Saturday 30 May 2015

Bank holidays, Vikings and Jim - Hundested, Roskilde and Gilleleje

Sunday 24th May saw us up at about 0500 ready for a 70 mile sail to Hundested. What we didn't know (we mostly don't know what day it is!) was that Monday 25th May is a holiday here; clearly this weekend was a good one to dust off the boat and head for, er, Hundested.

I suppose we'll have to get used to it when the dreaded July arrives, but we were surprised to find no available box moorings as we wove our way through the narrow channels that remained between the rafted boats. Fortunately we managed to find a suitable space to raft up as, after a 12 hour sail, we really didn't fancy setting off for somewhere else.

Hundested has a beach, galleries and places to eat (if you can afford them!). It also has the house of a Danish polar explorer that you can visit but, to be honest, the place didn't really do much for us. We decided to leave after a couple of nights and take what looked like an "interesting" trip south to Roskilde, a former capital of Denmark.

Cyclone's in there if you look carefully - Hundested after everyone had left!
The trip to Roskilde was interesting for 3 reasons: Scenery, an opening bridge and depth - or rather, a lack of depth!

Cyclone disrupting the traffic again....

Some of the scenery en route

It doesn't seem possible to get photographs of scenery that do it justice, but the fjord was very attractive with fields or trees adorning the banks and, for the most part, blue skies too. The fjord was also very shallow, such that the only way to make progress for much of the way was to follow narrow buoyed channels - so mucho concentration for the 6 or so hours it took us to get there! It was rather alarming when, at one point, the "shallow" alarm on the depth sounder went off and the sounder itself announced that the water was only 1.4m deep - particularly as Cyclone has a 1.7m draft! Then we saw the nearby swans pulling up long strings of weed and so concluded that - as we were still afloat - we must be passing through some of that.

Roskilde is famous for its cathedral and, more recently, its Viking museum. The cathedral has served for many years as the final resting place for Denmark's royalty. It is a UNESCO world heritage site and contains no less than 39 royal graves. Needless to say, these are not hidden away underground (for the most part). Instead, the tombs - some of which are very elaborate - are in public view.

One of the many tombs in the cathedral

It's not just tombs though. The cathedral is a very beautiful place with lots to look at and admire.

Cathedral organ, dating from 1425 with 1654 facade

Huh? Never mind if pigs could fly.....

The cathedral from a distance 

One of the reasons that Roskilde is where it is is that there are many natural springs supplying fresh drinking water. In fact, legend has it that King Roar founded the city and named the city "Roars Kilde" - which means the spring of Roar - after himself.

One of the many springs

As mentioned above, Roskilde fjord is very shallow. Historically, there were just 3 navigable channels to the city, making it relatively easy to defend from a seabourne attack. To make an attack even more difficult, the resident Vikings blocked 2 of the channels; one by scuttling 5 of their ships filled with rocks. That left just the one channel which, because of its winding nature, needed local knowledge to safely navigate.

1962 excavations revealed these 5 ships, which were then painstakingly removed and reassembled for display in the museum. There's more left of some than others, but there was sufficient for lots to be learned about the ships themselves and how they were made. This knowledge was then used to create authentic replicas that are on display at the museum and which can be taken out for a row / sail by visitors. More significantly, the replicas enabled much to be learned about the speed and seaworthiness of the craft. They even sailed the one in the photo below to Ireland and back!

Sea Stallion: 30m long and sailed with a crew of 60!

The originals in the museum

Some more complete than others!

All cultured out, on the 29th May we retraced our steps past Hundested and out into the Kattegat en route for Gilleleje. This is a really nice lttle town at the most northern point of Sjaelland - see pics below for a flavour:

Gilleleje harbour

One of many beautifully kept old cottages

Our berth in the harbour. Lucky we stopped in time!

Weather permitting, we intend to go to Copenhagen tomorrow. We've reserved a berth in Christianshavns canal  - right in the city centre.

Now it's time for some wine and a special toast to our very good friend Jim who is currently recovering from heart surgery. To you Jim. Here's to a full and speedy recovery. And of course to Del too. All the best to you both.

Saturday 23 May 2015

The perfect sail? Rudkobing (Langeland) and Kerteminde (Hindsholm or Fyn?)

After writing the last blog we stayed a further day in Marstal before setting off for Rudkobing on the island of Langeland - a distance of about 10 miles. We spent that day getting better acquainted with Marstal itself; including the museum and the beach.

Probably the poshest beach hut in the world - with its own gnome (where's the fishing rod?)

Huts aside, the beach wasn't anything special but the maritime museum was remarkable. Housed inside a couple of 'ordinary' old town buildings was a warren that contained a vast amount of information, memorabilia and artifacts. There were a huge number of incredibly detailed model ships that had been painstakingly created by hand - far too many to be given the attention they deserved. Perhaps most remarkable of all though were the interiors of boats that had been recreated inside the old town buildings - see pictures below:

The bridge...

... and down a ships corridor and some stairs was a cabin.....

..... and lounge area.

And so to Rudkobing.

Rudkobing's claim to fame is a bloke called Orsted who, amongst other things, gets the credit for the discovery of electromagnetism. That's him in the picture below.

Hans Christian Orsted

Before we could explore the town though, we had to negotiate our first 'Harbourmoney' machine. We knew we had to do this because a very stern message on the electricity supply board informed us that we must pay up immediately - and before connecting up to electricity - or face being charged double!

The Harbourmoney automat. Fortunately instructions were available in English

Having discharged our duty we went for a walk about town. The pictures below give a good idea of what it was like. More of the same really; pretty, in good repair, litter free and with an immaculate church!

A Rudkobing street...

... town centre.....

.... and windmill

Langeland is connected to the island of Tasinge by a bridge and Tasinge, in turn, is connected to the island of Fyn by another. To avoid cutting off the harbours, some of these bridges are build pretty high. The one from Langelande to Fyn has a clearance of 26m over the water - so no problem for us getting under there then!

Langeland bridge, taken from the marina

Being so high, they also provide spectacular views over the area. It's hard to give an appreciation of the beauty of a place when taking pictures from a moving boat, but I think the one below - taken from the bridge - illustrates it well.

Tasinge with Fyn in the distance

The 21st May saw us making a bit of effort to cover some ground and we set off for Kerteminde, some 40 miles away.

Explorer pose!

That meant either taking a short cut under part of a bridge linking Fyn with Sjaelland that is 18m high or opting to take the longer route (that the ships take) under a section that is 65m high.

Now the original brochure for Cyclone says that the top of her mast is 13.9m above the waterline. We have a VHF aerial, windex and anemometer mounted on the mast, so that adds maybe another 0.5m. So we should have at least 3m clearance under the bridge. No problem then.

But what if it was a misprint in the brochure? And what if the water level is higher than normal? Strong southerly winds can do that and we'd had some of them.

So I measured a photograph of Cyclone (yes, really!) - length and then mast height. I knew the length, so could work out the mast height. It came out at 13.7m, so pretty close to the brochure really. And I googled it, but could only find the brochure quoted as a source.

Oh it'll be alright!

And then the bridge approaches. We furled the headsail to get a better view but were still making 6 knots towards it under main alone... It went very quiet. Very, very quiet......

/
What do you reckon

Will it?

Too late to change our minds now!
And....... phew!!

And so to Kerteminde.

Kerteminde, like those on Aero and Langeland, is another pretty town. That's the free museum in the picture below, but there are plenty more attractive buildings in the town,

Kerteminde museum

What makes the place special though is the Viking museum at nearby Ladby. This is based around a Viking ship grave where, in the early 900s, a king was sent off on his last journey in a "Death Ship".

He was buried in his ship, which is 21.5m long and 3m wide, with all his fine possessions, 11 horses and 3 or 4 dogs. Whilst all the wood has gone the bones can still be seen, along with the rivets, shroud rings, anchor and chain. Having been carefully excavated, it's all preserved in a concrete bunker in its original location.

Entrance to Viking Ship Grave

The ship

Some of the bones

The original anchor and chain

They are building a replica of the ship, using original methods where possible, which is due to be launched next year. It might then be sailed to England for a little rape and pillaging - according to the guy selling the tickets in any case!

An authentic replica under construction

Cycling the 5km back to Kerteminde we came across the Jampot rally - so called, I'm told, because of the look of the rear shock absorbers fitted to certain Matchless and AJS motorbikes. I didn't know there were so many still around - many of which had made the long trip from England.

Jampot rallyists

If you look carefully under the bikes you'll see a little square of cardboard that was issued to each attendee to keep the oil from staining the cobbles!

Not the world's fastest Indian, but was it the model that Munro's bike was based on?

So why is this entry caption the perfect sail? Because it very nearly was! Pleasant winds, sunshine, beautiful scenery, the mast didn't get knocked down(!) and the ride was Rolls Royce smooth in the flat water. To cap it all, we were joined by 2 porpoises on one occasion and a single one a little later on.

If we could just get those damned box moorings right!

Sunday 17 May 2015

Fleeced at Laboe; Aero (Denmark); and the joy of box moorings...

I was delighted when the posh yacht dealer at Baltic Bay Marina (Laboe) confirmed that he could supply the electronic charts I needed for Denmark and the Baltic Sea. With it being Wednesday and the following day being a public holiday, I would have to pay a little extra for FedEx (or something similar) delivery in order to get it on the Friday. We'd also have to stay a day longer than planned, but at least I'd have the charts I needed. 

The normal selling price for these was 229 euros which, with the favourable exchange rate, was a little cheaper than I could have got them in the UK and I'd be getting a more recent version than if I'd bought them before setting out. All in all, quite a successful strategy - or so I thought. 

Friday arrived, as did the charts, and I brandished my prepaid fairfx euro mastercard with the expectation of a bill of about 240 euros. Imagine my surprise then when I was asked for no less than 315!! I did my best to haggle through my indignation but there was only one junior member of staff present as everyone else had taken the Friday off to make a long weekend of it. She said I'd need to speak to the owner/manager on the following Monday.

Well we didn't want to wait that long so I had to bite the bullet and pay the 300 euros that was the best the lady could offer. Grrr!!

0730 Saturday morning saw us on our way to Aero, Denmark - a distance of 30-35 miles. Aero is an island in the South Funen Archipelago with a length of 30km and breadth, at it's widest point, of 9km. If you'd never heard of the South Funen Archipelago (I certainly hadn't!) it's at the bottom left of a group of islands that are situated between Denmark and Sweden.

The crossing was uneventful - a F5/6 on the port quarter and fairly flat seas. The entrance to Marstal, our chosen port, was up a narrow dredged channel with water as little as a metre deep on either side. This whole area is very shallow - much of it less than 2m deep - so careful planning is a must. You don't have to worry much about tides here (the average range is 0.5m) but you do have to be aware of the fact that strong winds can raise or lower the water level by more than a metre. Our berth is currently 0.5m shallower than it 'should' be.   

Port hand marker buoy with unusual "bog brush" top mark - Marstal channel

Before we could explore this very attractive island (more on that in a moment) we of course had to moor up our boat. We were relieved to see that there was plenty of space available as we hadn't known what to expect. We'd run through our box mooring drill prior to arrival and were as well prepared as we could be. The 20 knot crosswind was noted with some trepidation, but there was no option other than to go for it.

I cunningly selected a berth near(ish) to another boat, which I thought should ensure some help with the bow line! Sure enough, help quickly appeared. So far so good. Or it would have been if there was actually room for our boat to fit between the mooring piles! Having determined unequivocally that we would not fit between them (thankfully Westerly had the foresight to fit teak rubbing strakes down each side of the boat, so no harm done!) our helper kindly suggested a slightly bigger berth in the same row but - coincidentally? - downwind of his own boat (meaning we couldn't get blown onto it).

We managed to scrape through the piles and, with his help, tied up without further drama. It would have been a different story had he not been there as I hadn't got close enough to the pontoon for Jo to step off the bow. Even if she had, I don't think she would have had the strength to hold the boat against the force of the wind. Our helper was clearly finding it difficult even with a turn through the "n" shaped mooring cleat (what a ridiculous design - impossible to lasso from the boat!).

Feeling a little sheepish, I thanked our helper profusely and set about erecting our orangery (apparently conservatories are a little "last year") with which good old Cyclone - shaken but not stirred - is pictured below.

Cyclone on her box mooring in Marstal harbour

Installed in our orangery, we had the opportunity to watch and learn as others came into the harbour. Oh boy. We thought we had problems!

The next boat to venture in (thankfully downwind of us) managed to get his stern lines on OK but the lad on the front failed to step ashore or to throw his line to me (I was now in the willing helper role). Inevitably, the bow went sideways and the boat ended up across the line of mooring piles with a bit of a thump. Eventually we managed to float a mooring line to it on a large fender and 3 of us hauled it in. As an aside, they didn't have a great time leaving either. They got the stern lines off OK but the bow line jammed and the boat ended up slamming against the pontoon sideways - without any fenders to protect it (these had to be on deck in order to squeeze between the piles).

Whilst not as bad, the next 3 boats all needed help from the pontoon. The 4th arrival must have taken well over an hour to moor up though - and I'm not exaggerating. It was probably more than 40' long, so maybe they had a better excuse than I did for choosing a box that was too small, but that was only one of their errors. They just kept going backwards and forwards (and sideways under both wind and bow thruster power) bouncing off piles until they finally decided to just hang off a couple of piles at the end of a row of moorings - i.e. not in a box at all!

I guess box moorings and strong crosswinds just don't go together!

So what of Aero itself?

It's a really attractive island that reminded me a bit of Guernsey. It's very neat and tidy. with the majority of houses being in an excellent state of repair. There are only 3 towns and a single - free! - bus provides an hourly service between them.

Aeroskobing is described as probably the most well preserved town of the 18th Century in Denmark - and I can believe that. The town dates back to the Middle Ages and in 2002 was awarded the prestigious Europa Nostra prize for the preservation of European Cultural Heritage.

Anyway, the pictures below should give you a good idea of what it's like:


A schooner being built to scale at Marstal

The Marstal Maritime Museum

A windmill converted to a home in Soby

A street in Soby

Soby church. The graveyards here are immaculate

A model ship hanging from the rafters in Soby's church

A street in Aeroskobing....

...... and another......

---- and another. Spot the Model T!........

.... and another......

The square in Aeroskobing. The 2 pumps supplied the town with water up until 1952

The outside of a restaurant in Aeroskobing (we ate out in Eastbourne. Remember?!)

We'll stay hear another day or 2 because we like it and have yet to do Marstal justice. We're not yet sure what we'll do after that. Maybe explore the immediate area a bit more, or head north up the Store-Baelt between the larger islands of Fyn and Sjaelland. Time (and weather) will tell.