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The Lunatic Voyage
Image by John of Wirral
Sailing from Wirral to the River Lune in north west Engalnd, then up the river to Lancaster, on Hitia 17 catamaran Star Catcher.
Concerning sailing, one always has yearnings and ambitions. There is always something about which one thinks, one of these days I’ll do that. So it was for me to sail from Liverpool Bay up the Lancashire coast. I keep my Hitia 17 catamaran at a mooring at Meols on the north Wirral shore. From here I look out into the wide expanse the Irish Sea and feel a compulsion to go beyond the horizon. On a calm evening, at the head of the bay Formby Point stretches out as a dark line on a silvering sea like a boundary, beyond which when the air is clear mysterious distant forms loom: Black Combe, the clustered peaks of the Lake District, and the Bowland Fells, alluring but remote. I had never sailed beyond Formby Point and to do so appealed as an adventure. The moon was full at the end of the first week of July 2017, but it was not madness that induced me to sail up the coast. There was to be a rally of the Dinghy Cruising Association in the Lune estuary that weekend, which I intended to join, but Star Catcher, my catamaran, must first be dismantled to be trailed by road, which takes considerable effort, so sailing her up the coast to join the rally seemed by far the easiest option.
Wednesday, 5th July 2017. HW (Liverpool) 21h54, 8.1m.
My son Rick was keen to join me for the trip, and on the Wednesday evening before the weekend of the rally we walked out to the boat on the beach to wait for the tide to flood. As soon as we floated we slipped our mooring and sailed slowly down channel in a light sea breeze to anchor for the night in deeper water, just off Leasowe, from where we’d be able to make a timely start in the morning. We wanted to arrive in the Lune before darkness and before high water the following evening.
Thursday, 6th July 2017. HW (Liverpool) 10h18, 8.1m; 22h40, 8.4m.
Rick peeped out under the tent as the water of the incoming tide began to trickle round the hulls. "I can’t see the wind farm!" he exclaimed. Sure enough, the wind turbines on the Burbo Bank four nautical miles (NM) away were completely obscured, and we could barely see across the Mersey. This was not good. We wanted good visibility not only to navigate unfamiliar waters but also to cross the Mersey shipping channel. We would see how we got on. The forecast was fair, but we could always turn back within a couple of hours if it didn’t clear. We raised anchor at 08h30 and ran north before a light southerly breeze off the land. Within an hour we were passing the first of the wind turbines, the mist was clearing, the sun was starting to show through the haze, and we were keeping a careful eye out for ships.
Our aim was to cross the shipping channel in the vicinity of the Q11 and C5 N cardinal buoys, where the Crosby Channel leading out from the Mersey becomes the Queens Channel leading into the Irish Sea. By the time we could discern the twin cones of the buoys we had seen three ships pass up the channel but for now the coast appeared to be clear and we held our course.
The shipping channel is only a quarter mile wide, so within a few minutes we had crossed and left the red Alpha buoy astern, and the nearest approaching vessel, a gas carrier steaming out of the Mersey, was at least ten minutes away. Our timing had been perfect, just at high slack water with the sea calm, for at intermediate states of the tide the stream in the channel can raise an alarmingly choppy sea even in a light breeze. We had made good progress at a rate that would see us arrive in the Lune with time to spare.
The breeze remained light but veered westerly, giving us a delightfully relaxing broad reach up the Formby coast. The sun was starting to feel hot and we divested of some clothing and enjoyed morning coffee from a flask and a biscuit. We were gazing at the miles of bright, yellow-russet sand of the Formby dunes topped with dark green Scots pine trees sliding past a mile or two to starboard, and we could imagine a virgin, tropical shore, unexplored by people. There was little else to discern within our field of vision.
Suddenly, something in the water caught our eye – a movement, a shape of something dark, briefly at the surface. Then SPLASH! – much closer! And in an instant they were all around us – sleek, black, curved backs with sickle-shaped dorsal fins: a pod of about ten large bottlenose dolphins, breaking the surface, breaching, their bodies sometimes nearly clearing the water. They were pursuing fish, for once or twice we saw a fish leap, and a couple of gannets were circling and diving. The nearest surfaced within ten yards of the boat, and we saw one swim directly underneath. It was a bit disconcerting because they were massive creatures – something between the half and the full length of the boat, so perhaps about 12ft (4m) We could hear their squeaking signals. They remained in our vicinity for about twenty minutes. At one stage we followed them, steering closer inshore, but eventually they went out to sea again and they disappeared almost as suddenly as they had appeared. This was between Formby and Ainsdale, between one and two miles offshore. I had never seen such large dolphins so close before. We were surprised, somehow we were not expecting this kind of sighting off the Lancashire coast, and we were lucky to see so many so close. This incident alone was enough to make the whole trip worthwhile.
It is curious how size and distance becomes deceptive in hazy visibility. In pursuing the dolphins we’d been distracted from our compass course and come closer inshore. We thought a building at the end of Southport pier was a structure on the far side of the Ribble estuary, and we started to steer towards a tall tower that appeared through the haze, thinking it was in Blackpool, until we realized that Blackpool Tower couldn’t possibly stand behind Southport, and it turned out to be the tower of the cable-stayed footbridge across Southport marine lake. Blackpool Tower eventually appeared faintly to the north when Southport was off the starboard quarter some time after noon, along with a persistent periodic flash of reflected sunlight from the same vicinity, which puzzled us for two and a half hours until we came close and found it to be the sun’s reflection off a huge revolving glass globe – it was the Mirror Ball, a giant, mirrored ball on Blackpool promenade. A prominent seamark, about 4NM to port, which remained visible for a long time, was the Lennox gas platform. Other marks, which we were looking for, the outer Ribble buoys – a west cardinal and the Gut buoy – we failed to spot, so we must have passed them well inshore. But we met the line of perches marking the outer end of the training wall of the main Ribble channel and made a slight detour to leave those to starboard, although at two and a half hours after high water we probably had ample depth to clear any submerged obstacles. Thereafter we could make out the prominent landmarks of Lytham-St Anne’s: the lifeboat station, and a bright white dome in the distance on the seafront shining in the sun.
The breeze slackened, becoming very light as we approached Blackpool. For an hour and a half we were within earshot of the screams from the roller-coaster ride. As we came closer we would watch in morbid fascination as the train made its slow ascent up the long incline, then seemed to pause with bated breath on the lip of the summit, before plunging to its awful precipitous descent, while we awaited the screams, delayed by the distance the sound had to travel across the water. It seemed to take an inordinate amount of time to pass the town – South Pier, then Central Pier and the Tower (abeam at 14h30), then the North Pier, then seemingly endless pastel-coloured residential blocks merging into Cleveleys. Rick dozed on the trampoline and I took to periodic spells of paddling, merely to flex and stretch my muscles.
About mid-afternoon moderately high cloud closed in from the west and a few drops of rain fell. Just north of Cleveleys some kind of works and fencing seemed to close off the beach from passage farther north along the shore. Beyond here, we sailed past the most grim looking stretch of coastline I ever recall seeing. The skyline along the low, loose cliff top was dotted with heavy ground-moving machinery – excavators, diggers, dumper lorries, etc. – and tracks and rubble had been made and piled right down onto the beach. There was not a blade or leaf of green to be seen. It was a scene of utter desolation. This site is being developed for fracking and has been made thoroughly ugly. Under the grey sky with already hazy visibility the scene created an atmosphere of ominous foreboding such that as we approached Fleetwood we felt we’d arrived at the very outlandish ends of the earth.
There was one hazard to look out for along this stretch of coast: the chart indicated a pipeline running out about 3NM from the shore at Rossall Point, drying 0.2-2.0m. Low water (Liverpool) was 2.3m and by then it was about low water. We spotted a line of perches stretching offshore, so we slackened off as we approached and I asked Rick to keep a sharp look out forward in the water. "There!" he shouted. "Where?" I asked. We’d just sailed over it, a concrete casement beneath the surface. We cleared it with sufficient depth, but I felt we should have exercised a little more caution.
Ahead off the port bow we spotted the King Scar green buoy, marking our entry into Morecambe Bay where we should alter course NE to approach the mouth of the Lune. Here we entered a strange world of the diffuse boundary between land and sea, neither completely one nor completely the other. Off to port grey misty shadows of ships were moving in the Lune Deep, whereas to starboard a vast expanse of intertidal sand stretched north from Fleetwood. Between the two, occasional figures could be seen: men standing in the water up to their thighs fishing, reminiscent of Anthony Gormley’s statues, and a Land Rover crossed the horizon, seemingly travelling on the water’s surface. Atop the sandbank rose the silhouette of a flattenned, rounded hillock, atop of which was the gaunt carcass of a tree, probably washed up and stranded by a storm-surge tide; we realized that this mound was the King Scar itself. Beyond, a large derelict scaffold structure came into view. This was the remains of the supporting structure of the defunct Wyre Light. This prominent structure, which dates from 1839, can be seen from afar and marks the mouth of the channel into the R Wyre. A fortnight after our visit a corroded leg collapsed causing the structure partially to keel over, leading to enquiries being made as to who is responsible for it. It turns out that no one knows to whom it belongs as neither Trinity House, Fleetwood Council, nor the Duchy of Lancaster have any knowledge of its ownership.
I have taken to keeping aboard Star Catcher a stout 8ft cane which has multiple useful functions, principally as a depth sounder, being much more handy than deploying the lead line, but also as a quant and as a pole with which to fend off. It stows conveniently against the main cross-beam, and it repeatedly proved its worth as we skirted the shallows, feeling our way across the mouth of the Wyre (inshore of the N cardinal Wyre buoy) until we spotted the outer Lune W cardinal (no. 1) buoy, with which we drew abeam at HW-4h. Glasson Sailing Club had warned not to enter the Lune before HW-2h, owing to risk of grounding not only on shoals but also on parts of the old training wall which are exposed at LW in the bend in the river between Sunderland Point and Glasson. However, we were not prepared to wait 2h. We guessed that with a draught of only 1ft we could probably skim across the shoals, and we could avoid the training wall by keeping to the inside of the bend as we approached Glasson. So we proceeded upstream, following the buoyed channel – mostly a matter of no choice as some of the buoys were still high and dry. Once where there was a popple on the water the hulls rubbed briefly on sand but our progress remained steady and unimpeded. Some of the buoys were widely spaced but Rick was good at spotting them with his sharp eyes. Eventually we could make out the useful prominent landmark of the Plover Scar beacon. This distinctive Victorian stone plinthed structure has been repaired this year, having previously had its superstructure dislodged by a ship after collision.
The channel becomes quite narrow where it passes Plover Scar, where it twists into the bend round Sunderland point. The wind had picked up and we were running in fast with the tide, and as we rounded the bend and came onto a reach our speed increased even more. Rick, at the helm, was enjoying the exhilaration of the exciting sailing, but it seemed wise to reduce our speed, so in mid-stream with a clear stretch of channel ahead we rounded up and quickly got the main down then proceeded under jib. To starboard, inshore of a green channel buoy, we spotted a nasty looking large iron stake protruding from the mud. This was a particular hazard we had been warned of at the rally the previous year, for at HW it is completely submerged. With Sunderland Point astern, we hugged the inside of the next bend to avoid the possibility of encountering the training wall, we swept under the windows of Glasson SC, passed the lock gates of Glasson Dock, then on starboard tack reached into the sheltered bay beyond, luffed up, released the sheet, and nudged the bow in against soft mud. The mud was ubiquitous and had a noticeable tendency to suck the soles of the feet, but we found a suitable place to set the anchor where we could climb the mudbank with relative ease near the edge of the salt-marsh close to the mouth of the creek emerging from Conder Green. It was HW-2h, 12h after we’d weighed anchor on the Wirral coast. We’d covered the 45NM at an average speed of just under 4 knots. I had been aboard for 24h when I stepped ashore. Rick, who remained aboard and slept late the next morning, not stepping ashore until after noon HW, remained aboard continuously for 42h! I think this says something about the comfort that is possible camping on a small boat.
On Friday evening my wife arrived with the car and trailer ready for the return trip by road, and we availed ourselves of the facilities of Glasson SC. Then on Saturday we enjoyed the company of other DCA members attending the rally, and sailed together with the morning flood up river. Lancaster lies only five miles up the Lune from Glasson, a relatively short expedition, but the trip is full of interest and variety. The shoreline is placid and rural and abounds with bird life, the curves in the river combine with the low hills and occasionally sheltering trees to create fluky and sometimes challenging breezes, and all this with the added factor of the flow and ebb of the tide makes for absorbing and fascinating sailing. There were obvious signs that the tide had already turned against us as we forged up the last straight with a following breeze into the city of Lancaster, passing under the lofty Carlisle Bridge that carries the main west coast railway line. There was no time to dally, however, so we turned to face the beat back, carried by the strengthening ebb stream. We had an anxious moment when we failed in stays under the central span between the massive stone plinths, with the tide pushing through, when a gust suddenly started to push us backwards, but the crew set to with paddles and we emerged safely downstream.
Thus, aboard Star Catcher we had voyaged from the former Iron Age port of Meols on the Wirral coast to the former Roman port of Lancaster on the Lune purely under sail. And we took some satisfaction from knowing that we had completed the voyage and experienced it in a manner similar to how it had been experienced for centuries before transport by road and rail became the norm. To traverse the coast in a small boat under sail is to perceive the land from a completely different perspective. The strangest aspect of our journey home towing the boat by car was to see names on motorway signposts flash past in minutes to places we had spent hours passing by boat. Sailing up the coast had been the experience of a different dimension.
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