Aviles to La Coruna

We were up at dawn Friday the 13th.
Motored to the fuel dock and filled up with diesel in the main tank and jerry-cans on deck.

We planed to sail from Aviles to La Coruna a distance of 128 nm or around 25 hours sailing.

Here is what we really sailed

Weather forecast was for ENE winds 10 gusting 20 knots.
Perfect force and direction. We set of in sunny and almost calm weather, but after an hour wind picked up and became as forcast said.

We stopped the engine and sailed using the electric autopilot first, then engaged the Hydrovane steering.
It performed very nicely and the boat sailed very pleasant and quiet. No buzzing from the electric autopilot.

Sailing usig the hydrovane we can switch of all electronics except the fridge, AIS and marine VHF.
Thats the perfect time to use the HF radio. Geir had a few contacts with radio friends in Norway
and also downloaded weather GRIB files using Winlink/Pactor.

The GRIB file showed there had been a change in the forecast and that we were in for gale force winds on the second half of our voyage to LaCoruna. We double checked windy.com which also had the same change.

We therefore decided to sail to the small town of Ribadeo, which has a nice marina.
We arrived at 6PM. 

The Marina in Ribadeo

A nice park in Ribadeo. Yes Grete attacked me with a pair of siccors....

The next day weather was checked. This time the forecast looked fine and we left Ribadeo at 5PM Saturday.
The distance to LaCoruna was 85 nm and we arrived at 9AM Sunday. We had winds mainly from the aft and it gave us very nice speed. A bit rolly at times, but all was fine.

We moored at Marina Coruna, which is the first marina after rounding the breakwater.
The marina was half empty - so we are definately at the end of the season.
The weather is still very nice and temperature at daytime is up to 25C.

Our neighbour in LaCoruna