A Royal Welcome

After fuelling up in Leikanger (we had to call a man to come and operate the pump which was a new experience), we set off for Balestrand to catch up with a friend we had worked with in Kirkenes. She was working at the hotel there so had organised for us to stay at the hotels personal dock. It was still pouring with rain, but as we got within sight of the dock we were greeted with the sight of the beautiful old hotel, and our friend standing on the dock waiting for us!
It was a very shallow dock so we inched our way in and it all looked ok, so we tied up, threw our wet weather gear off and went up into the hotel for lunch and an explore. It was great to catch up with Klara again, who apparently had been following our trip the whole way! We felt this is how rich people must feel, arriving at a beautiful hotel in Norway in their own yacht, to a personal welcome at the hotels private dock…anyway, we spent the afternoon catching up and having hot chocolate in the warm hotel overlooking the fjord with our yacht in the foreground. Turns out this was another spot that Kaiser Wilhelm II liked to come for his holidays, so we got to sit in his personal chair, supposedly also where he was sitting when he received the news of world war 1 kicking off!

Since it was such terrible weather and we hadn’t been in civilisation much recently, we did something different and went to the movies in the evening! Quite nice for a change, and a cute local cinema, some sort of converted community centre.

The next day we went on a road trip with Klara and some of her friends to a local cider brewery, and when we got back we all crammed into the yacht for coffee. 9 people inside still wasn’t quite the most we’ve had! Unfortunately, just as we got comfortable, the boat had a itty bitty kiss with a rock on the bottom…funny how even the tiniest bump vibrates through the whole boat and makes your stomach drop.
So, everyone off to get the waterline up a little, but we touched again, and then again. So we scrambled to untie and move the boat back before any boat went past and caused wake. We found the culprit - a single rock sticking up right where our keel had been. With the low tide and wind change, we must have drifted forward enough to be over it. Thanking our lucky stars that hadn’t happened when a ferry went past, we decided it’d be best to leave the dock and anchor round the corner, especially since the tide was supposed to be dropping another 20cm. On the bright side, the sun came out and it was a beautiful place to anchor at the end of a small arm of the fjord, surrounded by enormous cliffs on all sides. A quick hike and blueberry pick, then our friend came out to join us on the yacht for a drink, before taking us to the local sauna. Pretty lovely having a sauna on the edge of the fjord, being able to look out at the mountains and swim in the fjord to cool down!
The next morning, we brought the yacht back for a buffet breakfast sponsored by the hotel! All of Klaras friends/colleagues were awesome, and thought it was insane what we are doing…Tide was in again so we could use the dock for a few hours.
It was time for us to carry on though, and luckily Klara could join us for a couple of hours. Luckily the wind came through and we had a beautiful downwind sail back to Leikanger, with Klara learning to sail on the way. Quite a shift from working together with huskies in the arctic winter, to sailing together down the Sognefjord!Read more