Skomer Island - 07 June 2006 (day 18)

Yacht Gothik

At Anchor

North Haven

Skomer Island

Pembrokeshire

07 June 2006

Click here to see a map.

Logged distance: 16M

Chart distance: 20M

Time under way: 3h 20m

Wednesday 07 June 2006

Skomer Island is a marine nature reserve and bird sanctuary situated a few miles off the west Pembrokeshire coast. There are two exposed anchorages; one open to the north west and the swells from Brides Bay, the other open to the south west and swells from the Atlantic. Therefore one has to be very lucky to have conditions that allow for a trouble free night at Skomer Island. We were lucky. The fine weather and smooth seas we were currently experiencing meant either anchorage was possible.

It is only 20 nautical miles from Neyland to Skomer. To get a good push from the tide meant waiting until early afternoon so we had another lazy morning in the sunshine. It's a hard life. When we did finally depart there was no wind but we hoisted the main sail - it was good practice if nothing else. Shortly after leaving the marina we passed a badly mauled navigation light - somebody had had a bad night (see picture).

By overhearing conversations on the VHF radio between Milford Haven Port control and the waiting oil tankers it seemed there was a lot of fog in the entrance to the Haven. It was hard to accept when we were in the blazing sunshine with blue skies. I thought it best to believe what we were hearing and started punching coordinates of various waypoints into the GPS. I'm glad I did, as we approached the open sea we were blanketed by fog and could see no further than 50m. As a precaution I took us outside the shipping channel and hugged the shore. "It's a pea souper cap'n" was Keith's remark. He was absolutely right. It was fun blasting the fog horn but it would have been more fun without the fog.

It is an odd feeling making precise course changes in thick fog. I'll never get used to it. Navigating around things that you only know are there because the chart says so. It is very hard to maintain a sense of direction and the compass and log become the most important things on the planet. Fortunately for us the fog would lessen every now and then. Only for a brief moment but just enough to gain a visual reference. It was eerie approaching the channel between Skomer and the mainland. We could sometimes see the cliff tops but not the waters edge. The cliffs looked very close on both sides. The water in the channel, although calm, was twisting and turning in eddies, bubbling up from the deep as the tide worked its way northwards. A few dolphins accompanied us briefly and it was here I saw my first Puffin!

As we exited the channel and steered toward the north side of the island the fog began to thin. Soon we could see not only Skomer but also the small passenger boat carrying bird watchers to and from the mainland. A few minutes later we had picked up a mooring in North Haven, Skomer. There was one other yacht; a 40 foot, bowspritted, cutter rigged ketch from Milford Haven. I would have liked to have said that that was it - only us, the other yacht and the birds - but I was amazed at the number of people ashore. A steep path wound its way down to a small landing stage and it was lined with perhaps a hundred or more people waiting for the ferry boat. The ferry boat would return every 30 minutes or so and pick up the next 20 people from the queue. By the evening everyone was gone and we and the other boat had the island to ourselves.

It certainly was a interesting place to be. You couldn't describe it as tranquil because of the noise of the birds. We sat and watched, fascinated at the numbers and the activity. The air was full of them: Puffins, Razorbills, Guillemots, Shags, Sheerwaters, Gulls and many others. It seemed a joke now that I'd never seen a Puffin. Eventually we opened a bottle of wine and cooked a fine meal before attempting an excursion ashore in the dingy. We had just got to the landing stage when the ferry boat returned with some sight-seerers. The ferry pootled on over to us and told us the island was 'closed' until 10 o'clock tomorrow - "to give the birds a rest". That was fair enough, they needed it.

Not wanting to spend such a fine evening without some form of activity, we popped back to Gothik, picked up the spare can of petrol and headed out for a trip along the cliffs on the north west side of the island. Heading into the open sea in a small dingy with a tiny 2.5hp engine is not usually the best of ideas (especially after a few glasses of wine) but the weather was perfect and the sea a mill pond. I could feel the tide under us and made a note to keep my head. I could see Keith was a little worried but he is a trusting fellow and after some reassurances we continued. The cliffs were a wondrous sight - illuminated by the setting sun and covered with wildlife. We saw seals perched on a rock, bird filled gullies, sea blasted caves and sheer cliffs plunging into deep clear blue water.

The original plan was to go right round the island, 4 miles or so, but after feeling the tide I didn't want to linger. As it happened it took a while to get back to our anchorage but we were all very happy that we'd seen the best sights of Skomer. I'll leave you with a few more pictures... as usual, click the picture to enlarge.

The north of Skomer from the sea. You would hardly believe it's the sea, it looks more like a lake.

Ben and Keith observing all.

Guillemots on the rock face.

A closer look at the Guillemots.

Guillemots would dive from the rock and run on top of the water to get flying. Like the Puffin's, it seemed an enormous effort for them to get airborne.

Two more pictures, a little blurry I'm afraid but just so you know I've actually seen them;

Puffins and...

...Seals, you may need to look hard!