daystrom

Mahina 2016: Part 1 - Kirkwall to Silda

Julie was keeping the journal day-to-day, so it's told from her perspective. Pictures from this part of the trip can be found in the gallery.

Tuesday, May 17

We got up about 8:15, showered, and had hotel breakfast. We did our navigation quiz while waiting for our food. We were done with everything about 10:10 including packing. We went to Tesco for gluten free snacks, then sat at the St. Magnus Cathedral for a while in a drizzle. We quizzed each other on sailing terms (another quiz later in the day). They were setting up for a music concert but unfortuantely, we only heard a bit of guitar, keyboard, and strings. We met at the boat at noon. We had some introductory information, then had lunch at 12:45pm. It rained most of the day with little wind so we motor sailed to an anchorage off the island of Eday. Julie felt good that the other students were struggling a bit with the "Mahina Method", so it wasn't just us. We had a nice cold tomato, basil, and cheese topping with pasta for dinner. We won't be seeing the Shetland Islands after all because there's a narrow weather window to get to Norway. Oh well.

Wednesday, May 18

Breakfast was nominally at 8am, but it was being served at 7:45am when we got out of bed. We had porridge for breakfast. Lesson today was on engine maintenance. The wind was blowing hard during the night, and the boat rolled a fair amount.

We left in 20+ knot winds. The seas were probably 9-12 feet. Ken and Julie were both inside when it really started rolling and bumping. Both of us were sick, Ken more so. We had a plastic bucket with a lid to throw up in. We would have been better off if we had been up top. Then it was our turn to be on watch. Steer 30 minutes, lookout 30 minutes. Julie had a hell of a time steering and nearly fell over several times. Fortunately, the harbor on Westray was much calmer than the open channel we took to get there. After a late lunch, we went exploring around the town and saw the local castle & museum on Westray. It was really windy — both of us were wearing 3-4 layers each (top and bottom including rain pants).

We had fresh local crab for dinner. Plan is to go to North Ronaldsay (home of the seaweed-eating sheep) tomorrow afternoon and leave for Norway overnight tomorrow.

Thursday, May 19 - Saturday May 21

Tme to go to Norway! We took showers in Westray after breakfast — our last shower in Scotland. It was really windy (30 knots) all day Thursday, and we wanted to wait for it to calm down first. We had to move the boat by hand along the dock, which was difficult.We watched the weather closely during the day, and eventually left at 3am Friday morning. We would have left at 2am, but we decided to wait for first light which was definitely available at 3am.

Offshore, we had 2 hour watches — 30 minutes steering, 30 minutes lookout, then repeat. Overnight, Julie had a 2-4am watch; Ken had 10pm-midnight and 4-6am. Ken said he found it disturbing that he watched the sunset on the first watch and the sunrise on the second. Julie was on deck when we lost sight of the last bit of land — Fair Isle between Orkney and Shetland Islands. It felt strange to be completely surrounded by water, but not disturbing.

Julie helped get underway on the passage. Since we were beating upwind, it was pretty bumpy down below, especially in our bunk in the vee berth up front. Julie slept OK. Up there, Ken didn't. He was pretty seasick most of the time, even with 2 seasickness medications (stugeron and compazine). Julie was pretty ok, as long as she avoided navigating or reading down below, with 1 seasickness medication (stugeron). From a motion perspective, the most comfortable places in the boat were in the cockpit outside (where it was cold) or lying with your eyes closed in your bunk. I had the lee cloths up, but even still, once I almost fell out of bed because there was a big lurch when I was sitting up, and I hit the lee cloth buckle with enough force that I almost dislodged it. I also mistimed going into the head, accidentally fell over, and ended up not in the hallway but in the bunkroom next to it.

Winds eventually built to 25-32+ knots sustained (Force 7, near gale), with gusts as high as 38 knots. We had to sail both upwind and downind in those conditions — a little nerve wracking and very bumpy below. We sailed south of our destination so that when the wind changed, we wouldn't be sailing directly into the wind for the final bit of the passage. Ken had a lot of trouble sleeping during the passage because it was so bumpy, especially upwind. He noticed when the boat turned downwind because the motion changed significantly. Julie didn't notice the difference in particular. Ken later recollected that it felt almost like a light switch for him — upwind motion was that much more uncomfortable for him. Once we turned downwind, he started to feel better, was able to sleep, and even developed an appetite for the first time in a few days.

We weren't the only ones struggling in the wind. We were visited by a small migratory bird for several hours. We think he was blown off course and didn't intend to be in the middle of the North Sea, and was exhausted. He would land on the cockpit, rest, fly away, and then came back after trying to fly in the wind. He provided great entertainment while he was there. Eventually, he flew inside the boat by accident and landed on Amanda's head! Amanda provided a box for him to rest in, but unfortunately, he died later that night.

On passage, we all wore our full foulies and sea boots, as well as safety harnesses. To avoid waking people up below, and to avoid getting everything below wet (because we were regularly getting drenched while on watch), we generally got dressed in the cockpit, under the hard dodger.

We eventually got into Bergen about 1am on Saturday night (Sunday early am). The approach into Bergen at night was beautiful with all the lights into the hills. We had to motor around looking for a mooring space in the harbor. Eventually we pulled into one which we later figured out was a private berth next to an office building. We assumed it was CEO parking or something.

Sunday, May 22

We had morning and early afternoon to ourselves in Bergen. We bought a shower pass, took a shower, then had lunch at the Egon Restaurant (which we later figured out was a chain). It cost about $50 (?) for lunch, so it was a rude awakening to Norwegian prices. We wandered around Bergen looking for gluten free bars and some warm clothes. We clearly didn't bring enough warm clothes with us, so we were looking for a fleece. We never found a grocery store, so we bought some bars at 7-Eleven for $3 each. Ouch. Many of the outdoors stores were closed on Sunday, but eventually we found some fleeces for $25 at a souveneir store. They served us well the rest of the trip, and let Ken avoid having to wear 4 layers at a time to stand watch. Julie also bought a "buff" for her hair, inspired by Lisa. We saw a classic Volkswagon club display and wandered around the old town. The buildings have a pulley system to access the 2nd floor storerooms. There were lots of tourists in town, mostly from the cruise ship that had pulled in. We left port about 3pm.

In the morning in Bergen, we moved the boat to a new location. We drove around looking for either an open space or another suitable boat to raft up to. We eventually found a guy walking around a sailboat in foulies, so that seemed like a good choice. [It felt a lot like skiing when you need to ride the chairlift with other people — you size up everyone around you and try to pick someone "good".] He turned out to be a Swedish violin-playing pulmonologist who was kind enough to let us raft alongside. John said later that in the cruising community, what goes around comes around — you never refuse a request for help.

We motored to Fedje in the rain. Today, we had a real-life lesson in the value of Automatic Identification System (AIS), a boat tracking system required on large boats and encouraged on smaller ones. It transmits and calculates information about the boat such as type, size, distance, and closest approach. When I was on watch, there was a decent amount of fog, but visibility was still OK. Michael saw a ferry boat appear out of the fog, and I asked John for the range via AIS, which was 4 miles. We were in a really busy commercial lane between oil support ships, ferries, the occasional cruise ship, etc. The fog came in even worse as we approached Fedje, with little visibility. Ken was the lookout standing high on the granny bars (mast pulpit), and I was actively monitoring the AIS. We had a ship come really close but Ken couldn't see it in the fog even though he could hear it. Then, we had a narrow channel into the harbor, and I could tell from the AIS that one of the two boats in the harbor was coming out about the time we wanted to go in. The first time Ken (up on deck) was aware of this ferry was when it blew the 5-blast "danger" horn signal, and then appeared out of the fog in the middle of the very narrow channel we were about to enter. Scary. There seems to be good AIS compliance in this area, we think because people want to be aware of the shipping traffic. However, that's not true in all parts of the world. We also had radar on in order to pick up things not on AIS.

We had dinner on the boat at 8:30pm after arrival. After a quick walk through town in the fog, we all went to bed.

Monday, May 23

We motor sailed to Floro next. (Note: the difference between "motoring" and "motor sailing" is that you put the mainsail up with 2 reefs, which both increases speed and reduces rolling of the boat). The sun finally came out! There was lots of island dodging to get there, because the winds on the outside passage were too strong. We saw many pretty little villages on the way to Floro, with a few houses each. We also saw houses on tiny rocky islands which must be really hard to reach in the winter. Ken was freezing cold all day because he was outside too long. Julie showed Rick and Michael about secondary port tidal calculations and Ken did navigation. Julie did research on interesting places to visit and found Kalvag as a possible place to stop by the next day. Our next main destination is a nasty headland where we need favorable weather to get around it. We'll spend an extra day in this area to wait for the weather to break. We did showers and laundry in the evening. We took a walk before dinner and found a grocery store to buy body wash (we didn't think we needed to bring soap, so we hadn't packed any in our toiletries).

Tuesday, May 24

Julie woke up around 6am, and around 7am decided to get up and do yoga on the aft deck. It was breezy but felt good. The previous day, we had discussed visiting the local museum and then leaving. But in the morning, we decided instead to have a lesson about rigging (half of which was outside and super windy), then we had a weather lesson, then lunch, and then we left. We decided to go only to Kalvag (~7 miles) for the night. Wind was 20 knots dead ahead, in an area that would be difficult sail through in the necessary direction (lots of rocks).

There was a lot of spray, and Rick and Martin got pretty soaked. Ken got wet, too, during his watch. Although it wasn't Julie's watch, she stood on the granny bars a bit (exhausting!).

Julie also took off the main halyard after docking, just to prove she could do it. You have to climb onto the mast winch and granny bars in order to reach it (and use both hands).

Ken was navigator today. That meant that the previous night, he had to plot waypoints on the paper chart and put them in the log. Because the paper charts aren't detailed enough for navigation, he had to work with John to transfer them to the computer and refine them to avoid rocks. The navigation is painstaking work — there were more than 25 waypoints.

We needed to wait for a better weather window for rounding the notorious Statt Peninsula. Julie identified Kalvag, which Lonely Planet describes as a "picture-postcard perfect preserved fishing village". After Amanda taught rig inspection, we left Floro and motored seven miles to Kalvag. We found an empty guest dock in front of Knutholmen restaurant. We went walking and found a trail that led up the hill behind the village to some spectacular views of the village and surrounding landscape. On our climb up the hill, Ken and I crossed a small creek with a very muddy white Labrador happily laying in the creek and drinking the water. His owner and we had a good laugh about it, even with the language barrier. Others in our group lost the trail and ended up going over a fence and through a very friendly woman’s backyard to get back.

After we got back, there was a review of weather and route planning for the next day, then dinner, then an anchoring lesson. Ken took a harbor picture at 10pm — it was still really light out! (note: you ain't seen nothin' yet!)

Wednesday, May 25

Alarm went off at 6:15am for a 7am start, because we wanted to leave before the wind blew up too much. The weather was not too cold, and it was also sunny, so we ate both breakfast and lunch outside in the cokcpit! Everyone was excited about the sunshine. After breakfast, we did man overboard drills. It's our 4th sailing group and 4th method for man overboard drills. This one makes a lot of sense for a yacht with only 2 people on it. You use a combination of the boat and Lifesling to rescue the man. The rest of the day, we motored because of narrow channels and especially unfavorable wind direction. We're 2-3 days behind schedule right now because of the unfavorable winds.

We stopped in Måløy for a while and went for a walk. Michael found a fishing store with store with pretty much everything a fisherman or sailor would want! He bought waterproof gloves, and we were all jealous. We all trooped over to the store, and Ken and I bought 2 pair each — an insulated and noninsulated pair. We wore the insulated ones in the afternoon, and they were very comfortable. We went to Silda for the night, a little village on a little island. We went for a walk and went through a construction site and some wet mossy areas. Julie did some yoga in the downtime before dinner.

After arriving in Silda, Amanda gave a talk on provisioning. I'm impressed at how she feeds 8 people, and she is an excellent cook. We later found out that she had worked as a cook in New Zealand and also on other yachts. She has all the meals plotted out including how to use leftovers. She has to make the food fairly easily for all of us. She uses a combination of Costco in Puerto and other major (and inexpensive) ports for a large yearly provisioning, plus local ports for fresher foods.

After dinner, we had a group singalong. John was impressed that we brought our own songbook — apparently, we were the first people to do that even though the packing list said to bring "a favorite song". Julie sang loudly, of course!

Finished the day with a lesson on engine maintenance, then bed.