The last and only time I’d sailed across the Bristol Channel was on one of my RYA training runs nearly 30 years ago. We were heaved-to and boarded by the customs and excise with machine guns. They had suspected us as being drug runners from South America as they had no record of our passage plan from the local coastguard. Tim, our trainer, spoke first and clearly his Welsh accent put them at their ease. “Oh bugger” he said “I forgot to register our passage plan – sorry chaps, would you like a cup of coffee?” – and there we were in the middle of the Bristol Channel sipping coffee and exchanging tales with the now relaxed assault crew of the nearby Naval Vessel hovering on the horizon. We learned how they had been shot at several times during assaults and had often seen crew off-loading drugs into the sea to avoid prosecution by being caught in possession.

But I was relaxed, this would not happen this time – I’d reported my passage plan to Falmouth coastguard, switched on the AIS and satnav and was heading on a straight bearing toward Milford Haven inlet. The weather was sunny and bright – what could possibly go wrong. While we were happily sailing on a beam reach, I noticed after a few hours that there were some somber looking clouds and storms emerging from the west. The winds got stronger and suddenly a squall came along with heavy rain and the wind suddenly veered to the NW (ie on the nose) and I had to take down the jib and motor sail for a while as the winds were gusting to force 5 and the sea was becoming quite choppy. But the storm passed and the wind settled back into the west and we were sailing once again with stronger winds toward Milford Haven, when I got a text from Andrew asking why my AIS was switched off. Earlier, I had said to Ros, “this is not like the English Channel, I can’t see any ships on my AIS (not realising it was switched off). We then worked out what had happened. I’d heard the main VHF above the chart table making quite a hissing sound so I asked Ros to switch it off.  But she switched off the main VHF switch on the control panel, which switched off both the VHF and the AIS. I then switched the main VHF switch on and the AIS system clicked into action and suddenly I could see shipping everywhere on the screen. So we had just crossed the Bristol Channel playing a form of Russian Roulette. Luckily the visibility was good and we had not been mown down.

As we got within an hour or so of Milford Haven and were back within sight of land, Ros said that there was a boat on the port bow – it seemed to be coming toward us. Then she said, “it is coming toward us very fast, I think it’s going to ram us”. Sure enough – it came alongside about 50m off and I could see some writing on the side “Range Patrol” – the vessel was called the “Smit Penally”.

I turned the VHF handset onto the emergency channel 16. “Smit Penally, Smit Penally, this is Milo, this is Milo, over”; “Milo, this is Smit Penally. Move to channel 08, channel 08, over”. I switched to channel 08 wondering what was coming next. “Smit Penally, Smit Penally, this is Milo, this is Milo on channel 08, over”; “Milo, may I ask you what port you are heading for? Over”. “Smit Penally, this is Milo, we’re heading for Dale in Milford Haven over”. “Milo, this is Smit Penally, you’ve headed into the military firing zone during a firing exercise and we have had to halt firing while you are here. I’d like you to head 270 for 3 nautical miles immediately until you clear the zone. Over”. “Milo to Smit Penally, copy that, apologies.” There was then a mild panic on board as we were sailing on a close reach on a course of 327. Heading to 270 would turn us directly into wind – a direction we just could not sail in. So we had to furl the jib, which was not easy in the strong wind, tighten the main and start the motor before heading due west on 270. Smit Penally shadowed us close behind escorting us the whole way until we were out of the firing zone. It then advised us that we could then head on a course 330 into Milford Haven.

Milo’s track on AIS showing where we were intercepted by the Range Patrol and had to change course by heading west to get out of the firing zone as quickly as possible so that they could resume firing.

By then the weather was getting fierce, at least force 5 and the sea state quite rough, although oddly the sun was starting to break through – it seemed to be clearing up. As the waves entered the bottle neck of Milford Haven they got even higher, so I kept Milo on motor and main making up to 8 knots on occasion with the tide. It was  a huge relief when we rounded to the lee of the Dale Fort headland. We’d been offered the use of mooring D27G by Kevin Rogers of Dale Sailing Club while his boat was out of the water. We picked up the mooring and then had a well-deserved cup of tea and a late lunch to celebrate the completion of the first half of our journey to Scotland.   It’s hard to believe that Pembrokeshire is half way to Scotland, but we have now travelled 290 nm through the water on a voyage that will reach 600nm as we get to Holy Island off the Isle of Arran in the Firth of Clyde, Scotland.

Rosamund and I have at last set off on our trip from our home port in Lyme Regis to Scotland. We plan to do the trip in two stages with a stop off in Milford Haven and a week at home.

We set off from Lyme on Sunday 24th May after a fantastic effort to get Milo ready to sail by the local boat builder HJ Mears & Son, the local marine engineer Rob Perry Marine and of course the harbour masters Graham Foreshore and Mike Higgs who lifted her out and in again and left her on the pontoon for us to be ready to leave on any tide. Milo’s rudder had been damaged in the recent gales and emergency repairs were necessary just before we left.

What I like about sailing, apart from the usual challenges of weather navigation, tides and current, is the unexpected. After some quite tedious motor sailing against the wind to first get to Salcombe, then Falmouth and then Newlyn, we look a bus and train to St Ives as it was too windy to sail. We discovered the Barbara Hepworth museum there which was an absolute gem – set up in the house that she had lived in, it was like a time-warp from the 1970’s – everything had been left as it was in her workshop the day she died – her tools and the sculpting she had been working on. Very inspiring – I must try some woodcarving when I return from our Scotland trip.

The next day we headed for Padstow with an ambitious plan of arriving by high tide at 4pm in order to get into the inner harbour. We had to get up by 3am and leave at 4am in order to achieve this and cover the 64nm involved. The winds were light (3 to 4) so we motor sailed the whole way, but then at 1:15pm – the unexpected happened – a whole school of Dolphins chose to adopt and play with us. I went to the pulpit and two were swimming literally underneath me one to the left and one to the right of the bow as if they were guiding us along. Ros and I then changed places and she occupied the pulpit sending FaceTime images to the grandchildren! There must have been about 12-15 in total – they would race, dive, surface, one baby one jumped clean out of the water – others criss-crossed the boat and each other. We had a thoroughly entertaining 45 minutes until 2pm when we reached our waypoint off Padstow – they seemed to be having such fun and I’m sure they could see us – some did victory rolls flashing their white bellies. They guided us well into Padstow. Ros was glued to the pulpit and when I came up behind her she said “who is sailing the boat?”, to which I replied “she’s sailing herself” (thank heaven for the Autohelm).

We are now safely moored against the Quay in Padstow inner harbour, having arrived earlier than expected at 3pm. We’ll have to wait here three days now for storms to pass.