Sailing Letter May 2014: Göteborg – Kiel Canal

May 2014 Göteborg – Kiel Canal

Approach to Dyvig Anchorage

This is it! Finally we are on the big journey. Casting off the bowlines in GKSS May 11 was less sad than we thought. We were so filled with excitement for what the future could bring. Having said, that it was heartwarming with all people coming to say good bye. We will surely miss you.

The last 2 weeks before departure, were like a race towards the finish line. We were both in the project mode. Lots of logistics to take care of. Sorting, throwing and packing stuff. 2 cars to sell: we decided to let a company with the business to sell cars, take care of them. Wise decision since we needed them all the way to the last day. We had also made the decision to not buy food etc. for a long time, but just some things we knew were good to have. We expect to be in countries with cheaper or equally expensive food for some time to come

Thursday evening we had “open house “ for our friends and neighbors in GKSS, some of them we have been knowing for 15 years or more ( we settled in May 12 1996), sharing storms, winter problems and nice summer evenings. (We will miss our sauna evenings and pier grills.) In total we managed to squeeze in 24 people, in the pouring rain, in Tina Princess.

Friday before departure we said good bye to the last of our cars and took the bus back to Göteborg. What a relief! Now we only have 2 keys each: to the boat ant to the bicycles. Have been looking forward to that. Stopping in the city center on the way back, buying books for the gift card we got from our sailing / harbor friends, popping in to our favorite bar for a last beer and then home. Saturday was spent packing the last things making our ship sail worthy. Among other things Eva’s 100 meter 28 mm coil of green rope J it is now stowed under Peter’s bed.

As you can see on the blog, the departure was crowded, with a lot of hugs and some small words here and there. No real time to have deep conversation with anybody. A surprise was of course the rescue vessel with its hose pouring water in our direction. A nice gesture. Hasse and Karin, next year it is your turn!

First night at Vrångö ( 10 Nm) from GKSS was nothing special. I don’t think we had understood what we had just done. Next day at Österby Havn ( Laesö) we started to get some vacation feeling. This harbor has been the “waiting for”-stop ever since we started to discuss doing this journey. Laesö is / has been very special for us.  Unfortunately the weather was a bit cold, but we managed to say hello to the new bar owner of the “Old Pub”, a walk by the sea to the Golf Club for a beer and a visit at the spectacular Rhododendron park. Some of them in full bloom, but some damages vere done by the heavy rain one of the nights. On the walk to the golf course Peter found an interesting stone/nugget in bedded in the sand. Meteorite, iron nugget or man made, we don’t know, but will check on the web. Short stop at Anholt and then to our next checkpoint on the list:Tunö.

Last year we did not manage to get a place in the small harbor and we were actually risking the same this time. We came on a Friday that was “Bededag” in Denmark (big vacation). Normally with Tina we don’t expect any support to get a berth, but this time we did get OK to go alongside a very friendly Danish ship (thank you) and were able to stay at Tunö during the weekend. Nice weather too: +25 degrees centigrade, water aprox. +14.

Tunö is a rather small island (you can walk around it in 4 hours. On the north west side there are Black Guillemots (sw. Tobisgrissla) nesting. We love their red beak and red feet (like red rubber boots…). As we remembered from last time, there is small shed close to the harbor, where the farmers put some potatoes, onions, etc. for sale. You just put the money in a small box at the side. We have never seen this in Sweden. Maybe the money will not be left alone L. Anyway, this is asparagus season and we managed to get some green ones that the hares/rabbits had missed.

With less wind and more motor than expected, we moved down to Middelfart. Same here: no space in the old harbor last year and unfortunately not this year either. As always when the harbor is crowded and you find no spot, it is a disappointment. Usually you are tired and just not up for that kind of obstacles. The wind was increasing also, so we went “around the corner” and ended up in the new marina on the south side. Late evening we found a good pizza in the harbor café. Perfect!

Weather getting better again, +25, and we try one of the anchorages we missed last year: Dyvig. As the name suggest it is good holding ground J. Beautiful bay/bays, with plenty of anchorage and 2 marinas. We took the one with the restaurant “Dyvig Kro”.for one night and then one night at anchor. The inlet was a bit spectacular. Our draft is 2,2 meter and the echo sounder said 1,9 at the shallowest: sorry Börje, but we might have polished the kiel J. Nice dinner at the Dyvig Kro. Day after we ( Peter) put the solar panels to work. Power anybody? During our short walk we also found our first “factory sale” of sausages. So this is what it is going to be like: new anchorage, walk with rucksack and buy whatever that is nice and within season.

We have now passed Maasholm ( Germany) and entered the Kiel Canal. Varm/hot days with a lot of sunshine. A fabulous lightening in Maasholm. Hu! We are now in Rendsburg for a couple of days shopping (sausages, mustard and other essentials). Eva has planted the spices for the first months: basil, rosemary, oregano and thyme. We will try to do some motor service on Monday and then we’re off.  Eva has sorted out all charts and books for the area we will not use for quite some time. Now it is new charts that will be checked and followed.

Nature

As Eva’s colleagues from work know, there will be a small area in the letters with the title “Nature”. Here we will give you a glance of what we see and appreciate.

So far we have seen Black Guillemots in Laesö (not standard), Anholt and Tunö. Many normal Guillemots ( sw. sillgrissla) in Lilla Bält ( Denmark) and also, to our joy, a lot of Porpoises ( tumlare). Mainly visible due to the calm water. On Tunö we also saw lot of swallows. The normal Swallow ( sw. Ladusvala) and House Martin ( sw. Hussvala), but also Sand Martins ( Backsvala) that are new for us. We have also observed a lot of geese: Grey-lag Goose  (sw. Grågås) that are now outnumbering the Canada Goose ( sw. Kanadagås) and we expect to see the Egyptian Goose ( sw. Nilgås). The latter moved here late -60 and is thriving. Took some time before we were sure that we saw what we saw, but now we know that there is a population in the Kiel Canal J

In the Canal we have also seen Great Crested Grebe (sw. Skäggdopping) with kids and our Coot (sw. Sothöna) was at her normalplace by the jetty. This year without kids, but her neighbor had 2 beautiful ones.

Otherwise, the air is full of the scent from trees and flowers, however we feel some of the bigger trees are a bit later here than in Göteborg. It is a real gift to be able to follow the nature during spring and early summer.

Gastronomie

Some major eatenings:

• The grilled, marinated herring from Thorsens’ fish shop in Österby
• Fresh green asparagus in Tunö
• A marinated herring in the oldest pub in Middelfart ( Holms from 1574)
• White asparagus and salmon in the restaurant in Rendsburg.

Next letter in June,

BR Eva, Peter