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Josin is now safely cradled on land for the winter. We were three who needed to lift out early, before the collective session later in the month. The crane arrived on time and was ready to lift at 08:00 last thursday, which meant that I had to wake up and get up entirely unmentionably early. Nice morning though, little wind though chilly, sunny. Very effective crane driver, and cooperative gang finished the job in record time. A pressure-wash and scrub of Josin’s hull was only a little difficult at the water line, where a stubborn growth of green weedy grass had attached itself, otherwise very little growth and no barnacles. Must have been because of the cold water temperatures this year.

The day before, wednesday, was spent removing the sails and preparing the rig for dismantling, then pottering round to the mastcrane for lifting the mast out. Same three boats, same gang, same good team. Loaded my Berlingo, in van-mode, remarkably full with sails and booms, anchors and antennes, fenders and sheets and mooring ropes. Unloaded in the carport at home with decision to sort it all out later. Was weary.

The day before that, was Josin’s last tuesday evening regatta. Sunny, good breeze from the south east and chilly, and ten boats competing. The evenings are closing in fast now, and in spite of the start being half an hour earlier than usual, the finishing line was passed in the glooming. We came in sixth, poor showing mostly due to two hopeless marker-roundings, pointing us in the wrong direction and killing all speed. Caustic and ribald comments from other boats rushing past. Not my best effort there, no. But we were not last!!

Final winterisation, frame and tarpaulin awning, anti-freezing and extra support legs, topsides scrub and polish, will be done when I get back from two weeks in the US.

Going to visit brother Peter near Charleston, who is rightly worried about their seaside house on Dewees Island being exposed to cyclone Matthew’s high winds. News this evening, saturday, is that the winds have decreased, but the major worry now being extra high tides, which will almost certainly not reach the house. Phew!

Well, this may be the last boating blog, but I may well scribble something, with a pic or two, from America in the Fall, the Appalachian mountains being spectacularly colo(u)rful apparently.

All’s well.

Forecast was for very strong winds, increasing during the afternoon and evening, so I listened to my mature muscles and didn’t travel to Åsgårdstrand. Remarkably strong blow here in Kongsberg in the evening, so the forecast was probably correct. Lots of autumn-coloured leaves on the ground this morning, wednesday

One more tuesday regatta, next week. Hope for fairer winds!

How about this?

Josin won second prize! Whooppeee!  I helped. 

A very interesting regatta. Very variable wind, in strength and direction. Start delayed until there was enough wind to move the boats. Then start confusion due to rearranging times and signals, but everyone got away reasonably together. It took me a while to learn my biggest genoa again, having not used it this season, and got rather left behind in the 3-5 knot breeze, but round the first mark and I got the genoa in, gennaker out proceeedure just right, and gained a lot on those who were getting mudded. You win some, you lose some. It was my turn to lose some later, but luckily not too much! (Memo: Coil all ropes that are not in use. If left in a wuzzle on the cockpit floor, the boat gremlin lassos one’s feet).  Plenty to keep me busy due to the variable wind, so even the coffee in the thermos didn’t get touched. 

The evening before, I had emptied the boat of all the summer-sailing clobber, hoping for a significant reduction in weight, but it was more psychological than real. Anyway, every little helps. 

Next tuesday is another evening regatta, so, with this result in mind, we are going to have to be on our mettle. A better start will be on the program!

Time for a little snooze. 

All’s well. 

Was spent sitting on the jetty wishing for some wind and telling stories. There was absolutely not a breath. Mirror-calm sea. Slanting evening sunshine. Coffee and chocklate. The last tuesday evening regatta of the season was a draw, no winners, no losers. Better luck next season!

Next event, the club regatta, on saturday. Foecast says that the high has not moved much, so it will probably be another waiting game. On with the biggest, lightest sails. (Metaphorically only, the usual, but hope is encouraging). Goal is at least to not be last. Last year the wind died before several of us could finish, so he who decides the course should have at least a Plan B, taking us turtles into consideration. Maybe I should empty Josin of all the weighty and unnecessary clobber before the start, even empty the water tanks. Might add 0,1 knots. Every little helps, and the competitive instinct is not yet dead. 

Go, Josin, go!

There’s something soothing about fog. Sharp edges smoothed out, sounds muffled, view restricted. Take it easy!

On our way in to Oslo to show Josin’s non-standard safety features on saturday to a few interested people. Yesterday, wednesday, was busy delivering and collecting things, including a pulleyblock which was recommended would help reduce the genakker-rope’s tendencies to wuzzle. Fitted. Genakker hoisted. Wait for a little breeze to test things out. Late afternoon, OK. Out and head north in the southerly breeze. Un-roll genakker, Success. Sail a bit. Try a gybe. Success. Sail some more. Try a roll-up. Difficult. Too much wind in the sail. Un-roll genoa, behind which the genakker can hide. Try roll-up again. Success  This is fun. Oops! Land approaching. Head north again. Un-roll genakker. Easypeasy. Roll-up genoa. There we are, genakker pulling us along at splendid speed in 10 to 15 knots of wind, and in the direction I wanted to go. Delightful. Easy sail to Bile, outside Son on the east side of the Oslofjord, where a friendly mooring buoy awaited, the wind dying away in the setting sun making genakker roll-up a cinch.

Late wok dinner. Two other boats potter in to other buoys. Dark, until a near-full moon creeps up over the trees and makes a glittering stipe on the water. Fog starts to form. Sleep. Of course, the mooring buoy has to come during the night and bump the hull, gently of course, (must be lonely), until the combination of breeze and current sort themselves out.

Thick fog early this morning, vis about 20 meters. Sort out the mooring buoy wuzzle and go back to sleep, to the sound of mournful foghorns out in the shipping lane.

It is now lunchtime, and although the fog has thinned, vis now about 100 meters, I do not want to navigate the relatively narrow Drøbak sound in poor vis. Them big ships rushing along have radar and can hopefully see Josin, but I have only AIS which is not so effective at seeing others, so lunch will be taken, then a snooze before continuing.

Not a breath of wind of course.

All’s well.

The sailing season is not over yet, thankfully, but nor is the fixit season. Since gennaker sailing had been a rope-twiddling frustration at times, efforts have been made to cure the disease. The gennaker is on a roller-furler. A continuous furler-rope goes from the cockpit and to the end of the bowsprit, and round a pulley at the bottom of a torsionally-stiff rope to the top of the mast, with a swivel at the top. Pulling on one side of the furling-rope then roller-furls the sail from the top down. Easy. Theory and practice do not always match though, do they?. Setting the sail is the reverse, yes?. Well, not quite. There is the sail, neatly rolled up, hoisted to the masthead, and sheets attached. Ready? Yes. Start the unfurling by hauling on the sheet, furling-rope slack, wind gets into the top of the sail, and frantic rotation unfurls the sail from the top down, as you haul in on the sheet. Until it stops.  Prematurely.  Sail half-unfurled shaped like an hour-glass and full of straining wind. The furling rope gets stuck and gets twiddled around places it shouldn’t. This must only happen when there is plenty of time to think, plenty of sea-room to carry on sailing, and rapid problem-solving available.

The problem was laid before my friendly sailmaker/supplier, Sverre Tangerud of Elvstrøm Sails, and checks asked, modifications suggested, and made, one of which was a thinner furler-rope, less likely to get stuck. Correct. It didn’t get stuck nearly as often. What more? Other sailors in a gathering around the bowsprit with more-or-less helpful suggestions, and changes made, including a new fitting as the old one decided to take a swim.

I think we’re nearly there. Just waiting now for suitable, gentle conditions to go out and test. Last test-sail, before the mods, resulted in a bent bowsprit, when the sail, first wind-empty in the shadow of a large, high-stacked container ship, then suddenly very wind-full and powerful. Nothing broke, which is yet another proof that Josin takes good care of me, also when I make a mistake!. (Or should that be if…).

Note: The competitive instinct is not yet dead. We took part in the tuesday-evening regatta. Nine boats. Discussion theme: The strong wind. Not too bad at the start, but it got stronger. But although my physical strength was put to the test, I was competing, and didn’t come last, so there!

All’s well

Plan A was Jomfruland. Plan B was Stavern. There was no Plan C, BUT…..

The wind blew from the south west, as forecast, but stronger. Then stronger. Then stronger still. Then the waves built up, and soon we were rolling and pitching our way at an incredible speed. So, when Plan B would have been completed just after lunchtime, thoughts went to Tallakshavn, in the Tønsberg fjord. Getting closer, the MarineTraffic oracle showed another sailboat moored to the buoy there, so that was not popular any more. Then distances got measured, and it wasn’t so very much further to home port, Åsgårdstrand. And now, at about 18:30, the wind, although less, is still holding up and we are bowling smoothly along at 5 and a half knots, in the evening sunshine. What could be better. 

Smoothly yes, which allows typing on the iPad and hitting the right keys, which was not possible earlier, I tried! At its roughest, the competing wave patterns steered Josin so much that Rorbert the autopilot couldn’t keep up, so I had a long session practicing anticipatory steering, and the veering was significantly reduced. Passing Færder, the seas suddenly got smoother, so Robert was put to work again while I could get some sustenance, which of course had not been planned for so long a day. Also the thermos with hot water had decided to take a dive from its normally safe perch. Bad. Tried making tea with hot tap water? Not so good. 

This is only the second day this summer when we have sailed all day. What a terrible statistic! Surely better next summer, or ELSE!

All’s well!

A pause for Josin in Lillesand while I took a trip by train, bus and car, to Kongsberg, Oslo and Sandefjord, specially to help celebrate Odd Are’s 60th birthday, in “Vallhall” a suitable meeting location outside Sandefjord.  A splendid party, theme moustache, (bart in Norwegian), so it was a Barty. Ida and Hanne had done a splendid organising job, managing to keep it a surprise for Odd Are up to the day before. 40-ish guests, all with either a family or friendly connection from over the years. Odd Are welcomed each and every one in his speech. Well done!

I had hoped for some sightseeing enjoying the train ride from Kristiansand to Kongsberg, but the weather was not clement both ways, so the view was mostly of low cloud, rain and trees. Friend Svein Tangen, also a Ballad owner, in Lillesand, was most helpful in finding Josin a berth and also ferrying me around. Also two succulent dinners with him and his partner Hilde. So although a bit hectic, a successful interlude off the water.

So today it was back to ‘sailing’, well, motorsailing, from Lillesand to Finnøy, where Risør Seilforening has its facility. Too little wind to make fast enough progress without help from the engine, but it was a lovely day to be enjoyed on the water, even though it was remarkably bumpy. Strong currents competing with waves and rollers. Very easy to spill the coffee. Josin consumes about one and a half liters of diesel an hour, and I consume about one and a half deci-liters of un-spilled coffee an hour.

I need a quick visit to Risør tomorrow morning, to find something suitable for fixing the transducer for the echosounder, which came loose this morning, which resulted in no depth signal just in the tricky, shallow bit of course. Having fixed that, then further on in the direction of home port. Forecast is for south west winds, which should be great, except that they may be a bit strong for lazy sailing later in the day. No worries.

All’s well.

Long time no post, sorry! Today is monday, 22.August, and this little bay is perfectly protected from the southwester which blew us here today, from Farsund

But to go back a bit…..

We were in Espevær. Next, a longish motoring day, in mist and sunshine,  to Tananger, where Ballad owner Jan Monstad came aboard for a chat and hopefully some advice as to how to straighten out his pulpit, which had been savaged by a motor cruiser in Bekkjarvik harbour. Not much help unfortunately. But we exchanged mods and fixes.

An early ‘start’ next day, well, 7:30 is pretty early for us, with all the things to do before setting off. Longest day this year, 80 nm, to Skarvøy, a few nm SW of Farsund, arriving just after sunset at 21:30. Motor on all the way, with occasional help from the sails. Careful study of YR.no website for sea currents revealed that although the main, and strong, current past the exposed coast is north-going, there were many places close to the shore where eddies were south-going, so we kept to the ‘shallows’ all the way. A large Dutch motor-sailer didn’t, and we re-took him several times.

The reason for the long day was to try to get ’round the corner, Lindesnes, before the weather changed, but no, the day after was a stay-put day with strong SE winds and rain. So Skarvøy, for two days, where the first was spent sleeping several times to re-charge the batteries a bit.  In the afternoon a flotilla of four local motorboats arrived, tied up and put up a makeshift tent on the jetty. Much merriment trying to tame the tarpaulin in the wind and rain before it got securely lashed down. Then the party stared, it was, after all, saturday evening. I reckoned that it would crescendo till late, so I excused us, and pottered off to the other jetty a couple of hundred meters away, and enjoyed the quiet and my book, and the company of a heron. Sunday was spent reading and snoozing, and the weather gradually improved.

This morning we motored in to Farsund to re-fuel, necessary, as the tank was pretty empty after the previous days’ motoring, Then out to sea and past Lindesnes. Favourable wind, in strength and direction, so we sailed, at speed, but the seas were still large and confused, and we bounced, pitched and rolled our way eastward. Again, shaken but not deterred. Difficult to not spill the coffee. The sea was ’empty’. not another boat in sight the whole day, so for most the summer seems to be over. Or perhaps the seas were a bit daunting.

Two more days to Lillesand, to my Ballad friend Svein Tangen, for more chat and Ballad-eering.

All’s well

Here I sit, in the fog with visibility down to about half a mile, engine purring away as it is very good at, watching and waiting for the miles to slip by.

We are now south of Bergen. Spent the night in a tiny harbour on Huftarøy. Very quiet and deserted except for a gang of kids shoving each other into the water to loud and happy screeching and shouting. 

Woke early in the hopes of starting early, but the fog was too thick, so the other ear hit the pillow. By 9, visibility had improved sufficiently and we pottered off, coffeemug at the ready. 

Josin is equipped with three defences against the fog. 

1. The AIS system, which sends out my position signal over the VHF frequencies every 30 seconds, and which all other boats (the vast majority now), can see on their chartplotter, and I can see them.

2. An Echomax active aerial which, when it receives a radar ‘ping’, sends a ‘ping’ out, which means that a receiver thinks that Josin is bigger than she is. No, it isn’t cheating, small sailboats are notoriously poor radar reflectors, and this is in self defence!

3. My ears. I can’t hear bats any more, and operatic sopranos’ high notes are painful, but I am pretty good at rumbles. 

Today, the low-tech was the saviour. These high-speed catamaran ferries are on you before you can say highspeedcatamaranferries, specially if they are coming from aft, and I heard his diesel-rumble before the tech reacted. Of course it was in a relatively small space amongst the islands, and I made a dive for the rocky shore. I think he may have ‘seen’ me as he was doing less than the usual 25 knots as he rushed past, but still leaving Josin bobbing and me relieved. No time in the fog for doing anything else than keeping a sharp look out. 

We are now out in the broad Selbjørnsfjord, visibility is much improved and time and opportunity to write this. Also to dig deeper into the jungle of under-menus on the chartplotter, and whadduknow, the AIS has an audible alarm function, which is now activated. Moral: read all the instructions!

Goal for the day is Espevær, on the southwest corner of Bømlo. It would be nice if the fog would clear, and the wind would blow from north-ish. Sigh. Coffee’s gone cold, but otherwise-

All’s well