Up the Sognefjord

After our epic sail, it was lovely to have a bit of a sleep in and enjoy coffee in the sun in our lovely little bay. After that it was time for Russell to have a closer look at why our alternator was being funky. Turns out it was quite easy to find out - the mounting bolt had shorn clean off. So after a call to the engine dealer to check a few reasons this might have happened, we modified one of our spare bolts and hoped that it would get us to the next place we could buy a proper one. This meant that instead of cruising up the fjord, we needed to head up relatively quickly since there was no industry until most of the way down. Being the second longest fjord in the world, this meant a couple of days sailing until finding a proper town…

So we set off late in the afternoon as the wind came through and had a very nice, albeit slow sail to an anchorage at Nordrevik, having the world’s slowest race with a French yacht part way.
The anchorage was pretty, but exposed to the SE. Light SW was forecast so it seemed like a good spot, but of course that would have been too easy as we were woken up by E wind and waves…so at 5am we got sick of bouncing around, picked up anchor and started motoring up the fjord in the rain.
We were only making a soul sucking 2.5 knots against wind and current (and rain), so after a few hours we ducked into a dock in Ortnevik to wait for the wind to die. Eventually it did, but it meant we had missed our window to get to the town we wanted, to be able to then bus to the real town and back that day. And the next day being a Sunday meant we didn’t need to bother trying the day after.
Luckily, Russell managed to find a mechanic in Balestrand (where we were headed to meet a colleague from the dog-yard in Kirkenes) who didn’t have the exact size bolt we needed, but the size bigger and smaller, and would meet us on a Sunday. That will have to do!

Our afternoon trip across to Leikanger was still a rather miserable motor, but at least we were moving a normal speed again and weren’t getting quite as soaked. Another cool thing about the amount of rain we were having (there was a flood warning for the area) was that the already spectacular waterfalls were now insane, and even ones that were usually small trickles of water were now full blown water falls. We were also well and truly in cruise ship territory now, and they truly look like monsters coming through the fjords.
Leikanger was going to be our laundry stop, however, the guy who was meant to call us and give us access never did…
So a rather frustrating day, but some small wins still.Read more