Torrential Rain, More Friends, and Mushrooms!
14.–16. aug., Norge ⋅ ☁️ 17 °C
We had a late start leaving our bay in the forest, since Russell had a bad sleep with the strong winds that came through.
We only had a relatively small stretch of just over 20nm planned for the day to get close to where we were picking up our friend Lisa the next morning, who was joining us for the week.
We headed off before the rain hit us, with the clouds making crazy patterns again. Unfortunately we didn’t get to outrun the rain though and Russell got very quickly very soaked. We were again very thankful for our wet weather gear. We sure have had a lot of use out of them!
We hadn’t been having much luck with fishing for the past couple of weeks. In part because we aren’t the most patient fishers and after about 5 minutes declare there aren’t any fish here (5 minutes has often been enough in the north), but we found out today that it was also because we were no longer using the best lure. Angela tried the little hand line we had, and pulled up 3 mackerel!
The first time we have caught anything but cod and pollock in Norway so the mackerel was a real treat, and delicious! Our bay was dead calm, and they rain cleared enough for some beautiful sunset colours.
The next morning we headed out early to meet Lisa at the ferry stop from Bergen. It seemed an odd place for the ferry to stop since there was nothing around, just the end of a road, but made sense as we sailed past seeing the huge oil refinery nearby. Despite that, Lisa was the only one to get off at that stop and started to question if she was in the right place.
Heading off again, Russell had a great time dodging the numerous huge ships coming in/out of the channel. Starting to understand why Norway needs traffic separation lanes on their charts here now.
We started off weaving our way between some islands with some narrow passages. We had both looked at the route the night before and couldn’t see a reason not to make that shortcut, but we had both missed the 12m cable. We are 13.5m above waterline so that was definitely not going to work for us. Luckily we both spotted it as we came out of the corner and at the same time though oh that looks quite low…Not much of a shortcut in the end, but scenic.
We had another relatively short day, mostly motoring but also managed to get some sailing in. For a time the clouds and and rain were so thick and misty that in the channel we were actually starting to use our AIS system properly finally. Very spooky seeing big ships appear and disappear in the fog…The next day was supposed to be quite a strong northerly so we were setting ourselves up to catch the breeze down to the south of Bergen.
Now that we found out we could catch fish again, we made another 5min fishing stop and had more mackerel for lunch, then dropped anchor in a cute very sheltered bay with an already full free floating dock.
We paddled ashore for a little explore and hopefully some berries. What we found was even better than berries - mushrooms! After finding one mushroom it turned into a mushroom hunt, and we were rewarded by at least 3 varieties of edible mushrooms and the biggest porcinis we’ve ever seen.
Norway has a very handy app where you can upload pictures of your mushroom and where you found it and a specialist looks at it and identifies it for you, so we had fun testing this out. Also handy that Lisa is very knowledgeable in mushrooms and could tell us what we needed to cut off and where the worms hide.
We finished the day with mushroom tasting, a delicious creamy mushroom sauce with juniper rice and some wine. Great success!Les mer
Adventures in the Sun
16.–19. aug., Norge ⋅ ☁️ 10 °C
The strong northerly we were supposed to be getting to blow us south of Bergen eventuated into a light northerly and then nothing. We persevered with the sailing as long as we had the patience (and time) for but in the end we spent half the day motoring. At least the sun was out and it was even feeling quite warm.
We were kept busy by admiring cabins along the waterfront, dodging big ships and catching mackerel again for dinner. It will take a while before we get sick of fresh mackerel!
For the last hour the wind picked up nicely and we got in to the harbour in Våge just before dinner and planned to enjoy the dockside sauna, but frustratingly, you can only book the sauna online 18hrs in advance or at the restaurant where we were told it was booked out for the rest of the evening. Oh well.
The next morning was a slow one with a tasty Lisa special rice omelette and hike preparation. We eventually got out for the hike closer to midday, helping a lady herd her sheep into the paddock on the way. It was slow progress once we got into the forest - lots of blueberries means stopping every few meters for a snack. It’s really quite problematic how tasty they are.
Part way up Russell split off to check out a landing spot for paragliding and made his own route from there back to the track, while Lisa and Angela continued up the path. It wasn’t the most well trodden path and a very wet one, but the views were great, and the sun was still shining! The positive side of having such a rainy summer is that we REALLY enjoy any sunshine we get now.
When Russell joined again at the top, he declared he had found ticks…flicking off at least 10 on his way up and indeed, he had a lot more of them, some of them already burrowing in to his skin. He wasn’t very happy about that. Turned out Angela and Lisa also had ticks, just not so many since they’d stayed on track.
The breeze was getting stronger and a bit all over the place gusty, but Russell decided to get his paraglider out for a little play around anyway. Luckily he decided not to fly because as he walked back to pack up after some ground handling, his reserve had somehow come out and was trailing behind - quite terrifying, and something that definitely needs figuring out why it happened before trying to fly again!
Getting back to the boat, we did a very fast, very hungry shop for dinner then the first thing we did was pick off all the ticks that we had missed up at the top of the hike (and dig out some of them), shower and wash all the clothes. We were thankful this marina had great free showers and laundry!
Safe to say Russell has been put off hiking in the south of Norway now.
We stayed another night in the marina, and headed off the next morning towards Rosendal, staying in a cute little bay in the islands outside of it. Passing the ‘salmon eye’ floating restaurant/museum on the way. Just one mackerel today, after a much longer than average fishing time. An evening was spent playing another game of catan and enjoying the sunset.
We got to wake up to yet another sunny day and had coffee in the sun before heading off to Sundal. We would have liked to go all the way up the fjord and do some hiking up there, but the distances are further than they look and without big days of motoring, we just didn’t have the time. So this little branch was a compromise and we were glad we did it! We got a spot on the dock with a view of the glacier and after a motivational coffee headed off for a hike up to the glacier lake. It turned out to be more of a highway than a hike, the car park was full with busses even and more people on the trail than we have seen for a while!
But it was still a very pretty hike and a nice spot on the lakeside for a snack before heading back down. We also managed the walk a lot quicker than most of our other recent walks since most of the blueberries were already eaten! Still managed to find some raspberries though.
Once back at the boat, we bought some local mince that Lisa turned into a bolognese and relaxed, enjoying the stunning surroundings, calm dock and the sun before it ducked behind the mountains.Les mer
Feels Like a Holiday
20.–22. aug., Norge ⋅ ⛅ 16 °C
Coffee in the sun again to start the day. We still consider that a treat! And the campground who owned the dock we were on sold fresh bread rolls in the morning so we couldn’t resist and had some warm fresh buns with eggs for breakfast whilst on the way out again, past the salmon eye and to a free dock on a little forested island.
We had a light breeze, but head on so it was a day of motoring. But again, we were just happy to not have a storm and the sun shining!
Unfortunately our attempts at fishing before heading in to the bay were unsuccessful. We had been quite excited for mackerel cooked on the campfire we planned to have but since there were no fish here we would have to have something else for dinner.
The bay was relatively busy, with a few motorboats already parked up but plenty of space for us. After beer and chips in the sun we headed off for a little explore of the island and a little foraging session. There were lots of blueberries, which was problematic for getting Russell to move very far, and even a few mushrooms - a couple of edible varieties we hadn’t tried yet. Also got to watch some Norwegian teens showing off in a fairly ridiculous power boat - definitely some parallels between Norwegian and NZ culture…
Back at the boat we decided Lisa should try to catch a fish and, much to everyone’s surprise, she actually caught one! So we got to have campfire fish after all - delicious! The mushrooms didn’t fair quite as well on the campfire and the second batch ended up as char… oops.
We had a later start than intended the next morning, with Russell replacing the gearbox oil (we have been struggling to get forwards lately and it’s getting worse…).
The oil came out very dark, and we assume that we will probably have to replace the clutch cone, but for now hopefully the oil change helps.
After this little ordeal, we headed for Vik on an island not far away. A cute little entrance to the harbour, through forested islands and relatively narrow. Russell did a good job not getting hit by the ferry speeding around the corner in one of the especially tight channels.
We had planned to hike up to the top of the hill on the island once we got there, but after quite a late start/late arrival and the weather clouding in, we ended up going for just a small walk part way around the island. Russell bonded with the sheep on the way, we passed a Viking burial site and Angela found some mushrooms! Not a hike, but an interesting walk. It was quite easy to imagine the little village as a Viking village 1000 years ago.
The evening was spent with another game of catan. Russell and Lisa hadn’t been able to beat Angela all week and tonight was no exception. Lisa will have to try again next time we see her, since the next morning was a relatively early one, getting to Leirvik for the midday ferry back to Bergen for a flight that afternoon. Unfortunately for Lisa, the flight controllers went on strike and all flights ended up being cancelled for the rest of the weekend so she had a forced extra weekend in Bergen…
For us, we had seen the weather for the next two days blowing a pretty strong northerly and then switching to south easterly for the whole week after. We knew this meant we had to take the weather around the southern point (another trickier part of the coast where you need to pick the weather carefully) before the south easterlies came through. If we didn’t go now, our chances of getting to Oslo by the first week of September would be slim.
The problem was, we had two and a half days of northerlies and 150Nm to cover…
So after dropping Lisa in Leirvik and picking up some supplies, we headed off after midday with an ambitious 58Nm goal for the rest of the day (day one of our northerlies).
The last week with beautiful calm weather and sheltered anchorages had meant that we could actually relax quite a lot for once, and really felt like we were having a relaxing holiday! We had the feeling the next couple of days might remind us we are on an adventure.Les mer
Last Test Around the Southern Tip of Norway
22.–23. aug., Norge ⋅ 🌬 15 °C
So after we dropped Lisa at Leirvik, we needed to divide labour a little to get supplies from different stores in time to sail our 58Nm trip in the afternoon. Two days to cover almost 160Nm was starting to feel like we would be doing a fair bit of night sailing. Finally feeling like we were mastering manoeuvring our yacht with its heavy prop walk, we managed to set off from Leirvik with the sun still shining at around 1pm - not too bad, but we were quite conscious of the fact that we didn’t have unlimited daylight anymore, and we weren’t too keen on being out in 30 knots in the dark if we could avoid it. Thankfully, we had a bit of current with us, and a gorgeous broad reach to start meant we were getting along at over 8 knots. We were in a main shipping channel again so we had fun weaving between the ships and ferries. The wind slowly picked up and we managed to pick the perfect time to put our second reef in, turned the corner and blasted south. The going was relatively easy - and fast! But we were glad to have an inland route through Haugesund as big waves are pretty uncomfortable in our little yacht. More dodging of ships including one we were following after it passed us reversing and pulling a 90° turn a couple of hundred metres in front of us.
Running down the sound with a good breeze behind us was a lot of fun, but the weather had clagged in. This made sailing past a couple of enormous LNG cargo ships rusting away much more eerie.
We were making fantastic time, and so decided we could make our ambitious port 58 Nm from Leirvik (we had a couple of backups in case we didn’t make good progress). From the end of Haugesund, we were back out in the open, but thankfully there were a few island chains we could duck through, and it wasn’t actually as rough as we expected. We got to pass our first shipping lane roundabout (didn’t even know they were a thing until seeing them on the chart!) luckily without any ships actually in the roundabout. We finally pulled in to Tananger at around 9:30pm, led by a burn off flame from the oil refinery. We had made fantastic time, but we were still pretty tired, and we had an early start to make another 60Nm the next day, so quick showers then straight to sleep.
The next day dawned with a slightly windier forecast, which meant we lay in bed for a while pouring over the forecasts trying to decide if it was actually a good idea to sail round this part of the coast with a base 25 knots forecast. The coast here is notorious for few places to stop and the steep underwater cliff close to the coast that makes the currents do strange things, and the waves pick up to horrible, steep nasty things, so we had been told. We decided we could at least get most of the way down and should be able to make it into a port on one of the islands. So with not a small amount of trepidation, we set off with a beautiful downwind breeze and overcast skies. One thing was encouraging - there was a train of other yachts going in the same direction. As we got closer to turning the corner to go SW, we realised that somehow we were actually the fastest yacht, even though we were the smallest and had two reefs in already. Odd. But satisfying. Here the sun also came out, and the wind started to build. We were having a fantastic sail, gull winging in 20 knots with sunshine. Russell had to do the gull winging as the wind kept picking up and we were flying! Constantly seeing 10-11 knots surfing down waves, and just as we were starting to think it might be time to get rid of the Genoa, it ripped halfway up from the leech in. Luckily we managed to roll it up before it split the whole sail in half, but it was a sad point to realise that was finally the death of our Genoa. From here, luckily there was enough wind that we were still flying with just our main up. We were doing so well, and the sea state so manageable that we decided to skip our spot at Kirkehavn and instead duck in to Farsund. So we set a course back out to miss the worst part of the nasty underwater shelf and Russell started making dinner. This is where things started to get a little wild. The waves did indeed pick up from a 2m swell to horrible, steep 4 metre or more waves. Angela did a great job not getting taken out by them, while being distracted by pilot whales, but eventually one wave got her and we did a fairly spectacular broach, with Russell finding himself lying down on the side of the boat, above the pot of food. Our gimbled stove did an incredible job though, and not a drop of dinner was spilt, although a few other things managed to catapult themselves across the boat. Angela got the boat back under control and then not long after decided it would be a good idea if Russell took over. Meanwhile, Russell was trying to stuff some food down his throat while trying to not look too concerned at the size of the waves he could see rearing up behind Angela…
When Russell did take over, it was scary but manageable, and we saw over 13 knots down a wave before putting everything away. From here it got scary. Looking around, there were full lips breaking like surfable waves, not crumbling white water on top of swell like we were used to. Trying not to imagine what one of those lips would do to the boat, we headed further out to sea to try and get further away from the shelf that was causing it. No way we were going to try to cross in to Farsund, so it was either around Lindesnes if we could, or Denmark if not…Interestingly, there were still a few yachts around us, one had gone further out than us, and one inside the shelf. Both masts were moving violently, so it seemed nowhere really was good…
It’s hard to describe what it felt like to be picked up by a wave so steep that it seemed like the bow of the yacht was pointing straight down, and that awful pause that feels like forever, hanging 5ish metres in the air, then accelerating down the monster, pushing a bow wave that reached as high as our boom. Or having one of those waves break a metre behind us and swallow the stern of the yacht. We don’t know what our top speed was, but it sure as hell was over 13 knots! To her credit, our little yacht handled it stunningly well, once up and surfing, she was a dream to steer, and the only times Russell broached was when he didn’t catch a wave coming from a different angle in time.
Anyway, we finally got out of the horrible sea state and the wind also backed off a bit. It was still rough and windy, but it felt like child’s play compared to the last hour of sailing…the last yacht we were in touch with had come in line behind us while we were in the worst of it, and then had virtually stopped after a while which was incredibly odd, but we figured we had just managed to get out of whatever current was causing the madness, and they were still in it.
It was still a few hours to Lindesnes, and with it getting dark we really hoped the weather would keep easing off, as this was not going to be fun in the dark. It was a stunning sunset with a super bright moon, and thankfully, as we approached Lindesnes light, the weather did die and we could relax. The wind died altogether as we got around the point, and so we ended up motoring the last hour in the dark into Båly harbour. We are so thankful for how easy the navigation lights are at night in Norway. Coming into a new, complicated harbour in pitch black isn’t always easy, and especially after a long, stressful sail. Thankful for a safe dock and nothing badly broken on the yacht, we collapsed for a well deserved sleep after a 16 hour day and almost 100Nm.Les mer
Small Hops in Sunny Days
24.–28. aug., Norge ⋅ ☀️ 20 °C
No sleep in for us in Båly since Russell had a job interview to do and needed some time and caffeine in order to look alive. But it was a beautiful sunny day which is always a good start!
While Russell was interviewing Angela got chatting with an older Norwegian guy sailing to Bergen who had lost his engine the day before and had a wee argument with the rocks… luckily not much damage though.
On our walk to the supermarket we were shocked at how different it was here to the west coast. It felt like we had ended up in a different country! Everything was incredibly dry - it was evident they had a much different summer down here.
There was a canal going through the town, or more like residential area, and every house seemed to have their own boat house attached instead of a garage. Cute place, but we saw few people and it almost seemed like a village just for show.
We left Båly late in the day and a made short hop to an anchorage for the night. A pretty anchorage between some islands and an early night to catch up on some sleep.
The next day was a day of going straight into the wind, so we decided it was a motoring day, but a short day. We threaded our way between islands and through small channels, appreciating that we had yet another sunny day.
We stopped in a very popular bay with a relatively tight entrance, and decided to try out tying up straight to the rocks. It took us a little while to figure out where we were going to sit well and where the bolts were we could tie up to, but for our first time tying to the rocks I think we did pretty well! The Norwegians who came in after us made it look easier for sure.
We rewarded our good work with a beer in the sun and it was so warm we went for a swim! Our first swim for over a month. This felt like being on holiday again and we wondered if we would have gotten bored if we had a proper summer…
Unfortunately, the rocks we tied to blocked our morning sunshine, so we had to have coffee on top of the rocks. A new perspective of our boat, looking down on it. I hadn’t seen what the top of our mast looked like before!
A little bit of rock climbing around the island and perving on the yachts along from us (we figured out one of them was over 1000 times more expensive than ours…) before going back to our now sunny boat for breakfast and get ready to move again.
We had planned to go in to Kristiansand, mostly to pick up a new clutch cone for our gearbox, however the guy hadn’t gotten around to looking at it yet or ordering it, so we skipped it entirely and anchored in a not so sheltered but quiet bay next to a potential mushroom forest. Unfortunately it did not end up being a mushroom forest.
From here in to Lillesand, there was a small channel called the Blindleia, between the mainland and many little islands that we could pass through, which was recommended by the Norwegian man mentioned earlier. It was a great sightseeing channel, many cute cabins and communities along the water, and still everything so dry… and the trees already had their autumn colours! What feels like summer to us is already autumn here. Some of the passages in the channel were also hilariously tight, barely wide enough for our yacht, and watching the bottom as we went through we really had to trust the charts!
Arriving in Lillesand we went straight for the Gelateria (of course).Les mer
Life’s Easy When the Weather Behaves
28. aug.–1. sep., Norge ⋅ 🌧 18 °C
We stayed for two nights in Lillesand, waiting out a storm and using the stormy weather to have shore power so Russell could work on the project he was given as part of the interviewing process.
From Lillesand, we had a few days to get north to Sandefjord, where the company Russell was interviewing for was based. Conveniently on the way, he agreed to stop in to have the next interview in person. That gave us enough time to work our way up the coast without too much stress to go far each day. The weather was being very kind, with sunny days and reasonable winds forecast. When we set off from Lillesand though, it was quite grey and windy, so we were concerned the forecast was lying again. But nothing terrible materialised, and we had a pretty nice sail downwind for an easy 38Nm sail to Lyngøya. There was a bit of a swell so it wasn’t the most comfortable going, and only having a main to sail with now is quite a handicap, but it was still nice to be going downwind, with the only real excitement coming when we turned to make the entrance between the islands. Luckily the swell was easy to manage coming into the gap, and it was beautifully calm when through. Unfortunately it was a weekend, so the Pub owned dock we were aiming for was full, so we continued along a bit further to a very cute, fully enclosed bay to anchor in close by. This was guarded by a very narrow entrance with a charted rock right in the middle, so some very careful steering was involved to get in without touching any rocks…luckily, we have had some practice at this now. The rock was not spotted, but also not hit.
The next day we were off again, heading to an area where we had many options, as we weren’t sure how far we would make it with the lower wind forecast and our slow sailing speed now. It turned into a really lovely sail, mostly in the open, but then we found some respite from the swell behind a long flat island - supposedly good for kitesurfing, but not this time. Good thing we had respite from the swell, as the long rolling swell seemed to be getting Angela a wee bit sea sick, much to her annoyance. Some fish caught for lunch, and some fun once again sailing between tiny rocks like some sort of slalom race passed the time until we made it to a beautiful bay at Åbyelva. Here we were treated to a stunning sunset, almost fish for dinner (it got off the line before we could get it on board) and once again, a beautiful calm bay. We were really starting to remember why people enjoy boating as a relaxing past time…
The next morning, a fruitless hunt for mushrooms, but a nice walk in the forest was had, and then we set off for a short sail to a little rocky island with a lighthouse on it. This was a painfully slow sail, so we decided we really needed to fix our Genoa, but sail tape was needed first. We at least caught some more mackerel for dinner, and as we came to our first anchorage choice on the island, realised there was still too much movement in the water for us to tie to the rocks with our tiny fenders, so we decided to check out the other side that had a pretty narrow entrance and was open to the swell which was not nothing. The comments we had read about it say the locals know that the entrance is a lot more relaxed than it looks. We aren’t locals, so it looked pretty fucking scary to us. But once again, trust the charts, trust the boat and trust ourselves, we decided to give it a try. The locals were mostly right, and it wasn’t quite as scary as it looked, and dead calm once we were through the entrance. What we were greeted with was one of the coolest spots we’ve been the whole trip, with a tiny settlement next to the lighthouse, and bolts in the rocks to tie to. So once we were all tied up, we had a wine on the rocks watching the sun, and after dinner explored the island a little. This meant some rock climbing of course.
The next morning we had a stunning coffee in the sun watching our yacht tied up to the rocks (our yacht wasn’t in the sun so we paddled to the other side of the bay to drink our coffee) and then an explore of the settlement and lighthouse. The settlement is mainly just a tourist destination now and you can stay the night in some of the houses, so we felt like we were exploring a ghost town a little bit. It was time to say goodbye to the little island though and head to Sandefjord. We ended up motoring the whole way as there was no wind, but the sun was shining and all was well.Les mer
Off to Sweden!
1.–4. sep., Sverige ⋅ ☁️ 19 °C
Sandefjord turned out to be quite a nice town, and we had a bit of an explore in case we did end up living here. It’s a bit of a tourist town, with a very strong whaling history which was interesting to read about. While Russell went for his interview, Angela went to Biltema to try and get them to replace our funky battery, and some other stores to get some maintenance bits we needed. This proved harder than anticipated, and would have required giving the battery to them for a week while they tested it, so we decided it was a later problem. Once Russell was back, we chilled out for a while in the sun on the dock, with the aim to head out of the fjord a little in the afternoon. The afternoon was so lovely, and we were both tired, so we decided to have a bit of luxury and stay an extra night at the marina. Turned out that since it was now September, it was off season and they didn’t have a payment system set up, so we got a free night!
We set off the next morning for an easy 30Nm sail to Sweden! Crossing the border would mean that we had now technically sailed the entire length of Norways coast. Pretty crazy. First we had to get there though, and with a lighter breeze than forecast, it was painful sailing on just the main. So much so that Russell got sick of it and dropped the Genoa to tape and stitch it back together on the go. After an hour or so of surgery, we hoisted the Genoa and we were back to full speed! We had a lovely, easy sail in the sun (although the rolling swell was still doing funky things to Angela’s stomach), and as we approached the Swedish border, we put our courtesy flag up, poured some scotch, and aimed at one of the yellow buoys marking the border. It was a very weird feeling, and a bit hard to comprehend that we actually made it to Sweden. This wasn’t quite the end for us though - we still had to get the yacht to Oslo! We found a cute bay to stay in tucked away amongst a bunch of islands, but unfortunately it rained the whole time, and there were no fish, mushrooms and very few berries to be had, so Angela decided she didn’t like Sweden. On our little walk we did see a deer wandering through the bush though. When we left our little bay the next day and sailed back across the border into Norway, we decided we should probably give Sweden a better chance than just our one night, but not just yet. For now, the time had come to make our way up the Oslo fjord, toward our final destination of Oslo. We only went a few nautical miles up it, wanting to stop at a really cool looking island, but since it was a Friday night, this was already full of boats, so we went a bit further to a quiet little bay with a buoy we could pick up. We spent the rest of the evening watching a train of yachts heading past to a regatta, judging the tackiness of their names as they went past.Les mer
The End
5.–7. sep., Norge ⋅ ☀️ 14 °C
Writing that title actually made me a little emotional. After 5 months of one hell of a sailing adventure, here we are.
But, I’m getting ahead of myself. As we made our way up the Oslo fjord, there was one last friend to meet up with. Anežka worked in Kirkenes with the sled dogs while we were there, and she also helped us out a lot getting the boat ready after we bought it over the winter. She was also there for our first ever test sail with the yacht, so it was only fitting that she join for one of the last. We picked her up just north of Tønsberg, and headed to an island a bit north with a lovely beach. We yarned, went for an explore, and then went for a swim after a beer in the sun. A far cry from our first sail, dodging ice bergs and trying not to use the engine too much to save our dodgy impeller… Unfortunately, there was a bit of swell coming into the bay which was making Anežka feel a bit ill. So we upped anchor and headed for a more sheltered spot near Horten. This turned out to be a great idea, as we had a beautiful view of the setting sun. We ended up coming into a new, complex bay as the last light of day was disappearing, but being as calm as a lake, it was perfect. In the morning Anežka went for a swim while pancakes were made, and after pancakes and a game of Catan in the sun (our first game outside the whole trip), it was so hot we all went for a swim! We needed to make a bit more ground up the Oslo fjord though, so we headed off, with Anežka having a go at pulling up our stupidly heavy anchor, and went to Holmestrand to drop Anežka off. After saying goodbye, we hooked into the new breeze and made our way to Sandspollen, making our way through a weird gap in an old sunken wall crossing part of the main fjord. The wall is only 1m deep, and the only markings for it are a couple of small lateral marks in the corner to signify the gap. A whole lot of markings on the chart though. We imagine this probably gets hit a lot… When we got into Sandspollen, it was nice to be able to find shelter from the wind as it was blowing pretty well now. It’s lovely to have anchorages behave again, and a bay that should be sheltered from a certain wind direction, is in fact, sheltered from that direction.
The next day dawned grey and calm, we expected to have a decent breeze to blow us into Oslo, but we had to start off motoring. After a bit it did fill in, and we had a lovely downwind sail. It was very surreal sailing into Oslo, passing all the points we passed coming in on the ferry in November last year, in relatively similar weather. I remember looking at all the ferries and traffic on the water back then thinking that sailing through here wouldn’t be any fun, and now here we were, sailing our yacht into the heart of Oslo…The ferries weren’t any more of an issue than they had been the rest of the coast though, and we celebrated the milestone of making it to Oslo by having a scotch while watching the city skyline get bigger and bigger as we sailed toward it. Coming into the marina, stepping off the boat and being in the centre of Oslo was a very strange feeling, and while we were super stoked that we had made it all the way here, it was a very bittersweet moment knowing that that was the end of our adventure.
A young couple are planning to buy our yacht now, so we plan to spend a week doing some repairs and maintenance, and then we will be standing on the dock with all our gear, waving goodbye to our lovely, crazy, quirky little yacht.
There’s too many moments that took our breath away to think of and too many new experiences to count, my vocabulary isn’t good enough to sum up what an adventure this has been, but we are incredibly happy that we’ve kept this diary/blog to at least record some of the madness that the last 5 months entailed.
Tusen takk Norge. ~2500Nm and 5 months. That was one hell of an adventure.Les mer
ReisendeWhat an extraordinary five months and one hell of an achievement. I loved the chance step inside your adventure for a tiny part of it. “The End” of this chapter, but very curious to see what comes next. ❤️
ReisendeCongratulations on achieving your goal. I'm totally in awe of what you have done and my breakfast time will not be the same without your latest adventure to read about! Waiting for the next episode!
ReisendeKia Ora Lisa!!