we shouldn’t be). Hmmm, what was going on?

Against the tide, again

All was revealed as soon as we entered the Raz. Here we were clearly pushing into a strong current. We had 11 kn of wind on the port quarter, a full main and a double reefed genoa and our speed fell slowly but steadily away. All the while the waves were getting bigger, steeper and the gaps between them were getting steeper. What had been smooth sailing was fairly quickly turning into a rollercoaster ride. And the speed kept steadily dropping. When it dipped under 1 kn it was time to get the engine going because we weren’t even in the Raz proper yet. The Raz proper was just ahead of us, a clearly defined line beyond which the dark waters of the Atlantic suddenly became a vast expanse of river rapids, big pressure waves boiled up from the deep and wind-against-tide on the surface created steep waves and breaking crests.This mess of water stretched for as far as we could see. It was time to push the engine revs up to 2000 rpm and to see if we could push through this mess.

Going backwards

That turned out to be not very fast at all. Despite looking like utter turmoil the ‘rapids’ turned out to be a fairly smooth ride with absolutely no slamming or pounding, but just like the rapids of a river the current was all over the place, twisting, turning and rolling Yuma all over the shop. Happily enough, all the commotion was sufficient to dislodge whatever it was that was jamming the log and suddenly we could see how fast we were sailing through the water. Fast. For the best part of an hour we rolled and twisted along over the roiling water with 15 kn of wind pushing us along and the engine on a steady bass note at 2000 revs. With all of this power we were doing 7 kn and sometimes 8 kn through the water. Despite this, every time we’d look to starboard, the light on the Tévennec rock remained, mockingly, a mile or so off our beam. We might have been doing 8 kn through the water but over the ground we were doing 0.2 of a knot and unfortunately, for a period of at least 15 minutes, that was 0.2 of a knot backwards.

Yuma’s limits

Working so hard and going nowhere, the call became, do we give up and go back or do we just push on? We figured that we might as well just go on, as surely, soon enough, we’d get to a stretch where the current wasn’t so strong. Besides the two yachts we seen going (very fast) in the other direction had looked like they were having a far rougher time of it, slamming into pressure waves and taking water over the bow. So, we pushed on, and on, and finally 2.5 hours later that damned Tévennec rock had slipped, however imperceptibly, aft of us and we’d finally covered the 2 nm length of the Raz de Sein and pushed out into far more forgiving tidal streams. At least we could say that, having had 8+ kn and waves against us, we had found Yuma’s limit for making any headway. Next time we’ll just wait it out but it was actually a fun ride and worth doing…once.

What went wrong?

How did we get it so wrong. Quite aside from our own natural ability for pilotage errors, our pilot book had indicated that for 6 hours from high tide in Brest we’d have a southerly setting current. Despite timing our departure from Camaret-sur-Mer accordingly, it never really felt like we had the current with us. Maybe the French Navy had been doing tests with changing tidal currents 😉?? The tidal streams on the charts also indicated that it would be flowing leisurely south. Frederieke’s guess is that the tidal streams we checked on the charts lay just outside the Raz and that we hadn’t zoomed in enough on the electronic charts to see the predicted streams inside the Raz itself. Lesson learned, although we’re still confused about the pilot book.

After the excitement of the Raz we had a leisurely sail with the headie poled out down to Sainte-Evette where we picked up a mooring in the bay at about 1900. A good day!