Heading for Oslo

On our first leg from Stavanger after rescuing our damsels in distress, Gord took this little video clip of a fun days sail. The wind is blowing 25 to 30 knots (about force 7), we are heavily reefed running before the wind with no main and about half of the genoa (front sail) doing 7-8 knots, about our maximum speed. The swell is about 9' causing us to surf occasionally.

We have spent a week doing the island strewn east coast  from Stavanger to Hankosundat, my stop for Oslo. 250 miles characterised by sun, wind, pretty rock rimmed anchorages, holiday homes (everywhere!) and even a bucket full of mackerel, caught at 3 o'clock and on the plate by 7 as we continued our sail up the coast.

The winds were very predictable, northerly in the morning swinging south in the afternoon as the sea breeze kicked in; we spent the mornings exploring and the afternoons and often late into the evening sailing.

The islands make for some interesting mooring. With insufficient room to swing around an anchor amongst the little inlets, the Norwegians tie up to bolts fixed in the rocks; that is the back of the boat!

We did one fabulous bike ride into the interior. Rolling hills, pretty villages and littered with little lakes. However, there was trouble on the way! My pedal had been giving trouble for a while. I ordered a new set on the internet which are waiting for me at home but too late. Half way through the ride, the pedal fell off, in the middle of nowhere with 20 miles to go! The thread screwing the pedal into the crank had worn to the point that it wouldn’t hold. Hmm, now what? Being an ex-boy scout (or more truthfully having had mechanical trouble in the past and not had the right tools) we were at least prepared with a spanner.
A corner of the map wrapped around the thread seemed to pack it out sufficiently to just hold it in. As long as I peddled with my left leg and used the right only to rotate the pedal, it seemed to work and we set off to limp back to the boat. Every few miles the pedal fell out but we were getting closer until…. finally the pedal decided it was having no more of it and gave up the ghost. It had been a hilly ride, we were about 5 miles from the harbour, fortunately flat or downhill the rest of the way. With my hand hooked into his waistband Gord towed me the final few miles. Thats what friends are for! That’s the pedal in my right hand with the empty crank beside it.

Our bucket of mackerel had 2 fish remaining; it was time to try my smoker again after last years somewhat embarrassing attempt (paraffin instead of meths). Armed with my newly purchased bottle of meths, the wood chips went in and we shut the lid on the smoker to see what would happen. 20 minutes later, hey preso, beautifully cooked smoked fish!

 It tasted rather as if, well, as if it had been sat in a bonfire for 20 minutes! To tell you the truth I was not enamoured with the taste.  I think I shall have it ‘au naturel’ next time!

One of the small groups of islands we passed through was home to the little village of Lingor.  With no roads and no bridge to the mainland it was a quaint place indeed.

The sun is now setting on the first half of my adventure in Norway. I am going home now for Melanies birthday (it is her 50^th on Monday). She and I are coming back in a couple of weeks to set off to Sweden, through the lakes and canal system to Stockholm. Tim and his girlfriend Lucy will be joining us for a few days early on.

Lyse Fjord

It does rain in Norway! 

It was a rugged moonscape of rock dotted with snow patches that greeted us as we got to the top. The weather started to deteriorate, visibility dropping to as little as 50 yards and the wind gusting to 30 knots at times, rugged indeed! The base of the clouds scudded along at about cliff top height so we go glimpses of the grand scene below in gaps in the cloud. We hope it would not get any thicker for when we arrived at our objective, the top of the massive vertical cliffs we had seen on the way up the fjord with water cascading down the shear drop. The route was well marked through the rock and snow. After 2 hours we came across a cairn and signpost, clearly pointing to our destination nearby but by now the fog had completely closed in around us. After 200 yards the markings petered out, it was not going to be safe to go on. Getting lost up here could seriously spoil our day! Just as we turned back 2 walkers spotted us and called out that they had found the cliffs. They pointed us in the right direction and within 200 yards the top of the cliff opened up before us and the cloud parted, divine intervention?! What was laid out before us was one of the most amazing sights I have seen. The scale is impossible to convey in a photo, you have to come and see this for yourself! 

This boulder is also quite an attraction; since Victorian days people have stepped out onto it to have their photo taken 3000’ above a fjord, but it was not for us on a wet windy day!

For the descent from the cafe we had taken our trusty bikes for an exciting 7km  gravity driven thrill ride round 74 hairpin bends and through a mile long tunnel in the pouring rain. The sunglasses are to keep the rain out of my eyes!

After Lyse Fjord we left the fjords behind us and headed for the lowland south of Norway to make some miles towards Olso. We stopped in at Stavanger then headed off into a forcast of force 4 winds and blue skys. It very qickly became apparent that the forcast was wrong as we got out into the main channel out of Stavanger. 

Rescuing damsels in distress!

The coast line is now quite different. Generally low and  very rugged, surprisingly arid and rock strewn.

Over the last 3 days we have had some very beautiful anchorages, 

collected a vast quantity of kelp and a few giant cockles on our anchor (breakfast?)




 

 and this evening enjoyed an excellent chicken dinner under way with a warm gentle breeze and some lovely sunshine!

Change of Crew

Norway is an incredibly wealthy country on the back of North Sea oil and gas, first discovered in the ‘60’s. Very sensibly they are spending their liquid gold on their infrastructure. The roads, myriad bridges and communications systems are impressive indeed. There are hundreds of islands off this small part of coast alone with any island within bridging distance of another being connected by road, often serving as few as a dozen houses. Every home has electricity cables regardless of how remote. It can’t make economic sense but it keeps the islands alive if you can afford it, and afford it they can. We spent a couple of nights in a small harbour on one of the outlying islands flanked by 2 huge 60’ motor yachts and a small(!) 40 footer, only in Norway (and perhaps Nice) could Moondance be eclipsed by other craft in a small harbour, there is some serious money here!

The cost of living here I reckon is about double the UK. A litre of milk is £3 and a loaf of fresh bread £4 – not a cheap place to hang out! Minimum wage is also double. How they compete internationally I do not know.

Tourism seems to be of little interest to the Norwegians despite what they have to offer. Tourist information is scant and little effort is made to encourage visitors; I can only guess that they are well enough off from oil not to need it. I have seen no commercial fishing or agriculture (the mountainous terrain is not very conducive any way); I can’t really figure what these people do except enjoy themselves in their thousands of holiday homes dotted all around the coast line, not a bad life!

They are a funny lot these Norweigans. They are friendly enough when you engage them but they seem to keep themselves to themselves; they very rarely exchange greetings when they pass you. Extraordinarily there are almost no sailing boats here despite the mass of inlets, islands and lovely boating opportunities; it is all power boats. They worry about cycling through poorly lit tunnels and advise against going up to the tops because there is snow around. I think the Vikings would be ashamed of this lot!

On Saturday Mike set off home whist in the opposite direction on the train from Oslo  came Gordon, my Canadian friend who I did the Himalayas with.

I spent the day servicing the engine and doing domestics, cleaning and doing the washing – by hand as all Norweigans seem to have their own washing machines thus having no need for a laundrette and leaving humble yachties to get out the bucket. Domesticated man, female porn I am told?!

A somewhat jet lagged Gordon appeared on deck to another sunny day on Sunday having arrived at 1am after missing a connection. We headed south, bound ultimately for Oslo, where we would end the first half of this years trip.     P..41

60 miles and no mackerel later (where are they all, are we to starve??!) we pulled in at the mouth of Lyse Fjord, one of the most famous of Norways fjords close to the ferry port of Stavanger.

 

 

A stunning place indeed and the sun continues to shine.

Heading South to Bergen

Sogne fjord is the most northern part of my sailing adventure; today we started to  head south. I think I can hear Melanie cheering from here?! Mind you, with the weather we are having here, who needs the med?!

We are now in amongst the many hundreds of islands strung out down the whole coast of Norway.

From one anchorage we went for a bike ride down the full length of the island to get a taste of the beauty a little inland; we were not disappointed. Rolling hills, fir trees, sparkling crystal clear lakes dotted with wooden chalets; many Norwegians have holiday homes in this area.

There was a pleasant gentle breeze when we got back to the boat so we set off again to do little more than drift south amongst these beautiful islands. We sailed down channels between islands from 1 mile wide to as little as 50 meters wide, a little tight!

We caught a whacking great Pollock trawling behind the boat. I hoped he might get close to Waddy’s Irish cod but sadly my tackle broke as I tried to haul him in over the back of the boat, he must have been huge!

We spent the afternoon wandering round these lovely old buildings at the old wharf, some of which made us feel somewhat drunk just looking at them with the funny angles caused by foundation sinkage over the years.

Bergen has a very interesting history. It was the capital city for hundreds of years. The king decreed that all trade (mostly dried cod caught in the north) traded internationally must go through Bergen. The Hensietcke League who were a huge German trading cartel throughout Europe in the middle ages moved in and pretty much took over the wharf area for 400 years. It was they who built and ran the wharf.

Flam – Sogne Fjord

We spent the night at the head of another arm of the fjord close by at a place called Flam. In 1940 a tourist railway was built to take passengers from the cruise ship up into the mountains and give them a taste of the scenery from above. We took the train up the spectacular 3000’ climb, the train meandering in and out of the valley walls, through tunnels and around switch backs to get to the top. We came back down a little way in the train from where we had a very pleasant 3 hour walk back down to the harbour. We passed a few houses with this somewhat innovative roof insulation!

It was then time to start heading back towards the sea; 4 hours of motoring and a small bonus sail when the wind favoured us got us back to Balestrand.

On Friday morning we set off for a 2-3 hour walk to 1500’ peak nearby; we intended to be back for lunch then make some more miles back up the fjord. The tourist information here is not great. Half an hour into the walk we discovered that we could get to a much higher peak on what looked like a very nice circular walk.

We took stock of supplies. We had 3 crunch bars and a liter of water, decided that where there was snow there was water and that hunger was for cissies and set off for the top. What a fabulous walk. We topped out at 985m (3200’), once again we had lots of snow around us and plenty down our boots! Tired, hungry but very satisfied we got back to the boat, scrumped some more mussels for tea from under the pontoon and headed back out of the fjord.


We have suffered one tragedy this afternoon. Mike’s daughter Jenny had packed him off with a box of the most fabulous chocolate brownies that she had made. Needing to recharge the calories we tucked in for the final time and depression settled over Moondance at the thought of no more of these delights. Perhaps we can sweet talk you into another batch for our next cycling trip Jenny?