Belle-Ile, Brittany, France

We are almost at our destination in La Rochelle and we are moored outside Le Palais on Belle-Ile waiting for favourable winds to take us the final 120 miles. The weather now is perfect and Belle-Ile is certainly tres belle.
The voyage has been difficult since we left Cuxhaven in Germany for Den Helder. We were doing very well motor sailing quite nicely until the wind back onto the nose and then steadily built to about 20 kts as we were coming around the the North West corner of Holland. That was not too much of a problem until the tide changed and it is very disconcerting to see the heading lines on your chart plotters turn around and the navigation marks that you can see in the distance, slowly recede.
We turned around and went inside the Friesian Islands, that we might make it to Den Helder on the inside. That was not to be either as the winds had built to well over 30 knots and we took shelter in a tiny marina in Oost Vlieland. The place was very interesting and the marina was full of huge Dutch barges. The staff were very welcoming and we rafted up to a large motor cruiser.
By the next morning the weather had settled down and we had some nice sailing down the coast to Scheveningen to wait for some weather to cross the North Sea.
The Admiral got the news that her dad was quite ill in England and found a flight from Amsterdam to go and take care of him.
There was no favourable weather to cross the North Sea to the UK for at least a week so we decided to try to sail down the Dutch coast past Belgium and France to get a better shot at reaching the UK to drop Marie -Luce off.
We left Scheveningen one evening passed through the Rotterdam traffic system and arrived at Blankenberge in Belgium the following morning. This was a rather strange Belgian holiday resort which had two things going for it. One was excellent mussels and the other was its close proximity to the city of Bruges, which was visited on the following day. (to be continued)

Cuxhaven, Germany

We are now in Cuxhaven in Germany after a long run down the Kiel canal. The weather over the past few days can only be described as bloody awful. we have had at least three inches of rain and the temperature has not been over 70 degrees.
The sailing from Bornholm was the usual Baltic mixture of breeze from every direction and velocity. We did get some sailing done early on and athe end but it was mostly a motorthon. We have not been too lucky with the breeze on this cruise. We got to the Kiel Fiord the following morning in 20 knots of breeze and passed through the lock and did about twenty miles to the town of Rendsberg and stayed for two nights. Despite the weather it was quite nice and needed a bit of a rest.
On the following morning we traveled the last 40 miles of the Kiel canal in intermittent showers and mostly headwinds. Quite a difference from our trip north over a month ago.
we went another 15 miles west in the Elbe Estuary in very squally conditions up to 35 kts with very poor visibility to Cuxhaven marina and we will wait for a weather window to take us back to Holland.
We spent the day wandering around Cuxhaven but did not find it exceptional.
It looks like we will leave tomorrow in the company of some new friends on an HR48 called Northstar. The weather does not look ideal but there does not appear to be anything better for at least a week so we will see what we get.
Next stop Den Helder in Holland.