But not quite!
Day 157 – 161 Thursday 27th August until Monday 31st August 2026
Reading time: 8 minutes
Day 157
We planned to leave the Faroes on Thursday evening and found we had a bit of time on our hands. It was no good leaving any earlier because the ferocious tides would halt our progress.
We had spotted a coffee cup symbol on an enamelled map of Leirvik and decided to try to see if this little village actually had a coffee bar. We walked to the old part of town and met the affable Erik who we had alteady chatted to in the harbour. We asked if he could point us in the direction of the rumoured coffee bar but he was having nothing of it, he would make us coffee. Erik knew every house in the village and was both a farmer and a fisherman and seemingly quite a local historian. He opened the door to a timber house with a turf roof and what a surprising place it was! It wasn’t a house as such, but more of a rustic party and meeting place. The main room had a massive timber table able to seat at least 20 people. The walls were lined with shotguns and fishing gear. Erik phoned for an artist friend to join us. We sat outside in the yard and were given coffee. Erik then came out with a massive scaucepan of excellent soup and then introduced us to Faroese dry “fermented” lamb which he shaved off a five year old leg in wafer thin slivers. It had a strong slightly moreish taste.
We asked about the turf roofs which are so common in the Faroes. It seems that the modern roofs are firstly covered with a textured plastic sheeting which retains water in thousands of mini “egg cups”. I think they used to use birch bark. The first layer of turf (75 mm thick) is laid upside down, yes there are no upside-down turf jokes here. After a while, a second layer is added the right way up. The first layer grows through the second and securely anchors the now 150mm thick covering to the roof. The pitch has to be just right. Sadly, I don’t think the UK has enough rain to allow these wonderful roofs to survive.
After our impromptu meal we returned to the boat to prepare for our departure.
It wasn’t going to be a very pleasant voyage. It had already started to rain and fog was due. Darkness would fall soon. We togged up and motored into a slight contrary current. The wind was due to be a light northerly and gradually building to NNE 20 knots. It wasn’t until 04:54 that we could turn off the donker and get sailing with one reef and the Yankee. We pretty much maintained a speed of 5 knots the whole way with the overall port-to-port average being 4.9 kn, well above our normal average speed of 3.75 kn. By lunchtime on Friday the vis was down to under 100m and it was cold.
Day 159
At 03:22 we were approaching Rona and Sula Sgeir. It is funny how these little islands always get in the way! We goosewinged to avoid crashing into Rona and the boat went into its usual death rolls making sleeping below impossible. We changed back as soon as we could. The wind increased and veered slightly. We eventually approached Stornoway with three reefs and a Yankee, still making 4.5 knots.
With a following wind our Aerogen wind generator can not keep up with the power consumption and our general service battery had dropped to 11.9V. We had already turned off Navionics, saving the power to use it to enter the harbour in the dark.
We tied up alongside in Stornoway’s inner harbour at 23:30 GMT, directed by a helpful member of the Harbour Staff. I emailed HM Customs to say we had arrived earlier than my submitted passage plan and they later emailed to say we could lower the yellow quarantine flag and leave the vessel.
I was slightly taken aback at the cost of staying on the pontoons in Stornoway. It was possibly the most I have ever paid at £42.96 per night and the showers were extra. This was double the cost of Tichmarsh in Essex! Stornoway is lovely place nevertheless with great harbour staff.
It was a shame that we arrived on a Sunday for two reasons. Tim and Alex were in Stornoway with their yacht, Thembi, but left for Ullapool on Saturday morning to greet their daughter Megan and friends who were due back from their adventure in Greenland. The other reason to have arrived on a Saturday is to enjoy a wonderful Indian meal at the County Hotel which is sadly closed to non-guests on Sundays.
The yellow French yacht we met in Torshavn sailed in at 04:00.
Actually most of the town was closed but we did manage to find an excellent coffee shop called Becket snd Sons who do perfect coffee and some smashing great value sandwiches.
We took a stroll around the castle grounds and topped up our provisions at Tesco, it was good to buy food at UK prices!
In the evening we decided to eat in HS1, nothing to do with railway projects but a bistro type restaurant near the harbour. We decided that the popular and recomended Cala Hotel was a bit too modern for us. The HS1 food was great.
We spotted a short weather window and despite strong wind warnings we decided to go for it and make a dash for Portree about 50nm south.
We set off at 06:00 GMT and motored south until the breeze set in and we were able to sail, but not for long before we were becalmed and needed to motor again. The wind would pipe up and we would storm along and then it would die again. Generally a very flukey but overall quite fast voyage saw us arrive in colourful Portree at 16:24 GMT. It is still freezing cold!
We will eat and relax on board tonight and row ashore for the town’s delights in the morning.
So the long trip nears an end but the expedition doesn’t really finish until the boat moors up safely in Dunstaffnage. And there is plenty of time for a mishap before then!
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