The wind forecast on Windy was for a westerly wind, followed by no wind, followed by a south easterly wind in the afternoon and so it turned out. We left at around 06:00 BST and although there was still a little sea running after the strong winds, once out of the harbour, we soon had the sails set and went along nicely for an hour or so. We then sailed and motored sailed on and off as the wind died as predicted. We kept our passage speed up with the engine and by the middle of the day there was no wind at all, but at least it was sunny. Then the south easterly breeze filled in and we had a fantastic sail for the last couple of hours doing well over 7 knots over the ground with the tide under us. In fact the wind became quite strong and was blowing over 21 knots when we took the sails down going into Howth harbour. We have never been here before and for visiting yachts you berth on the yacht club pontoons and sign in with the club on arrival. There were absolutely no formalities for a UK flagged yacht!!!
After that it was time to tidy Harvard up and then retire to the very smart yacht club bar, sit in the sun on the veranda and enjoy a couple of pints of Guinness. Another big step further south.