Failing to get to La Gomera

We had finally got it together to leave Las Galletas for San Sebastian de La Gomera. We were thoroughly ready to go and the weather forecast was good with not too much wind forecast so we took our departure at 1000. First of all, we had no wind at all and good views of Pico de Teide as we motored past Los Cristianos. The photo shows it was a bit hazy though.

As we approached the one third mark the wind started to fill in but from due west. Our course was 290 so we had to continue to motor. The trouble was that the wind insisted in getting up until we had a sustained 45 knots and gusts of fifty knots. In pure wind terms this is a force 9 with gusts of force 10. It was not a storm of these proportions of course or our hair would be standing much more on end than it is! That said, it was blowing like hell and our progress slowed to the best part of nothing. We battled on till about 1400 when we worked out we would have another six hours or so till we arrived at that speed. We therefore turned back and covered the same distance in about three hours to get back to Las Galletas at 1700. All very frustrating, not least since it is the first time we have had an abortive passage on this cruise. Still, we are going to have another go either tomorrow or Monday.

I wanted to get a piccie of the anenometer showing 50 knots but the spray was flying by then and I was swearing far too much to think of the camera so here it is at 43.