SIRENA IV 2018

The wind howled and the boat bounced all night, and in the morning it was still blowing though the rain had stopped. Our flag halyard snapped in the wind and the Danish courtesy flag landed in the cockpit, which is better than overboard! Outside the harbour the waves were still big with lots of white so despite the forecast for it to ease, and most boats leaving, we took the risk-averse decision to go tomorrow. We like Bagenkop a lot and it's our last bit of Denmark. When we reach Heiligenhafen in Germany tomorrow, in a sense the trip ends and the work starts to prep the boat for winter. It's a short hop from there to Fehmarn where she is lifted out ... in 5 days time. We went for a walk through Bagenkop, which does not take long, and out into the countryside. The sun came out. We found a Loppe Marked - literally a flea market, actually more like a garage sale - that we had not seen before - pic. Later we saw a display of old water pumps and pails - pic - great for th

Still in Bagenkop. Been raining cats and dogs for hours. Big winds are rocking the boat on her moorings as we sit here drinking hot coffee and making to-do lists for when we get back to Germany and lift her out.  This place attracts beautiful tall ships. There's a couple of long pontoons where they can berth. See pic of two of them, one departing in the background. It's been interesting to watch their manoeuvres close-up. We were rapt the other day, to see one huge tall ship sailing out of the harbour silently,  on just one square sail and no motor. That takes guts.  The rain has gone on so hard and so long that instead of seeing tanned people in shorts, all you see are bedraggled forms in full waterproofs, hoods up, like dayglo monks. Yesterday's swim in the sun seems like an age away. 

We stayed in Bagenkop because we wanted to go to the Cold War museum 'Langelandfortet'. The Harbourmaster provided free bicycles, and we wobbled and puffed the 3km there and back - Denmark is not all flat!  The museum is actually the whole enormous site on top of a hill which commands two out of the three narrow exits from the Baltic. It has multiple gun emplacements, control room and ammunition bunkers all perfectly preserved. There is a second 'fort' that commands the third Baltic exit at Stevns Klint, very close to where we left the boat in June. This site also has a minesweeper built in 1941 that was in service for 34 years, a MiG-23 MF Warsaw Pact jet fighter purchased from Poland, the last Danish submarine and a 75" section of the Berlin Wall. There was a fair amount of English on the walls and it gave a very detailed and chilling reminder of the cold war period. The lady at the ticket office said, 'you'll need a couple of hours." We spent 4 hour

At last we left lovely Aeroskobing today and with a westerly wind, we were soon sailing on the foresail only. There was a series of narrow channels marked with red and green buoys to negotiate, to zig zag our way across the shallow seas between the islands. We both love the actual sailing with sails, as opposed to just motoring. See the smile on Nic's face. Along the way we met a Dutch tall ship. We only put the motor on once, to beat through a short section directly into the wind. It was a sweet sail , although getting towards our target, Bagenkop, it got very bumpy and rolly. There wasn't much wind, but the waves had come a long way and they knocked the boat hard. We passed through Bagenkop briefly last year. Looks like we are the only ones sporting a British ensign. The place is attractive enough and it has an ice cream shop. Right now that's what we are focussed on!

Ano day at Aeroskobing. The wind howled and the rain beat down. We hunkered and both did some writing. Nic submitted some flash fiction to a project at Uni of Greenwich, Lesley submitted a programme script to world service about the disappearance of cash. We were invited for drinks by Jane and Steve in their rather splendid Nordship 43 - a very pleasant hour spent swapping stories and experiences. No pics today, 

After getting up late and doing the food shopping, we mooched around delightful Aeroskobing - can't have too much of this place. The inside pics are from an original 1700s house furnished by sculptor Gunnar Hammerich (1893-1977); it is stuffed with his collection of antiques, including 3,000 Dutch tiles.  It just happens that we have chosen the w/e when possibly the largest German sailing regatta of the year spends the night in Aeroskobing. It's an annual event, they only race about 21 miles from Kappeln in Germany. The Old Harbour is reserved for them - over a hundred yachts and 1,000 participants ... and a LOT of beer. It is truly an amazing sight. This harbour, as with so many, used to be for fishing boats and there's a common saying along the lines of 'there were so many boats you could walk across the middle of the harbour'. The well-heeled Germans have managed to create the modern day equivalent!  Other than that, the rain comes and goes a

This morning we welcomed Jorgen and Nicola on board who (until last year) owned another Nicholson 35, Andromeda. Since there were only 225 of these strong and  beautiful yachts ever built, there is a strange kind of bond between Nic owners. We found plenty to talk about. Jorgen told us about the massive German yacht rally that was dispersing this morning. It's held by the shipping industry and apparently it's a networking opportunity bar none for the largest German companies and rival managers at various levels- but the man who started it 30 years ago, shipping magnate Peter Gast died very recently.  After waving goodbye to our guests, we got back on the free island bus to go to the north of Aero to Sobygaard, a moated manor house. We were the only visitors. It was peaceful and quaint. (See pics) And it had an exhibition recounting the large number of traditional Aero schooners which had come to grief in foreign parts, (including Ireland) and the sad stories of their lost Danis

Having four days to spend on the beautiful Danish island of Aero, we decided to make the most of the free bus transport. We figured we could take a bus from Marstal (which runs twice daily on just two days a week) to the tiny village of Ommel which has two harbours. The tourist guide was overflowing in its praise. Said bus (minibus) was late. The driver looked shocked to see us. We were the only passengers. The next bus back would be 3 hours hence. Rain was forecast. At least we had checked online that there was a cafe. Once the minibus dropped us, we made for the cafe through silent streets. We found the owners outside, who said they had run out of food after a big party,  but we could maybe get a hot drink later. We set off for the northern harbour past a farm with proper old-style milk churns (see pic). The harbour proved to be minute and very sleepy. (See pic) We found a bench out of the wind and ate a yoghurt bar and watched the grey sea beyond. Still two hours to go. We trudged b

Last night the Danish Tall Ship 'Fylla' tied up near us (though not too near, thankfully). Built in 1922, she worked as a cargo ship in Greenland for decades. Now she is a training ship for young people and available for charter. As you can see, we had a nice sunset hence the arty pics, including the moon rising behind the lighthouse. It was such a quiet, balmy evening that we ate dinner in the cockpit, which is quite unusual. Then we were troubled by odd knocking noises outside. After considerable investigation we realised it was the stern warps creaking - they were under severe tension because the water level had risen and they were not sliding on the weathered old mooring poles. A lot of these island Harbours have quite poor fittings for tying up. We've noticed that there is often a water level change across perhaps 5-6 hours of up to half a metre - not sure whether it's the wind effect or tiny tides. Also the currents don't seem always to be logical. The Baltic

Today we tasted the worst and best of downwind sailing, that is, sailing with the wind right behind us.  We were expecting a warm southerly wind and that made us hum ' Blow the Wind Southerly' as we trekked to the showers in the morning. We were headed north to the top of the thin island called Langeland and part way down the west side.  First we had to extricate ourselves from the box berth. The night before, a giant German yacht had barged in beside us even though one of the berthing poles was missing which meant it might lean on us dangerously if something went wrong. We were discomfited, but asked them to change their ropes around so their enormous ropes were not looped over our little ones at the moment of leaving. This monster made Sirena IV look like a minnow. (see pic)  In the event, leaving the harbour proved pretty straightforward. We imnediately began to sail using just the foresail or genoa, and we didn't even let all of it out.  That moment of switching off the

Industrial Bandholm was rather nice and very peaceful. So as we left at our usual 0830 this morning we thought 'oh, good, the forecast NW wind is v gentle today.' But no, once out from the land it blew hard at us again. Whichever version of West we head, that's exactly where the wind comes from. Never mind, we are a motorboat for now.  There's a small island just outside Bandholm with birds on every branch of every tree. (Pic) Are they vultures? Is this Africa? No they are cormorants - a most unusual sight. Today's 6 hour passage was picturesque at times followed by some uneventful open water. The sun shone but there is a real chill in the air. We passed many wind turbines. In Maribo y'day we got talking in a cafe to two young Englishmen who work on building and maintaining the turbines. They said what a great job it was, 6 months work then 6 months off and they can work anywhere in the world. I suppose we could call them wind-riggers, they are the new oil-rigge

Strong winds made us resolve to stay in Bandholm on the island of Lolland for an extra night and get some jobs done. But there were other possibilities- a ferry trip to a small island or a bus trip to the nearby town of Maribo.  The clouds looked threatening so we opted for the place with most shelter...the town. We paid a fiver to go in the local museum, partly because the tourist authority lady painted such a glowing picture of it in perfect English. We saw furniture, a collection of early Danish toys and Danish winter wear including some Victorian woolly handknitted socks (see pics). The socks look very similar to some Lesley bought in a Genbrug or charity shop shortly after. Next was a very breezy walk by one of several fine lakes in the town. There is a population of sea eagles around there somewhere, but the boat trips to spot them don't go on a Monday. As the tourist woman said apologetically ' Monday is not a good day.' Then we dropped into Lolland's own cathedr

In Kalvehave where we were last night there were hundreds and hundreds of swallows dipping and diving, tweeting away, lining up on the boats and warps and young ones tweeting from their muddy nests under all the eaves. Yes we got a bit of poo on the foredeck but they are forgiven because they're so sweet. Todays passage was a 7 hour motor into F4 wind and a stream of up to 1.5kn created by that wind, as we wound our slow way along narrow shallow channels and under 3 bridges between islands. You can't draw lines on the chart for this, you just follow the buoys. So we resorted to ticking the buoys on the chart as we passed them, just in case the electronics died - good practice for the Stockholm archipelago next year where this technique is apparently essential.  The shoreline looks very pretty and rural.   Why struggle west into the wind you might ask - surely in the Baltic you go with it? Well we have to go west at some point so it's better to do it through the comparativel

We departed Rodvig (for a second time) into a day of blue skies and strong south westerly winds which whipped froth on the tops of waves. Sadly the wind was in our teeth as we ploughed south into the bay until we reached the really shallow stuff you have to traverse to get into the small port of Kalvehave. And here we began to feel we were back on the English east coast, motoring carefully between red and green buoys which marked the safe channel.  The lowest depth under the keel was 0.9 meters or about 3 feet. We had seen worse in the Netherlands. For a good part of the journey we followed a beautiful traditional wooden boat (see pic) which we had first spotted in Helsingor. We felt very kindly disposed to it, because on board were a young couple and their small baby who was held in a kind of bouncer suspended from the wooden boom. His stroller was perched perilously on deck.  After two hours of buoy- hopping we finally arrived in the sleepy former fishing harbour. There are swallows

After our 'hardly left the house' day yesterday, we were up early and keen to be off ... well, one of us anyway. Malmo is just north of the famous Oresund Bridge (that features in The Bridge scandi noir series - yes I know we go on about it but this is the last time, honest). So we passed under it by 0930. It really is a thing of curvey beauty. You would not think from the pic that the clearance is more than twice our mast height. Then 25 miles in a straight line back to Rodvig, scene of The Accident. Only not straight because we had to avoid a variety of ships. This completes our tour around The Sound between Denmark and Sweden. Now we'll be back to Danish islands. At Rodvig we were able to go alongside, thus avoiding the jump off the bow - which we have been doing ... very carefully ... but it's nice to avoid it in this particular harbour. One of today's tasks en route was a bit of de-spidering. There's always been a few living in the deck fittings (not inside

Another day, another change of plan. Strong southerly winds would have been tough on us as we beat into them going South West to Rodvig, and reluctantly we decided to err on the safe side as Nic is still not 100% in terms of strength. The trip is off until tomorrow when the winds are kinder. Today became a writing day. Nic is submitting some flash fiction for a Greenwich University project. Lesley worked on her own poetry, fired by the fact she's signed up for a course with Jacqueline Saphra (the TS Eliot prize shortlistee) So a very quiet day on the boat/library. A few other jobs were done. All with the constant purr of traffic on the massive Oresund bridge in the background, the 'Bridge' which links Denmark and Sweden and which starred in the TV series we loved. The sound won't stop us sleeping. But ducks might. Last night Lesley was suddenly awoken by a loud 'quack quack'. The bird must have been nibbling weed at the edge of the boat and shouted its ducky hea

We really enjoyed our extra day in Helsingor - if you accept the inevitable tourism, it is a delightful place. This morning we motored east across the TSS (Traffic Separation Scheme - watery motorway) dodging tankers and ferries then turned south back down the other side of the Sound for Malmo. The wind was indeed in the west but died away so again a little sailing and more motoring. This was a 6 hour passage and as usual the off-watch person got much reading done, as well as eating, dozing, and researching the next marina to figure out the optimal position to look for an available berth (ie not a half-mile trudge to the facilities!) After some debate about chancing the city centre harbour we remembered it is the Malmo Festival this week, so caution prevailed and we are in the Limhamn South marina, 3miles from the city centre - another huge one, and we had no trouble finding a guest berth. The Swedes'  holidays finish next w/e but with the Danes back to school and the Germans headi

A quote from Hamlet: ' But what is your affair in Elsinore? We'll teach you to drink deep 'ere you depart.' Our affair in Elsinore lasted longer than expected. And we drank deep of lemonade on a surprisingly hot morning.  We were ready to head out west on our anti clockwise tour around Sjaelland, when we realised we didn't have the paper charts to do it. We never take the risk of navigating only with the electronic chart plotter- it could spell disaster. You always need the paper chart as backup. Maybe we could buy the charts here, maybe not.  It got us musing, and second thoughts set in. If we headed west we would also be motoring into the teeth of westerly winds - which are set to continue and strengthen. So we dropped the plan and decided we will head for Malmo in Sweden thirty miles away. But there was no hurry, so we decided to take another day in Helsingor and started with a walk through the grounds of Kronborg...known to all as Hamlet's castle, an elegant