FRT Day 11: The best laid plans

Lest you think that I have somehow shed my type A planner personality and did no planning for this trip, be aware that is not the case! Today was the only day that we had something absolutely 100% planned for: a yacht trip around Brest Bay. It was booked months ago and we’ve been looking forward to this as a highlight of our last day in Brittany.

The weather still is beyond sultry: hot with very little wind for breezes and some weather forecasts indicated a possibility of thunderstorms. But some didn’t. So we headed south to the harbour to meet our captain for the day. A lovely picnic lunch in tow, we boarded the Alwena, a 36 foot beauty for a day of sailing.

Unfortunately we didn’t actually do much sailing. We spent a great deal of time motoring which was very disappointing to all involved. Thunderstorms did decide to roll in so there was a lot of sitting and listening to the rain on the boat and avoiding the worst of the storms. We did get some swimming in – I can tell you that 21° is very exhilarating for a water temp. And sometimes the sun did break out and we were able to have a lovely picnic lunch with some sun and some clouds.

The wind picked up a bit in the afternoon as the sun broke through and so we actually did get a good hours worth of proper sailing with Frank learning to be the first mate and saying things like tack and jib as if he actually knew what he was talking about! 😂 In the end, we lost all hint of a breeze and had to motor into the harbour to end our sailing excursion. An enjoyable day all around – I even got a nap in – but certainly not the day that we had envisioned when I planned this all those months ago.

We had a recommendation for a restaurant in Brest from friends and we had our final meal in Brittany: mussels! An excellent bottle of Loire valley Chenin Blanc to go with it and then it was time to call our last day true day of holiday to an end.

Data for today: