but for the Grace

We started the first leg of our Baltic odyssey on Olton station waiting for a train and we finished it for this year on Sonderborg station! We were on our way to catch a plane home at Copenhagen, via a detour to Roskilde to see the Viking boats and burial site of the Danish Royal family for the past 1000 years. And then onto France for a few days for a family party and finally back to reality!

Olton Station at the start of our journey

Sonderborg Station at the end of our journey

But first things first, lunch! We had a 4 hour train journey ahead of us and something to eat would be a good idea! I dashed to the bakery I had spotted at the top of the street (I have developed an unfailing ability to find bakeries!) and asked if they had any sandwiches and got handed two foil wrapped packets, when I asked what they were I was told very helpfully that they were ‘sandwiches’! And that would be 50 Krone, thank you! Oh well! I wish I had discovered Danish packed lunches before, so much better than messing around with bread rolls and cheese slices!

Once on the train we set about having our picnic and what a fantastic treat we found, a lovely selection of open sandwiches, cheese and fruit bread. It was clearly the thing to have for lunch as everyone else in the carriage was eating the same things!

Crossing the Great Belt bridge on the train

Roskilde was the ancient capital of Denmark, Copenhagen was originally founded as a satellite port on the Oresund for Roskilde by the Bishop of Roskilde and only took over in importance for trading when the Roskilde Fjord silted up. We wanted to go to Roskilde to see the 5 Viking Longships that were excavated from the Fjord in the 1950’s and hopefully have a sail in one.

We stayed at the Danhostel on the dock next to museum – what a fantastic location! Although it was billed as a youth hostel, it was inhabited by middle aged Americans with rucksacks doing Europe, so we fitted in perfectly!

Danhostel Roskilde

Roskilde

A Viking ‘theme park’ has developed around the museum in a sort timber shanty town. The museum is a rather colourless and austere 1960’s concrete building but provides a perfect backdrop for the boats. The boats themselves are a remarkable collection of the different types of boat in common use over 1000 years ago. Some of which are still in use today in the Fjords of Denmark and Sweden. The recovered boats consisted of a large ‘traditional’ longship built in Dublin! A smaller, locally built longship and a fishing boat, a local trading boat and a large ocean going commercial ‘freighter’. When they say large and ocean going it must have taken real courage to cross the North Sea in what was in effect a large open boat! As old and well patched boats they were filled with stones and sunk to form a barrage as part of the defences of Roskilde about 1100 to 1000 years ago.

The ocean going ‘freighter’

The large longship and the trading vessel

The fishing boat

The small warship

The shield rack from the small warship

As part of the museum they have a boatyard where they build traditional boats using the different woods and tools available in the Viking era and it is these boats you can sail. So not having been on a boat for 24 hours we were first in the queue to go for a sail! We ended up rowing our way across the Fjord under the command of a Danish speaking New Zealander.

The boatyard and boats 

Sailing Viking style!

Our boat

The skipper was a hard task master and made us row!

And pull on ropes!

 This was then followed by lunch at the Viking restaurant. I did not realise that the Vikings ate pizza!!

The other significant sight to see was the cathedral. It claims to be the oldest brick built religious building in Europe, although I am sure we have come across this claim somewhere before in our travels! 

The Cathedral 

The Cathedral is in a great setting on the hill 

Each Royal dynasty built an extension on the side of the church in the style of the moment to house their bodies and those of their families. There is medieval chic, renaissance high style, best gothic grim, overblown baroque and so on! This continues today with the current queen that has a very trendy Scandi vibe sarcophagus under construction. 

Best medieval chic tombs!

Renaissance style! 

Baroque bluster!

Puritan plain!

Modern scandi awaits their current queen!

By way of demonstrating how well connected the Danish Royals are, in one of the burials chapels a column has been marked with the heights of various visiting Royal children over the centuries, including Czar Nicholas and Prince Philip!

Visiting Royals see if they measure up here!

 The whole building has a lovely calm feel to it which is slightly spoilt every hour by the clock which emits a tremendous farting wail as a model of St George chops the head off a dragon!

A peaceful place, most of the time!

The end!

Thank you, if you have read my posts I hope you enjoyed them as much as we had being part of them! We are missing Grace and the freedom and challenge of sailing her and cannot wait for next season. This really is the very last blog for this year! If you want to read more, and I hope you do, then look out for the next part of our journey starting in May 2018. This will take us to Sweden, Finland, Russia, Poland and the Baltic States; Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.

Andrew and Anne

17th September 2017

We all felt a bit flat as we left Dyvig that morning. This was going to be last time we would sail Gracie for 7 months, so we were determined to make the most of our last leg to Augustenborg. It will be next May before the weather will be good enough for us to continue our cruise on to Sweden, Finland, Russia, the Baltic States, Poland and Eastern German.

Preparing to leave Dyvig in very light airs 

The wind was really very light, Force 1 to 2 as we sailed through the narrow buoyed channel from Dyvig back into the Stegvig. We were followed by a couple yachts as we headed towards the Als Fjord. I think because of our very shipshape departure out of the berth they thought we knew what we were doing ……a very risky assumption to make! We wanted to sail every moment possible. So we used every trick we had learnt over the past few months to make Grace go and it was very satisfying and enjoyable…..although it took us 8 hours to sail just 15 nm!

How unwise! Following our lead through the Dyvig Channel!

Safely through!

Dodging the ferry in the Als Fjord for the last time 
On reaching Augustenborg, all that was left was to complete the final totals in Grace’s log for our 2017 journey from Chichester:

977 nautical miles.

12.5 degrees East of Longitude travelled.

47 ports of call.

2.7 knots average speed.

364 hours sailing.

187 hours run on the engine.

248 litres of diesel burnt.
Reluctantly I put her log book away in the chart table for this year.

Final logbook totals 

We now had two busy days to prepare Grace ready for handing over to Anders for safe keeping over winter. We commandeered the marina’s washing machine room door key and washed everything including spray dodgers and steering wheel cover! We then threw out every thing we did not wear over the last 3 months and vacuum bagged the rest! This also meant eating everything that would go off or not survive freezing, so we had some slightly unusual food combos! We also decided that wine would not keep so reluctantly that needed to be drunk, which improved things dramatically!

Wine helps!

Anders who runs the boatyard was brilliant, he knew we were winter storage virgins and that I was hugely anxious about having the mast taken down, then having Grace dangled out of the water on a couple straps from his crane and then parked in one of his sheds for 7 months! He was at his most enthusiastic self to reassure me that all would be well. Although my anxiety levels were raised a bit when he decided to show me where the transducer for the speed and echo sounder was, and that he would also demonstrate how to take it out to clean it. Apparently Grace has a particularly good one! This left a hole straight through the hull and in 3 m of water the end result was not to be unexpected…..a plume of sea water 2 ft high in the forward cabin! We both struggled to put the transducer back, it did feel a bit like the little Dutch boy putting his finger in the dyke to save the village and I started wonder how long it takes to sink a yacht with a 3 inch hole in it. With the speed the water was coming in, I guessed it was not going to be very long if we did not get the transducer locked back in to place!

Getting Grace ready for winter meant an engine service and new pre and fine fuel filters. Fortunately there was no evidence of the diesel bug that we had in Chichester, it must have been all the chemical preventer I kept adding to the fuel! Drain and fill with antifreeze the sea water heat exchanger and the toilet. Drain the water system completely, leaving taps and sea cocks open and then draining the water heater – apparently often forgotten and no wonder as it is another perfect opportunity to flood the engine bilge with 30 litres of water! Last but not least, lubricate the auto prop. 

Our auto prop

Although this bit of kit has caused me angst throughout the trip, I decided to keep it when I realised it was a proper Brintons Autoprop and that explained why our fuel consumption was so low, why we can trundle along at 4.5 knots at just 1000 revs in virtually any conditions and why Grace will go so well astern…..with virtually no prop walk, which at times would be of help to spin her round in a tight corner!

Grace waiting at the mast crane 

Grace’s winter home 

Getting her storage cradle ready 

In the boat lift

In her cradle 

Safe in her new home!

We also agreed on rather a long list of things to do before she goes back in the water next spring……Oh well, I have 6 months to earn some cash to keep Grace in the luxury to which she has become accustomed! So we can:

⁃ Replace the sail halyards.

⁃ Fit a whisker pole system to goosewing the genoa down wind (Grace’s Christmas present!……Just what she always wanted!)

⁃ Repair the damage to the bows after our unfortunate incident with a Dutch lock.

⁃ Service the steering gear.

⁃ Polish the scapes out of the hull acquired from visiting 47 different and completely ‘new to us’ moorings!

⁃ Replace the anodes. Different ones are needed in the Baltic to UK waters.

⁃ Antifoul the hull and saildrive. Soft for the hull and a copper free hard on for the saildrive

⁃ Fix the cabin lighting………Not too bad a list I think after a busy season sailing.

16th September 2017

Well what a contrast with yesterday! We woke up to a calm and still morning. This was not what we wanted as we had a long way to go to cross the Little Belt and reach a safe berth for the night! We wanted a decent south westerly breeze. Instead we had a light Force 2 southerly and it was going to be a slow crossing but that is sailing for you!

A new day in Lyo harbour

We left Lyo Bugt on a bearing of between 270 and 285 following the light fluky winds to get as much speed as possible. After about 10 nm miles we reached the north cardinal buoy marking the shipping lane off Als where it passes between the Sondue Stenvon reef and the south cardinal off the Hesteskoen reef. We passed a large blue freighter as we crossed the shipping lane. The wind was now SSW and we sailed on 285 for 5 nm towards the Nordborg lighthouse, then for a further 6 nm on 235 to the mouth of the Als Fjord. It was Saturday and with evening approaching we soon found ourselves in company with other yachts and quite a few dolphins!

The Fyn to Als ferry

Sailing across the Little Belt

Just crossing the Little Belt and making landfall on Als

Sailing towards the Nordborg Light

We held our course for as long as possible to get deep into the Als Fjord, tacking on the 5 metre contour line onto a bearing of 160 for 2 nm before making the turn into the Stegsvig. The Fjord is quite wide but very shallow and it is important to steer towards the White House at what seems to be the end of the Fjord. However this marks the entrance to a well buoyed channel but very narrow channel into Dyvig Fjord. In places the channel is less than 10 metres wide and no more than 2.5 metres deep but opens up into a wide and very pretty and tranquil lake. At the far end is a smart hotel and mooring pontoons. In season, it is normally packed with boats rafted up 4 deep but we found a berth almost at the hotel’s front door!

In the Stegsvig, sailing towards Dyvig

Negotiating the narrow channel to Dyvig

In to Dyvig

The hotel was timber clad and had the feel of an alpine chalet. On the door, a sign proudly proclaimed that it was what looked liked ‘Denmark’s smuggest hotel’. However on translation it turned out to be ‘Denmark’s chicest hotel’. I still prefer my translation! This was our last stop over of our 2017 cruise and we treated ourselves to supper in the ‘smuggest’ restaurant surrounded by stuffed animals made up from various species, it was as if Dr Frankenstein had been practicing his technique in a zoo! All a bit grisly really!

Denmark’s ‘smuggest’ hotel!

The last supper, surrounded by bits of stuffed animals!

15th September 2017

Grace had suffered no ill effects for being abandoned in Svendborg in the gales. All her lines were secure and the fenders had clearly done a good job! The wind had shifted round to the west as we predicted but Grace was still held on to the pontoon by the wind and we were going to have ‘fun’ getting away from the pontoon without drama. We set up a bow spring line to get the stern out and got safely away, going stern first away from the pontoon and out into the fairway. We followed the marked channel under the Svendborg bridge and out towards the island of Skaro to the west cardinal buoy off Vornaes Pynt.

Grace suffered no damage in the storm

Heading out of the Svendborg Sund towards Avernako

We tacked up the channel between Fyn and Avernako passing Skaro and Drejo to port. After about 4 hours we reached our turn point for either Faaborg on Fyn or the island of Lyo. Faaborg would offer better shelter while Lyo has a narrow but straightforward approach but is quite exposed once inside the marina. We chose Lyo as it would save us about 7 nm in the morning by avoiding the need to retrace our steps and we as we had already quite a long leg planned to cross The Little Belt. This would save us almost 2 hours sailing ensuring we could be into Dyvig in daylight.

I noted in the log; ‘Rain ahead, I hope we miss it!’……….No, within about a minute we were in the thick of it! The wind built up rapidly, first 15 then 20 knots as we shortened sail, the rain was driving in our faces as the sky became darker and darker. Then it hit us, 30 knots peaking at 35 knots and we were struggling to to keep Gracie under control as we took more sail in. We ran for cover and sailed toward the calmer water that lay in the lea of Avernako. The wind moderated to around 25 knots as we left the shelter of the island and crossed the gap towards Lyo. We followed the ferry in and were glad to be in the marina. However our relief was short lived as when we went between the mooring posts the bows got caught by the wind and before we could secure the bow lines, Grace got blown back against the posts, 10 metres from the pontoon! A bit embarrassing! This took some jiggling to untangle ourselves from the posts and get the bows securely tied up. This is where bow thrusters would have been a good investment!

Grace safely moored up in Lyo

The wind dropped and it became very still in Lyo Bay.

12th and 13th September 2017

We had escaped the wind but not the rain by going to Copenhagen. Our two day tour of the sights picked up most if not all of the main tourist attractions, which included the first baths since Amsterdam! We also scouted out some great places to moor up in the city if we have time to come back in our 2018 cruise.

The Royal Yacht

Great places to moor up for 2018

So where did we go? Straight off the train and into our first sight to hide from the rain……..

1. The Tivoli, this had the garish feel of a 1960’s Bond movie, with Russian spys chasing us round every corner! It consisted of a strange mixture of gardens, funfairs and absolutely terrifying rides. Walt Disney visited the place many times and was said to have got his inspiration for Disneyland from here! Of course we had to have a go on a ride and went for Odin’s Train, which seemed to be quite tame………but oh no! The flaming thing rattled you out towards the road at breakneck speed not just once but three times. I could hear screaming and begging for it to stop. Later Anne told me that was me! To recover I had to go to the very smart liquorice shop and had a superb liquorice ice cream and their equivalent of a Skipper’s Pipe! 

Hans Christian Andersen looking towards the Tivoli

The Tivoli

2. We then walked round to the Nyhavn, the new harbour which was actually built by Swedish prisoners in the 1660s. It is a very trendy place to drink, watch people and stay dry from the rain showers.

The Nyhavn

3. The Little Mermaid was a spectacular disappointment and I almost missed it as it is so small, perched on the edge of the harbour! I had always wanted to visit Copenhagen because of The Little Mermaid. As a child that broke everything I touched, my Grandmother would only let me play with a stone and brass Little Mermaid souvenir that she had got when she went to Copenhagen in the 1950s. It all felt very risqué to a 6 year old as the mermaid had breasts and no clothes on! I was able to buy the exact same one for just 5 Euros! It was paid for by a brewer, who obviously was nowhere near as successful as the other Copenhagen brewer – Carlsberg who build and stocked a huge art gallery in the city.

The Little Mermaid 

My Little Mermaid!

4. Street food in the old Meat Packers Quarter. It was all a bit basic, especially the urinal in a container but the food itself was excellent if rather alarming prepared! We were clearly hipsters and the oldest people there by about 25 years.

Street food!

5. Our visit to the National Museum was amazing, especially the Iron Age to Viking era stuff on the ground floor. Early Danes seemed to have a penchant for throwing stuff in to the nearest bog. This was good news from an archaeological perspective as everything was beautifully preserved from shoes to clothes.  They were also big into stone axes and clung onto the technology long after the Bronze Age had arrived elsewhere. In fact they loved stone axe heads so much they actually carved mould lines into the heads so they looked like bronze ones!

Stuff from the bog!

Axe heads but the dozen 

The golden horns

More stuff from the bog!

6. Georg Jensen and Royal Copenhagen stores, where we bought a rather stylish barometer for Grace with the collection that work gave me when I left and a present for my Aunt’s birthday.

Grace’s cool barometer 

7. The Raunturn was built by Christian 4th as an observatory. He clearly could not be bothered with stairs so he had it built with a spiral roadway running up to the telescope on the top of the tower. Great for our sore feet and it was at least dry. The centre of the tower was taken as the centre of Danish empire and the point from which all distances were measured.

Christian 4th

Spiral roadway up the tower

The Observatory 

The centre of Denmark 

8. The Christianborg, which is the official Royal State Palace, the Parliament Building and the Central Court. The building only dates from 1907 and was Denmark’s first building to use reinforced concrete. It is the 5th palace on the site as the last 3 burnt down with suspicious regularity. All a bit dodgy and someone should check the insurance!

The foundations of the previous Christianborgs dating back to 1000 AD

1000 year old water pipes

We had completely free reign of the building and could wonder around at will and explore some of the really interesting things they have. One room has a floor made from the salvaged timbers of the Mars, a Danish warship sunk by the Royal Navy at the siege of Copenhagen in 1807. They have a room with a remarkable wall sized painting of the royal families of Denmark, Great Britain, Russia, Greece and Prussia plus a few more minor royals when they were visiting for their annual summer holidays!

The Christianborg

The place to ourselves!

The throne room

The Mars floor

A typical Danish family portrait 

Some great descriptions of the palace!

They also have a room with paintings of the kings of Sweden dating from the time when they were at war with them. The artist gave them all double chins and squinty eyes!

The kitchens were also interesting as the Chef responsible for the royal functions said that they were really easy to cater for as everyone had the same thing at the same time….. so much easier than running a restaurant!

The kitchens

9. The Christianborg Tower, compared with the complete absence of security anywhere else required full airport style belts and shoes off security! The tower was just a resturant and a store room for spare statues but it does have very interesting lifts and great views from the top including of the Oresund Bridge.

Spare statues at the top of the tower 

Posh lift

Less posh lift

The security in the tower took so long that we had to rush for our train and we ended up sitting opposite a drunk who woke up suddenly in a panic as we crossed the Great Belt Bridge, he was convinced that he was on the Oresund Bridge and heading toward Sweden!

10th September 2017

The morning started fine and dry. On checking Windfinder, our meteorological app, the forecast storm was coming in faster than expected. We had a window of 36 hours before the bad weather began, peaking with 54 knot winds on Wednesday/ Thursday morning before blowing itself out on Friday. The hurricanes in the Caribbean were making themselves felt even in Denmark!

With a brisk Force 4 wind blowing from the East it promised to be a long day, with a 38 nm sail to Svendborg but we had to just go for it, otherwise risk being trapped on Omo for the next 5 days with little prospect of escape except by the ferry.

Svendborg was our preferred destination as it put us a day’s sailing closer to Augustenborg and Grace’s winter berth.

Sailing out of Omo

We sailed out of Omo, reaching on a bearing of 325 for 2.5 nm and into the main channel. Omo has a broad, if slightly shallow sweep to the North West which makes access easy into the Great Belt. We then went close hauled onto a bearing of 270 for 8.5 nm, passing the Agerso Flak beacon to starboard until we reached, the Kobberdyh, a 1 nm wide passage through the sandbanks that separate Langland from Fyn and marked by a port and starboard cardinal.

In company with another yacht as we enter the Kobberdyh

As the wind had started to sift towards the South, together with the strong Northerly tidal stream we could barely make 280 and needed to tack over the Vengeance Grund to make it through the Kobberdyh channel and into the Svendborg Sund. All across the Great Belt the wind had picked up and Grace was soon ploughing her way through in an unpleasant short sea.

Once in the Svendborg Sund we were able to tack down south past the Elshove Light, seeking as much shelter as possible from Langeland. However we were barely making 1.5 knots in speed over the ground. It had taken several hours to work our way less than 2 nm down the Sund so as we neared the South Cardinal off Thuro we started the engine and took in the sails to ease the pounding on the rig as Grace fought her way through the short steep waves that are so very characteristic of the Baltic! We had been well reefed so that Grace was sailing comfortably in the strengthening Force 5, but that had brought her speed down so much that we were barely moving against the tidal stream and the motor’s help was essential!

On rounding Thuro point and passing Valdemar’s castle it became very sheltered and we soon had the genoa out, running before the wind towards Svendborg. Once there, we checked out the new marina which is perfectly round but after getting stuck between two mooring posts we concluded that the city marina was a better bet and less crowded with yachts seeking shelter.

In the calm of the Svendborg Sund

Once in we moored up very carefully with double lines all round and eight fenders. Several other yachts had the same idea and over the next few hours as darkness fell we were joined by a number of yachts and motorboats as well as a Danish Navy patrol boat.

Grace well secured and rendered alongside in Svendborg

We had a plan! Anne and I did not fancy staying on board for 3 or 4 days in the torrential rain and gales so we decided to ship out and go and stay in Copenhagen for two nights and enjoy the luxury of a proper bed and a bath!

Developing a plan with the aid of Danish apple cake!

9th September 2017

We’ve been trapped in Nykøbing for 3 days by the bad weather and finally we have a clear patch of two may be three days before we have another 5 days of gales and 50 knot winds. That’s sailing for you, either no wind or too much, it’s the Goldilocks syndrome and never just right.

In the marina we are meeting people who are now making their last dash for home in Germany and Holland. There are no other English yachts here, we have not seen any for weeks. We have certainly gone further than most other people, so it must be time to head west again.

At 0900 we leave Nykøbing in an airless drizzle, visibility is around 5 nm and we are soon feeling a bit cold and damp as we follow the 8 nm channel out to the Guldborg bridge. Feeling a bit grim and determined not to hang about for the bridge to open. I do not stop or slow down, Grace is motoring towards the bridge at 4.5 knots and an easy 1000 revs. It is going to be who blinks first, the bridge keeper or me! It is him! With just 200m to go we get the red lights and the bridge opens and we are through into the Smålandsfarvandet.

Leaving Guldborg bridge behind us!

Our original destination was going to be Vejro, a small private island with nice moorings however we are at the turn point for the island’s harbour by 1300 and we have made such good progress that we decide to press on to Omo. So changing on a bearing of 300 for 14 nm we reach the safe water mark at the head of the Omo Sund. The wind has dropped and the rain set in! Round here they say that there is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing…..I am not so sure, we are both in our Mustos and Hifits and we are soaking wet but are committed to doing the next 3 or 4 hours!

Passing the North Cardinal off Femo and pretending to enjoy the rain

Once in the Sund we change onto a bearing of 150 to the second green buoy. Reassuringly a ferry appears from nowhere and heads straight towards us….so we must be on the right track! The final approach to the island is nice and easy, even in bad weather providing you do not turn for the harbour until the bearing on the ferry dock reaches at least 240 to make sure you avoid the surrounding reef.

In the Sund and enjoying the weather!

Omo is on the edge of the Great Belt which means we can go either north to Nyborg or south to Svendborg depending upon the wind direction, giving us an extra day in hand to beat the gale. It has been a long 32 nm hop.

Omo is a relief, we moor up in an almost empty marina and the prospect of a hot shower is glorious! The only other boat there is a very large German yacht moored alongside the main quay. It was called the Prussian Eagle. A bit of an insensitive name for this part of Denmark remembering 1864 and German / Danish history!

Grace, almost alone in Omo!

It’s definitely been a wet sail! Every pair of gloves has been used!

As we are secure, we go to take the lines of a singlehanded sailor who has just arrived near us. We are watching from the pontoon as it all starts to go wrong for him. How well we know that feeling! When Anne got to him he was hugging the mooring post saying he was just glad to be in and out of the rain and was not going to let go! He clearly had a tough trip up from Svendborg! Box moorings are not easy on your own and he was being blown side on to the mooring stern posts and was stuck. After much coaxing he was persuaded to let go of the post and throw us a line so we could haul him in like a big wet fish! Unfortunately in his hurry to he forgot to secure his end to the boat and he drifted away again! Eventually after some more toing and froing we got him in. He was clearly happy to be on dry land and then followed us round like a lost sheep asking how it all worked!

The sun setting over the the Great Belt bridge. Looking forward to better weather tomorrow!

8th September

We reached Nykobing on Wednesday in good time to get Lorna on to her train. Exploring Nykøbing did not take very long, the town’s main claim to fame was that in 1716 Peter the Great of Russia stayed there on his way to support the Danish king in some battle or other, however rather than have a Danish ‘all you can eat’ banquet with the king in the Slot he preferred to go to the local coaching inn. Then some 200 years later in 1898 when the place was in sore need of refurbished, the very enterprising owner of the same said inn wrote to Czar Nicholas with the story about how the Czar’s illustrious ancestor stayed there and asked for cash to renovate it. In return the hotel would be called the Czar’s House. The Czar fell for this and promptly stumped up the cash to get it rebuilt! It also now claims to be Denmark’s oldest restaurant…….I wonder who they will ask to pay for the next repairs! The lunchtime traditional open sandwiches were superb!

The Czar’s House

Great for a lunchtime sandwich

Umbrellas in the street, not a good sign!

Nykøbing town square with a bear statue in honour of the town’s connection to Russia.

Other than that and a comfortable berth in a storm Nykobing had very little else to offer except perhaps an excellent laundrette where I spent a wet and windy afternoon in the warm watching socks go round!

At least it was warm and dry!

We beat the next band of bad weather, however the forecasts were just getting worse. The weather felt distinctly autumnal now and our our long term weather forecasts indicated a series of storms and bad weather ahead. If we could get away early on Thursday then we might make it to Copenhagen and still have time to get back to Augustenborg and Grace’s winter quarters.

The expected bad weather with driving rain and 30 knot winds struck Wednesday night rattling Grace about a bit. We were able to find a new water leak through the steering position and from a portside saloon window which added to the overall dampness! The wind did not die out until around midday on Thursday, so helping with our decision whether to push on to Copenhagen or not! What was worse was that the weather forecast had predicted terrible weather for the week ahead, with 54 knot winds for Thursday. We needed to make sure we missed that!

The weather had changed with lots of high winds and rain to look forward to! Reluctantly we realised that after travelling east for 12 degrees of longitude and almost 900 nm Grace’s 2017 cruise was at an end! We still needed to get to Augustenborg and Grace’s winter storage location. That meant crossing the Great and Little Belts, around 5 good days of sailing. First off we needed to develop a passage plan, so off to the bar! Our ideal berth to ride out the coming storm would be Svendborg, it is across the Great Belt but has a good train link to Copenhagen and is tucked away in a natural bowl formed from the surrounding hills so we knew we could leave Grace in safety. We just needed a break of 3 good enough days to make it; first to Vejro, then Omo and finally on to Svendborg.

Serious planning in progress!

5th September 2017

Lorna’s time with us was coming to an end. We needed to get her back on the train to Copenhagen airport. So we had to find a mainline station near a port, oh and in the right direction for the expected wind. Not as easy as it sounds! The nearest towns with stations were either Korsør, good for an easterly wind or Nykobing for a westerly.

Leaving Karrebaeksminde in the sunshine

We also had a window in the weather of 36 hours before a nasty storm from came in. We left the marina at Karrebaeksminde at 0945 in a light F2 westerly, so Nykobing it was! The sea state was very calm and perfect for the first leg of our journey to Guldborg or if we made really good progress, then up the Guldborg Sund to Nykobing itself.

Passing Femo

Our first leg was 5.5 nm to the south cardinal on the end of Knudshoved that marked the gap between the shoals that stretch towards Verjo. We then changed onto a bearing of first 170 and then 148 for six nautical miles to avoid the reefs that run between the north cardinal off Femo and the south cardinal off Vesterskor. Then we sailed on a bearing of 340 to pass between the north cardinal that marked the Vigso Flak and the red buoy that was at the start of dredged channel that twists its way to the Guldborg Bridge.

The start of the channel into Guldborg Fjord

Guldborg has an opening bascule bridge which you have to negotiate to reach the marina. Opening bridges and the messing around while they open holds no fears now after the confined spaces of the Dutch canals! We approached it slowly, flying our “N” flag to request the bridge to open. Nothing happened! No lights, bells or whistles to signify that it might open for us! I called up the bridge on the VHF on channel 12 and still nothing! There was no sign of life! We were a bit stuck, we needed to pass through the bridge to get to our planned stop for the night at Guldborg and it was getting too late in the day to go to our reserve port on Femo. This required a daylight entry to navigate its unlit and difficult approach. Suddenly after making another circuit in the approach to the bridge, a small door opened and an arm waved furiously at us to come forward. Edging closer and closer to the bridge and still nothing seemed to happen. Then when we were almost in touching distance, one of the spans slowly opened and we passed through, our rigging just a few feet away from the still opening bridge.

Finally it opened!

We had made such good progress that we decided to carry on up the Sund for a further 8 nm to Nykobing while the weather still held. It was very calm and we motored up the channel, which in places around the motorway Naviduct was only 10 metres wide. The only boat we passed on the way had its sails beautifully set to gently glide up the Sund, its side rails draped in washing, drying in the sunshine. We could see no signs of anyone at the tiller, just feet propped up on the side bench and a hat peeping out of the top of a book. It all looked very relaxed!

Gently sailing up the Gulborg Sund

Eventually we found the marina, making a sharp turn to port at the red buoy opposite the entrance. This was the Wikingen Yacht Club and we found a vacant guest berth in the shadow of the huge Dansk Agro grain silos. At least we would be secure here from the bad weather we were expecting, doubling up Grace’s mooring lines just to be sure! We were soon joined by two German, a Dutch and a French boat seeking shelter!

Wikingen Yacht Club

In the shelter of the silos

Grace securely moored up in readiness for the bad weather.

Large Dutch yacht running for shelter

2nd September 2017

At Last! With a few days of sunny weather forecast we wanted a day at the beach! So we set sail for Karrebaeksminde, a traditional Danish seaside town on the coast of Zealand. I was hoping for piers, donkey rides, sand castles and ice cream. With the exception of the latter I was to be disappointed! We left Omo at 1005 after the ferry, following it carefully until we reach the first green channel marker when we changed onto a bearing of 150.

Leaving Omo far behind us

The distinctive Helleholm lighthouse on Algerso

We tacked down the Omo Sund to the safe water mark where we headed due East on 090 for 15 nm in to Karrebaeksminde Bay. With the force 4 north westerly wind, Grace sailed well and tracked our course accurately to the mouth of the Karrebaeksminde breakwater.

Lorna sketching the views

Perfectly timed as alway to cause as much chaos as possible, we arrived in the middle of a race and had to avoid about a dozen racing yachts all sailing flat out for the finish line……. I think we came second!

Holding off strong competition!

The entrance to the Soefronten Marina is quite hairy! There is a double breakwater that channels the Nastved Canal into the sea. This creates a strong and rough surge as the canal water crosses the sea water and the wind. This makes entry into the marina a bit tricky – first full power to overcome the strong cross currents then once through the gap and inside the marina breakwater full astern to slow down enough to make a right angled turn into the moorings.

The breakwaters and ships in the canal!

This Marina has the best labelled berths of any marina we have seen on our trip! Berth width, length, free or not and price are all clearly visible from the water. Brilliant! None of the embarrassment of getting wedged between the posts because you picked a berth that was not wide enough or indeed getting stuck 2 m from the pontoons as the berth is too long for your lines!

Grace in the right sized berth!

Water in the canal can get a bit lively due to the strong current

Danish humour! A grasshopper lifting bridge!

Karrebaeksminde is slightly odd. It has a lifting bridge dressed up as a grasshopper, a nice beach and a great bakery, where I became quite well known! So much so in fact that the baker would try to translate into English what each cake and bun was called. This included the intriguingly named ‘Napoleon’s Shits’. I hope she meant ‘Hats’ but I had to buy one anyway!

Napoleon’s Shits, at least they tasted nice!

The canal is full of surprises too, as suddenly you can be eating a meal in one of the many nice bank side restaurants and fish and eel smokehouses that line the river when a large ship will suddenly and almost silently appear! I made a mental note not to leave the Marina when one these things is around……I do hope I remember to follow that sound advice!

A slightly surreal moment; having dinner when suddenly a big ship passes only a few feet from your table, the skipper on the bridge watching you eat!

And what we came for? A day at the beach! The weather was sunny if a bit windy later on. The water was beautifully clear, if somewhat bracing and had none of the jelly fish that fill the water on the other side of the Great Belt! And the sand was lovely and fine…..perfect! And unlike Germany, everyone managed to keep their clothes on! Although you are allowed to be naked on any public beach in Denmark but I have not put it to the test!

A day on the beach