2009-07-20 - 24 Rolling home

Finally Neptune showed us mercy and Monday the 20th a weather window materialized with fair southwesterly winds and an almost clear sky. We motored the first few miles south past Bressay and then we sat a south easterly course and hoisted the genacker. I took a well deserved (at least in my opinion) relaxing rest on top of the ding on the fore deck. Life is good again.

Passing the oil rigs again. The guard vessels are making sure that we are keeping a safe distance.

During the first night the wind unfortunately started veered southeast again and increased in the early morning to a small gale. We decided to make a stop over in Egersund and wait until the next day as this was supposed to be temporary, and the wind should veer back to south west again.

After a day and night in Egersund which is a very nice town, with good shopping and cheap tax free diesel, we took off again on Thursday morning. We motored in a south breeze towards Lista and as soon as we passed the lighthouse we could set sail again and continue on a south easterly course. We passed Lindesnäs with a glorious sunset behind us and left the North Sea for Skagerack. The genacker went up again in a light westerly breeze we trotted in to the night.

Kajsa killing time with soducko.

The following morning we made good speed in an increasing south westerly. We were yet again lucky with good wind and this fishing boat seemed to be lucky with the fishing.

The wind increased slowly but surely during the day and reached 20 - 25 knots. It was time for the genacker to come down. We managed to get the main up in full speed down wind. When the main was up the genacker came down behind the main and then the furling genoa came out in full glory. We continued eastwards and passed Skagen doing 7 - 8 knots. When we started out from Egersund we had calculated with two nights at sea but if we continued in this pace we would be make it to Sweden before nightfall. And indeed we did. We just kept racing on and at around 2300 hours we made it in to a completely packed Marstrand. With no marina berths available we decided to drop the anchor just north of Albrechtsunds canal together with two other sailing yachts. We made 3 attempts to get good holding ground as there was a gale warning for the night and following day. That was well spent time because the wind came howling during the night and one of the other boats dragged and was gone in the early morning.

We slept in Saturday mooring and after a late breakfast we left our anchorage and a few hours later we were safely back in our home port Björlanda Kile after 5 fantastic weeks. Thanks to the awkward wind conditions and sometimes lack of wind we had managed to make it to some really remote places. This together with the amazingly good weather the first two weeks had made this Shetland cruise truly memorable. We will definitely come back again and explore more of the islands and then especially the northern parts we never managed to cover this time.

We want to send our special thanks to the friendly people on Shetland. We hope to see you soon again.

2009-07-15 - 20 Waiting in Lerwick

Back in good old Lerwick again. We feel really at home here now. The narrow streets, the boating club, the comradeship among the fellow yachtsmen waiting for fair winds to take us wherever we are heading. We took the opportunity to stock up on supplies from Tesco on the other side of town. We managed to get a lift to the store but had to walk back. The two foldable trolleys we have comes in real handy in such situations. Carrying a week of food and drink supplies for several miles is tough work but stuffed in the trolleys it's nothing but a pleasant walk.

We spent another 5 days in Lerwick waiting for the winds to settle so that we could make a new attempt to head home. We were not alone. The marina was full with boats doing the same thing. It had been a strange summer so far with winds mostly from the east something. Everybody was waiting for a good old westerly.

Socializing with our dutch neighbors. They were sailing their 30 something footer for a 9 week cruise that had taken them from Holland through the Kiele canal to Denmark, Norway and Shetland. They were now heading south back to Holland.

Kajsas work of art or engineering.

Tuesday July 14. First try to get home

Our original plan was to spend a few more day exploring the northern part of Shetland. Such as the island Unst and hopefully make it up all the way to Muckle Flugga. The island that is, not our friends boat. Muckle Flugga is also the northern most light house in the UK. A very isolated but fascinating place on the map. However, the westerly winds forecasted for Friday which we had planned should have taken us home now turned in to be a sever gale on the grib files we downloaded. Not knowing what would come next we decided to take off in a rather light south to southeasterly wind. We sat course as close to Lindesnäs as we could and hoped for the best. However, the wind direction deteriorated and the wind force increased and along with that came the rain. Finely we found ourselves in an east to southeasterly wind force 4 - 5 with a possibility to hit force 6 and the waves were starting to build up and we were heading right in to it and had about 200 miles more to go to nearest land in the east. Every fiber in my body tried to tell me that this was all wrong. I believe the pigeon who rested on our solar panel had the same feeling. After about 50 miles beating against wind and waves with the rain just pouring down on us we decided to give up. We made an almost 180 degree turn back to Lerwick. What a difference! All of a sudden we had a nice "downhill" ride making around 7 knots. Even if the rain continued with some thunderstorms to add to the excitement the comfort on board, both mentally and physical turned from awful to rather nice as I hit the bunk and Mona took the first night watch. Around 5 o'clock on Wednesday morning we were once again safely mored at the Victoria pier in Lerwick outside a dutch yacht. We had completed a 90 mile detour from the Out Skerries to Lerwick in our attempt to get back to Norway. Well, at least going back was nice sailing and it felt good that we made the decision. It's always a mental ordeal to make such decisions when you're out there trying to get somewhere, but when the thought process has started it's normally the right thing to do.