Left the mooring in Baltimore about 2100 for a short hop out to Horseshoe Harbour on Sherkin. It was choppy with a fresh SW. We motored out and arrived at the entrance two hours after low water. The approach is to favour the port side until through the narrows and then turn to starboard to avoid a rock. Once through we dropped the anchor and FR settled in for the night in what is definetely on of the most perfect anchorages anywhere. Its a horseshoe (!) shape and open to the East. Very sheltered and this evening there was hardly a ripple on the water. A half moon lit the sky and we sat on deck til after midnight looking at amazing plankton with a torch. The water was like soup with tiny moving shapes. Next ... read more

The plan is to put FR in the water at Oldcourt Thursday afternoon (2nd June). The weathre forecast is for 25 degrees and the tides are high about 1730 so we should have a beautiful 90 minute motor to the mooring in Baltimore, west Cork. Its bank Holiday weekend so there should be a bit of a buzz about the place. We're planning to spend a few days on board getting FR in good shape. We have two dinghys. The small 1.5M (?) we'll take with us on our summer trip and the 4M (?) we'll leave at the mooring. I dropped the 30HP Mariner in for a service last week in Skib. I decided it was probably cheaper to spend money getting the outboard working properly than on getting surgery to my right arm! So ... read more