Category: 2023 (Page 1 of 3)

Year 2023

Winter is here on Kerrara

December 14, 2023 / fiandadrian

By Fi

Its been a little while since we blogged. Last time we spoke, we had just arrived on beautiful Kerrara to tuck in for winter. And we really have! The cold and frost is upon us, and we’re keeping our days busy with boat jobs, extra sleep ins, doggy walks and some winter keep fit activities.

Couldn’t resist risking taking my phone up the mast for this lovely shot of the marina and hills on Kerrara.

We’ve also discovered a beautiful community of people here on Kerrara and I’m enjoying yoga with the girls three times a week, and beers at the pub on the weekends.

Not long after we docked, we were actually off to France to participate in the “Dare to Dream” seminar run by Garcia. Its primarily targeted at new owners, and because we’re old owners, they asked me to come along and give a bit of a talk about our experiences on the boat, what we’ve done, how we felt about it all, and of course, a bit of a chat about my Fastnet adventure. I told the lovely Garcia folk that as this was my THIRD trip to France this year, there is the distinct risk of divorce if I can’t bring my husband as well, and so that was enough for the Garcia team to be convinced that the seminar should be the “Fi and Adrian show”, not just the “Fi show”.

The seminar was to be located on the island of Tatihou on the north coast of France, quite close to Cherbourg. So we hopped on a plane from Glasgow, and into Paris for the evening, and on to Cherbourg the next day.

Happy faces after arriving in Cherbourg.

It was great to catch up with my Fastnet team mates Marie and Clothilde, then on to St Vaast the next morning to catch the amphibious ferry over to Tatihou.

Tatihou is on the left, and the breakwater at the entrance to St Vaast harbour on the right.

The ferry is amphibious as the harbour entrance dries out with the tide.

Adrian on the ferry, anticipating what the weekend here will hold.

We found ourselves in St Vaast again. St Vaast was the destination for our very first trip on Away, and Tatihou is a small island that you can walk to at low tide from St Vaast, through the oyster fields that St Vaast is so famous for. We never got to Tatihou on our first trip, as when we were walking through the oyster fields, we were told that Bernie wasn’t welcome as Tatihou is a bird sanctuary, so we turned around. So it was great to finally visit and it is beautiful!

Lovely old buildings and gardens abound on the island.

The seminar was so much fun, and it was great to dust off my presenting skills and get up and chat and make people laugh for 90 minutes. I was pretty rusty, but eventually found my stride. I had so much fun and we ate so much beautiful French food and drank all the wine.

Day one of the seminar, getting to know everyone.

We were given a tour of the island. The Battle of La Hougue took place just near here between the French and the English in 1692. In the 1700s the area was defended by a number of large forts, a lot of which are still standing.

Dusted off my presenting skills and had a GREAT time doing it!

Much relief after finishing. Signing the wall.

Fabulous group of people to meet and talk about adventures.

Marie took us the scenic route back to Cherbourg via Barfleur and the lighthouse.

Me and Marie, my teammate on the Fastnet.

A little sailboat, taking the opportunity to sail past the Barfleur tidal race at slack tide. It would have been lovely sailing on this day.

Lovely Barfleur. A quaint fishing village on the east side of Cherbourg.

It was lovely to come home to Away on Kerrara and get back into our little groove here. Hiking, yoga, friends, trips into town on the ferry, boat jobs.

After staying in a dog kennel for a few days while we were in France, Bernie needed to get shaved as his fur got matted. So streamlined.

Bernie and I all dressed up for Halloween.

We also watched the fireworks from the pub on bonfire night.

We take a trip over to Dunollie Castle which is just opposite the island of Kerrara. Its a medieval castle ruin of Clan MacDougall.

We take a good hike one day to Gylen Castle on the south side of Kerrara. Again, this was occupied by Clan MacDougall before it was abandoned as it burned down after a siege.

We did decide that we ought to go see some friends while we’re here in the UK, so one extremely chilly morning, we hopped on the train to Glasgow, hired a car and drove around England for a couple of weeks.

Our trip took us to Nottingham to see my Dad’s friends, to Oxford to look at Blenheim Palace again and check out the super cute town of Woodstock, then on to Sommerset to visit Adrian’s friends, then to Bristol to meet up with work mates, then up to Malvern to visit more work mates, then on to Cheltenham to visit more friends, then to the Lake district because its so beautiful, then the big trip home.

With his new haircut, Bernie loves to sit close to the fire in these old English pubs.

Blenheim Palace. The Christmas market was really lovely.

We went to see the Uffington White Horse, the oldest intact white horse in England.

And took a walk along the ramparts of the ancient castle that was here – Uffington Castle.

We saw the standing stones at Avebury were amazing. The town basically sits right in the middle of these absolutely massive circles.

We stay at the George Inn, which has been serving beers for over 700 years. It looks like a movie set, or something out of a video game. I was expecting to meet a bunch of non-playable characters.

We took a walk to the top of the Malvern Hills.

And had cream tea at Croome Court, before exploring the grounds.

Designed and built for the Earl of Coventry, Croome Court is an 18th century mansion.

The owner never wanted Croome to change, and it fell into disrepair, before being sold to a property developer who did some pretty weird modifications to it. Since, it has been preserved by trusts and you can now visit and see the mansion, as well as viewing various art installations. It was spectacular, even with the weird bathroom the developer put in.

Beautiful grounds at Croome, even with the winterness.

Our transport for the morning in the Lakes District.

We get back on the water to navigate to the start of a hike along Ullswater.

Bernie not so impressed with the chilly conditions and his new haircut.

But a little frosty on the shadowy side of the lake.

Unlike Bernie, I am dressed for the occasion.

So, Merry Christmas dear friends and family. We are safe, warm and happy here on Kerrara and I’m recharging my sailing batteries ready for next season.

Back to this beautiful island of Kerrara.

And finally, the highland cows enjoying some seaweed. They are actually quite intimidating up close but I’m assured they are friendly.

Sorry… why are we doing this? Whisky.

October 25, 2023 / fiandadrian

By Fi

After waiting out our… well… second big Scottish blow in Malliag, we decided that given our body weight had increased last time we were here courtesy of the amazing bakery, and was continuing to do so, we should leave. This decision was also assisted by becoming too famous in the marina due to Away – she is stunning and everyone wants to talk to us, and we are introverted and we don’t want to talk to them, although we secretly like it, but we also get a little tired. Anchoring for a while is the tonic we need to recharge our batteries, while we use Away’s batteries.

We find a beautiful sunny day to head back on over to Rum, planning then to go to Dunvegan castle the next day. You might remember we went touring there with Nicole and Nick by road when they were here adventuring with us. We thought we’d go check out the anchorage and wait out the blow that was coming in that anchorage.

The red sky in the morning on the island of Rum, before the storm.

A lovely night on Rum, followed by a nice sail to Skye. We changed plans however part way through. The winds weren’t great, and we decided to stop near the Talisker distillery. The forecast was changing minute to minute. Safely anchored outside Talisker, we set our anchor in really well, ready for the blow.

Away anchored opposite the Talisker distillery. Picture taken from the oyster shop.

We rediscover the distillery, and also the super great local shop, local cafe (amazing coffee and I’m Australian, so… you know its exceptional if I say that), plus an oyster shack.

Chilling out with our oysters, whisky and coffee for a day or so, we check the weather and decide that actually, this anchorage is great, its protected from the prevailing gale wind direction, so lets just wait it out.

Ok, so we waited it out. We were fine. The winds were strong, but our trusty anchor with its nice new snubber was holding like the boss it is. That was until…

The wind was due to change direction then increase to gusts of over 50 knots. We knew. BUT, our error was to not manually reset our anchor for the new wind direction. We spun around to the prevailing wind, and everything seemed absolutely fine. We assumed the anchor had reset. It had not. We were just hanging on the chain. When the wind did suddenly increase to the predicted strengths, the anchor popped out of its spot, and tried desperately to reset, but just couldn’t as it had 16 tonnes of aluminium floating at a suddenly epic pace to try to stop, plus it was probably also covered in chunks of mud. It just skipped over the sea bed.

“Adrian – we are dragging bad” – I said as I quickly got dressed and went outside to turn the motor on. We had already set the boat up to be ready for “sea” as we knew this was coming. So engine on, and I just put it in reasonable speed forward to try to buy us some time.

I wanted to go and let more chain out, but its a little complicated as we use a chain hook for the rope snubber that provides “bounce” for the anchor chain, so I would need to pull chain in, take off the hook, put chain out, put the hook back on for the snubber. Not an appealing job in the needle like rain, massive gusts and bouncing bow situation we had going on as we dragged out into the bay. I have since learned, that having the snubber attached to the chain with some velcro, and utilising a second snubber, I could just drop the first snubber, let out more chain, then attach another snubber – learnings.

Fortunately, Adrian noticed that with me driving the boat forward, we had slowed down our drag enough for our wonderful faithful anchor to grab into the seabed. And grab it did. Sure, we were basically out in the middle of the bay now, but we were stuck in properly.

We spent the night and most of the next day on anchor watch. When we had dragged it was the forecasted worst winds for this gale, so given we were stuck in now, it was okay, but I wasn’t playing with this situation. We watched.

All was well. I managed a trip to shore the next day for more oysters and supplies. Its is truly a lovely spot, and really good holding, we just learned our lesson that if the wind is predicted to suddenly smash you from a totally different direction, but starts out light in said direction, then we’ll be resetting our anchor manually.

So, after that fun, we noted the forecast was for the wind to spin around (and get quite strong again) to the opposite direction (meaning we would be blown onto the shore this time), and so we found an anchorage that would be protected from those prevailing wind conditions.

We travelled the hour or so up to our new anchorage at Loch Bharcasaig. And it was perfect. We anchored up in the evening, dug that anchor in like the dickens, and had a good sleep. The wind picked up before we went to bed, and all was well. We could sleep, we were so protected.

Beautiful anchorage well protected from the north and west. This was our view to the south.

Knowing more gales are forecast, we elected to head back to Malliag to wait them out and eat even MORE baked goods, then further on south on to a secure marina for winter.

Gales gales gales forecast. Autumnal weather.

On a dog walk around Mallaig one day, I waved at the driver of the Harry Potter train, and people in the carriages thought I was waving at them so then I waved at them as well and ended up waving to the entire train as it went past. It was the BEST fun!

We took a train trip to Fort William so Bernie could have his yearly vaccinations. Enjoyed the pub and a walk around Fort William. Happy to not be sailing this day as the gale was in full swing.

The Harry Potter train runs on the same line as the Malliag/Fort William regular train so we got to meet these guys while we waited for our train.

Using the regular train service, you still get to go over the Glenfinnian Viaduct, made particularly famous in the Harry Potter films when Ron and Harry are flying in the car. Its beautiful, and a lot cheaper at 9 pounds for the ticket, as opposed to 90 for the Harry Potter train. But steam train enthusiasts would love the Harry Potter train.

The gales pass as they tend to do, so after a super fun sail, playing tacking tag with another sailboat, we stopped in Tobermory which is gorgeous! Plus it has a dairy that makes yummy hard style cheese much like a cheddar. Plus another distillery. Our whisky stores are increasing.

Tacking tag was super fun in the Sound of Mull.

Isle of Mull cheese make yummy cheeses and you can visit the dairy for lunch and cake and buy yummy things from their farm shop.

This vine covers the glass house cafe and was planted decades ago. It provides shade in summer and the leaves fall in autumn to allow the winter sun in. Beautiful.

Our view with coffee and cake from the cafe at the dairy.

Tobermory is colourful and well worth a visit.

Sailing to Oban was grey, but great wind for sailing.

After a beautiful sail through the sound of Mull, we arrived in Kerrara Marina just near Oban. We were (or perhaps, I was) quite finished for the season given all my racing adventures, so with some quick replanning, we negotiated with Kerrara for us to stay here for the winter. Its a beautiful island with great hikes, secure facilities, and its just a quick trip in their water taxi over to Oban which has excellent shops, pubs, connections to Glasgow plus a distillery. Happy.

Our wind instruments had broken, so up I go to the top of Away to replace with a new one. Beautiful Kerrara Marina on a still sunny day. Not seeing too many of those lately.

It doesn’t look that high from the ground, but when I’m up here… Whoo its high!

We take Bernie to Dunollie Castle for a look around. Its on the headland opposite Kerrara.

I suspect he was more concerned that there was no food to clean up on the ground.

But it was good exercise and new sniffings.

View north from Kerrara on a gorgeous day. Perfect sailing weather!

A quick trip on the water taxi takes us into the main Oban town for provisioning.

Oban is one of the busiest ports in Scotland.

We will stay here for the winter, heading home in February for a little sunshine, then continue our adventures in the new year. I’m sure we will find some breaks in the weather and get a couple of trips in over winter. The heater is working well!

Mostly sky. Occasionally Skye

October 7, 2023 / fiandadrian

By Adrian

Mallaig, it turns out, is a popular hub for accessing the west coast of Scotland. With one of the few train lines to the coast there is a regular influx of day trippers, walkers, and stalkers. We become familiar with the green jacketed parties boarding charter boats heading off to stalk some wildlife. Hikers abound and we later discovered many are heading to and from the most remote pub in Britain which is a boat ride away.

After locating probably the best bakery in the west of Scotland at the end of the marina we wondered if we would ever leave. But increasing girth and a rare forecast of good weather overcame our Mallaig malaise and we moseyed out to the islands.

Away discreetly hiding at the end of the marina dock

UK signage has a certain clarity not found in other English speaking parts of the world. I wonder what tourists with limited English think this means?

Rum seemed an appropriate destination in part of world dominated by whisky. The island had a long history of habitation from the standing-up-stones period to the current day. Its mostly a tourist destination now for camping, walking and shooting.

There were mooring buoys for visitors, but we chose the quieter anchoring option on a windless evening. I suppose I should mention this isn’t us, simply a nice neighbour who had the same idea, on a beautiful morning.

In 1888 John Bullough bought the island and his son later built this cottage to accommodate a few friends on hunting trips. Its not open to the public at the moment so we had to make do with a walk by. Seemed like nice spot for the weekend with a few friends. In recent years there have been several attempts to buy and renovate the property, but a deal is yet to be made.

250 000 ton of soil were imported for the gardens. Of course there is a sprung dance floor, a squash court, a golf course and a bowling green for when guests run out of things to shoot.

Bernie demanded we head ashore for a spaniel walk to the other side of the island. It was a hot still day so we agreed and headed off on an 18km traverse of the island.

*Yep that’s a location appropriate thistle with Away in the background*.

We shot these deer with Skye towering in the background.

We sat by the beach for lunch. Definitely a walking day. Not good for sailing.

Suddenly there was a big bellowing sound and everyone looked around.

Deary me, we were staggered. He had been sitting in plain sight and we hadn’t spotted him till he stood up to survey his kingdom

It was a hot day but Bernie discovered the muddy drainage ditches along side the track were ideal to cool ones paws, and tummy, and ears, and tail. I think its going to be a dog bath day!

As we got back to the boat the coastguard helicopter swooped into the bay and landed in front of the castle. We expect someone was suffering from heat stroke after temperatures had soared into the early twenties that day.

After a hot sunny day we knew what was coming.

Some Scottish atmosphere drifted across the bay.

Time to move on to Skye which was only a short hop away. Relatively settled conditions meant we could try an ‘day anchorage’ with ‘the worst katabatic winds’ in Scotland.

Skye is mostly sky, but occasionally Skye

We braved the grey and went ashore for a quick look. But it wasn’t till the next day that we discovered why there is a steady stream of tourist boats arriving here.

Plenty of Scottish drama: lake, waterfalls, rapids and a hut run by the Junior Mountaineering Club of Scotland, Glasgow Section.

We didn’t need to go far to find the lake and spectacular scenery

Bernie was happy to be on land but we were all a bit tired from our long walk on Rum.

Bernie knows the dinghy means adventures and will jump in, just in case, even if we are not going anywhere.

Leaving the anchorage the seals and shags were wildly excited to see Away pass close by.

This one even looked up. It was probably the last sun they would see in days so sun baking was more important than passing vessels.

We were heading back to the coast when we spotted one of the more remote beach houses on Skye

A blow was forecast but before heading for shelter we headed to Britain’s most remote mainland pub, The Old Forge at Knoydart. Its accessible by a ‘2 day 18 mile hike’ or a somewhat shorter ferry ride from Mallaig. While most of the hiking booted punters downed pints in the manner of long distance walkers satisfied after a challenging walk, we had dinner with a chap who had run the 18 miles that afternoon. Apparently there is a free beer for achieving that feat which was enough of an incentive for some.

Few things better in life that looking out of a pub window at your safely moored house.

The next day we enjoyed the short sail back to the bakery at Mallaig for a much needed dose of scrolls, chocolate croissant, sourdough, focaccia and sausage rolls.

Mallaig is also the destination for the ‘Harry Potter train’. It had arrived at the station so we had a look and a quick chat to the driver.

Fi chose a suitably contrasting outfit for her portrait in front of the locomotive.

Next time we sit out the first winter storms and then go to a distillery to sit out some more winter storms, and head back to Mallaig before more winter storms roll in.

Sharing the Outer Hebrides and Skye

September 25, 2023 / fiandadrian

By Fi

Last year we were lucky enough to have a guest (Tara – Adrian’s daughter) come and visit us on Away. Word must have spread because we are now on our 3rd guest visit this year and we love it! In our last post, we had Phil and Cheryl come visit for the North Sea crossing and some adventures around Norway and Scotland. This time…

It was to be in Ullapool that we would pick up one of my most oldest friends Nicci. She’s an adventurer, and one of the most fun and lovely people I know. Oh, yes and of course she’s bringing her brilliant husband, Nick along for the journey too!

Ullapool is a pretty place. We thought it would be really industrial after reading the descriptions on the cruising guides, but it was really quaint!

We are sat on a mooring ball in Ullapool that is only *just* rated for Away, so rather than drag them out there in the choppy waters via dinghy, we thought we’d pop in to the temporary stay dock and pick them up. Away in all her glory comes on in to the dock, and we are all together with happy tears to see each other!

Here we goooo! Ready for some adventures!

After a bit of a run down of the ins and outs of boating life, we have convinced Nic and Nick that we should spend the evening on anchor close by, and then do a proper 7 hour sail the next day.

Adrian getting straight into his sailing teacher get up.

Pretty anchorage, and all the fashionistas on the beach.

Even with the grey, the colours are magic.

After a little “beach” walk on the pebbles, we have a good sleep in this safe anchorage, and head off the next morning for our sail to the Outer Hebrides. Its a lovely sail! The wind is just forward of the beam and stays reasonably consistent, until it doesn’t and we all get a big excited with reefing, then naturally, just as we are about to get to harbour a lovely squall wanted to come and visit. No matter as we turned downwind and as it passed, we put down the sails and tied up in Stornoway in the Outer Hebrides.

Yes it was cold and grey. But the wind was great!

She’s smiling (and not just because she’s wearing red crocs)!

Getting towards the harbour, and we got smacked with a squall. Sails to the ready, we were okay and could turn downwind while it passed, taking the sails in a few moments later.

Bernie loves having new friends. Well, old friends, but new company.

Tied up safely in Stornoway, we heard bagpipes the next morning!

Here, the weather looked like we should stay for a few nights so we hired a car and drove around the Isle of Lewis and explored loads of old things.

Near the Marina is Lews Castle. Once owned by a mean drug dealer, it is now a lovely hotel with a tea room, museum and lovely gardens to explore.

A few of the Lewis chessmen (curious name as some queens were discovered too) were on display here – they were discovered in a sandbank on Lewis in 1831 and are 12th century chess pieces carved from walrus ivory and whales teeth.

We had a little look at the museum, and took Bernie for a walk around on this lovely sunny day!

We see this little one on the path and all rush up to take photos. It just decided to face the wall ad pretend like we weren’t there. Poor thing. Sooo cute though! Never seen one before! Little hedgehog.

First stop on our road trip was Scotland’s largest standing stone – Clach An Truishal Standing Stone. Its very large. A princess lives inside but she didn’t answer when we knocked. We also tried to take a decent family photo but its just resulted in me looking like I’m relieving myself on the dog. Payback?

You may be interested to know that I have purchased a Harris Tweed headband which is in my favourite colour – matching my jacket, and my crocs too but I couldn’t wear my crocs today as it was raining and we were possibly hiking.

Perhaps we will learn from Nic and Nick how to take a nice photo.

Next stop was the Butt of Lewis Lighthouse and this amazing view.

We forgot to take a photo of the lighthouse…

Because we were too busy giggling about taking photos of each other.

Our next stop was the Port of Ness beach, and a little explore around.

It DID NOT look like a harbour we were going to safely squeeze Away into any time soon.

On the way south, we also stop in at the local museum and learn about some bronze age finds near the area, have a nice lunch and stop in at the local shop. We also buy some eggs from the side of the road which I always love! They were all different shapes and sizes.

Onwards! To the Blackhouses! The weather was perfect one minute, and squally the next. Happily we had a car and could keep Bernie dry, and get him out when we could.

The Gearrannan Blackhouse Village was built in the 1800s. Each house it built on a slope, and the animals would live in the lower section, and would warm the building. There were no internal walls originally. People were living here until the 1970s (the did put in internal walls, and the animals were removed by then).

I listen intently to the old mate with the stories by the peat fire. Apparently when the last people who lived here were sent to council housing, the Scottish Trust took over and in the 90s restored them.

Most houses in the village are now accommodation (inclusive of internal walls, electricity and running water). Its a beautiful spot.

Next stop in our whirlwind tour of Lewis was the Calanais Standing Stones. We arrived after the visitor centre was closed, but the stones are still open so we had a bit of a look.

Very eerie. Its nice because unlike Stonehenge, you can walk right up to and around these guys.

This is the main site. There are 3 other sites that you can also visit very close by. Why were these even built??? Also how did I get a shot with NO ONE in it? Talent that is.

On the drive back to Away, we see some red deer in the field off to the side of the road.

Once our exploring itch was scratched and a couple of pub meals were had, we planned a passage to the Shiant Islands so go find some puffins, and then on to an anchorage, before a hike the next day, finishing with a quick sail to Tarbert on Harris.

Arriving and dropping anchor, we couldn’t find any puffins but there was an extraordinary number of gulls and shags. A quick google search enlightened us that the puffins would have left the day before for warmer pastures. Oh well. Off to our protected anchorage for the evening.

Happy, but no puffins face. Apparently they left the day before we got there for warmer weather.

After a great sleep because the wind died off just as we anchored up, and stayed away until we started sailing the next day (amazing), we planned a short trip to Tarbert on Harris, with a stop for a lovely hike on the island of Scalpay.

Our stunning anchorage for the evening. The Antares charts (our cruising MUST HAVE for this area) say this is in their top 10 in Scotland.

This short trip involved our new autopilots helming us over to the harbour where our hike starts. We needed to time it right, because the bridge we go under was 19m high, we are 20m high, and there is a bunch of water that makes things lower or higher to consider. As it were, we timed the tide perfectly, gingerly went under the bridge with no scraping noises, and parked up on Scalpay. Back packs to the ready, we were off!

Happy to be sharing this adventure together!

The heather is beautiful and in full bloom.

Happy because we remembered to take a photo of a lighthouse!

Once that epic hike was done, we were off to Tarbert for a couple of nights. Nicci and I enjoyed a cuppa inside, while Nick and Adrian motored the half an hour over to Tarbert.

For some reason, Tarbert is devoid of photographs. We visited the Harris Tweed shop, which funnily enough sold reams of tweed, and we had some food at a local cafe and visited the not whisky distillery. I’m calling it that because I fully expected whisky, but their premiere whisky batch was coming a week after we were there, instead it was gin. No matter, we bought gin.

Nicci did take a nice photo of the 3 of us in Tarbert!

From Tarbert, we plan a big trip to Skye. It was tantalisingly close, and keeps peeping through the clouds. Off we go, and picked out a nice anchorage for some evenings of no wind.

And WOW the amount of dolphins! We haven’t seen this many since we were sailing the NSW coast.

We decided stay on the island of Rona, just opposite Skye. There was supposed to be a lovely anchorage, deer and hikes on Rona.

This little girl appeared on the hill top while we were enjoying sundowners.

Beautiful spot to park, then repark Away. It was a very tight and shallow spot, so we anchored, then reanchored so that I could get some sleep.

Hiking on the island was boggy but beautiful. We saw our dolphin friends in the bay opposite, and a cave church thing.

Lovely no wind anchorage. And sunshine. The island also produces its own venison and sells it with an honesty system. We picked up a few frozen packages for later.

After a couple of nights, Skye was calling and we saw the perfect opportunity to get out the big red sail and float on over to Portree on Skye!

And our dolphin friends came back to say hello!

We sail near a boat called “Arvik”, a French expedition boat who are raising awareness of humans impact on the oceans and on wildlife. They are making great progress with the fishing industry by helping them change small things, to make it safer for wildlife and reduce by-catch. They do however have many sad stories about things they have discovered. Its people like this that will make the world a better place. We had them over for a drink and a chat and they are really inspiring. Check them out here: http://arvikocean.org/index.php/en/home-english/

In this picture, they have a tonne of rubbish they have picked up on the bow. Can you see the broken mooring ball? It had washed up somewhere and they collected it for proper disposal. Amazing humans.

I digress, we anchor up in Portree, enjoy the super moon, and hire a car for some Skye fun, before we need to get Nic and Nick further south to Malliag where they will be leaving us to head home.

SUPER MOON! Of course in the photo it looks like nothing, but in real life – SUPER.

Heading into town to go pick up our car and also have some breaky.

First stop the Old Man of Storr! It was featured in the Prometheus movie and Nick was keen to see. We were more than happy to oblige on this beautiful day – plus I love that movie.

Taking photos of each other taking photos again.

After a good hike and with a tired spaniel, we drive to Dunvegan castle, home to the Macleod family for 800 years! There is an extensive collection of Jacobite relics here, including a lock of Bonnie Prince Charlie’s hair.

Lovely castle. I believe they still live here. Extensive castle grounds too with amazing gardens.

This is actually an anchorage. Perhaps we will come back?

I rescued Bernie from car prison so he could also enjoy the gardens once we were done in the castle.

Next stop on our little adventure was the Talisker distillery where we tried out some of their whiskys, but neglected to take any photos though. But don’t worry, as I write this we have spent a lot of time in the area near Talisker, with some enjoyment, and also some terror. You’ll have to wait for another blog post for those shenanigans.

So, being the sober designated driver that he is, Adrian drove us to the Fairy Pools. Beautiful cascading pools where you can swim – alas you had to hike for 40 minutes, and as it was so late in the day (also whisky), we decided to enjoy the views and get back to Away to get ready for our trip the next day to Malliag.

The pools are up along this track for about 40 minutes. Perhaps we will get back here one day.

Yep amazing. The heather is still out. Scotland is gorgeous.

After our Skye adventures, we head off VERY early to make sure we catch the tides through the Loch Alsh area. They can run very fast, and so up we get at 5AM ready to go by 6, and swooooosh, we get the tides.

Yeah I might look happy, but mornings are not my thing. I’m happy because we left in time, would get the right tides and would get to Malliag before the wind picked up drastically.

Pretty sunrise. I include this as I don’t often see it. Its quite nice really.

It may not look like it, but we are hooting along in the current. We had to motor this leg, because there was absolutely no wind, and we needed to get Nic and Nick to Malliag. The wind was due later, but in the totally wrong direction for us, and I didn’t fancy putting them through tacking in tight channels as their last goodbye to sailing with us.

It was an EARLY start so Nicci enjoyed a nap in all her clothes in the sunshine. It was really chilly!

Safely tied up in Malliag, we do a little turn about town, before enjoying our last night playing cards.

Malliag harbour. Really safe, really nice, and with an excellent bakery – that was shut because we arrived late.

Bye Nicci and Nick! What an adventure to have my people on board. Its so nice to share a little more of my life now, and it was so nice to see my wonderful friends. See you soon!!!!!!

Lets go to Scotland

September 7, 2023 / fiandadrian

After Fi got back from the Fastnet, we went straight to a sauna, to break the news to her that we could be doing the north sea crossing the next day.

“No…” Fi said, even after this relaxing sauna, and that was settled.

Instead, we compromised and did a passage from Trondheim to Kristiansand where we could check out from Norway and cross the North Sea to Scotland. Finally. We were supposed to do this crossing last year but we left it too late because we fell in love with Norway.

We sent Fi up the mast for a pre North Sea crossing rig inspection

All rigging checked and we are ready to go once we get Fi down

We also had our lovely friends visiting from America! Yay visitors! We love sharing this adventure with our loved ones and we hadn’t seen Phil or Cheryl since our canal boat adventures together.

We had chosen what we thought was the best weather window, catching the good winds at the edge of a storm that had developed over south western Norway before it engulfed the coast in strong winds and rain for a week. And indeed, it was PERFECT!!

The local fish restaurant has been recommended and didn’t disappoint.

After checking out we left the dock early the next morning.

Kristiansund harbour. Our last port in Norway.

This boat was parked exactly on the waypoint we had plotted. We decided to go around it.

We avoided the oil rigs, and played the usual games with the fishing people. They like doing fun things at night. This night they stop right in front of our track and spawn some new AIS targets. We gybe away and they turn around and go parallel with our new course leaving their spawned AIS targets behind. We call them to ask them what in the world they are doing and is it safe for us to gybe again to pass between them and the other AIS targets. All settled we gybe again and head for the Shetlands.

We turned left to avoid two fishing boats. They spawned 4 other fishing boats and then headed off in the opposite direction. We turn and go between the newly spawned and old fishing boats.

After about 42 hours we arrive in Lerwick and clear into the UK. It had been a fast a relatively uneventful passage matching closely with the weather predictions. Rather than go to town, we decided to stop in a quiet anchorage and enjoy our first Scottish gale. Phil and Cheryl go into Lerwick for provisions while Adrian and I stay on the boat watching the gusts.

We pass our first Broch… An iron age dry stone castle.

Our first anchorage in the Shetland Islands.

Away sits out a blow in a somewhat sheltered bay.

After a few days of this, the wind decided to abate, and we sailed south to the Orkneys and another anchorage. We are just so amazed at how different the landscape is here from what we have been seeing the past year. North Orkney was flat!

Next its on to Kirkwall. We see castles and tidal currents – ah yes, we are back in the land of thinking about tides. Phil and Cheryl say goodbye to us here after their (and our) first North Sea crossing!

They do wee country cottages proper here.

Adrian and I chose to stay in Kirkwall for a few days to do some shopping. We even ended up at the local agricultural fair and wondered if we needed a tractor.

It was all Romans and donuts at the local show.

Some rather clever dogs tried to teach Bernie how to herd geese, but it didn’t really rub off on him.

Next up, we have some fun getting to Ullapool.

Before leaving Kirkwall, we walk to the beach where the wreck of the Royal Oak lies, and tried to get into the distillery but the coos said no.

The south side of the Orkney Islands get more dramatic.

Another beautiful day arrives so we leave to motor/sail around the island and through the tidal gates to Stromness. We were met by friendly locals who caught our lines and told us all the ins and outs of town. We were keen to see some old stuff, so we got our bikes out and took the 40 minute bike ride out to Scara Brae, a neolithic site that was uncovered by a storm in the late 1800s. Its amazingly intact, and old.

Neolithic buildings were primitive but very solid.

4000 years later things have changed a bit in Stromness.

We passed the home of a legendary figure in Australian history!

We had been in Scotland a week without visiting any stone circle so we set out to visit the local upright stones. Very Scottish. No time travel today though.

BUT – we have more guests arriving and we need to get to mainland Scotland! The rather scary sounding Cape Wrath needed to be rounded with a wide berth according to the charts. We find some perfect sailing weather and sail south west to the mainland. Cape Wrath was conserving its wrath, and we slid down the coast to a gorgeous little anchorage.

‘One of the most protected anchorages in the area’ the guide book said. Add storm Betty and it was soon gusting over 40 knots casting doubt on the shelter of other anchorages in the area. The anchor snubber even decided it was reaching the end of its life and started to unravel. So we couldn’t stay in this lovely place as the wind was forecast to get even stronger, so we had to brave the gale and get out into the sea to head further south to find better protection.

Sheltered they said… from what we wonder?

No ocean swell but plenty of wind chop. Sailing up wind is all fun!

After a lively upwind sail in over 30 knots we arrived at Lochinver marina where cruising guides promised more ‘protection’. Happily, when we docked, the wind had abated temporarily, and we stayed in the marina whilst yet another gale passed overhead, clocking wind speeds of 50 knots. Ahhh Scotland! We heard it was lovely sailing, then waiting out a gale.

From Lockinver it was just one more hop down to Ullapool, and a sufficiently rated mooring ball for us, where we could pick up our friends from Sydney!

We had imagined Ullapool to be quite commercial, but the loch was picturesque

Next time, we pick up our new guests and manage to see the Outer Hebrides and Skye!

Sniffin Bronny and Tronheim

August 25, 2023 / fiandadrian

With Fi heading off for a warm up race and then the notorious Fastnet, Bernie and I set about sniffing our way around Brønnøysund and then Trondheim.

Bernie watched Fi disappear into the airport terminal and was convinced we shouldn’t leave without her.

We amused ourselves with goings on in the harbour. These people were loading enough food on their tiny boat for an Atlantic crossing.

In Norway, if you climb a hill you will likely find a WW2 gun emplacement. The Germans invested a lot of resources into coastal defenses and much of it is surprisingly intact. Sure enough…

There was a spotlight that looked like it just needed a new bulb but we didn’t understand enough German to get the generator going.

This hole led to more underground rooms and fortifications

The flowers exploded into the short summer season

Bernie was wary, then suspicious and eventually curious of the hundreds of automatic lawn mowers. One drove straight up to the path we were on, received an appropriate barking, turned around and headed back to its hutch.

The race had started and we were glued to our screen following commander Bernard, following the fleet across the channel

Right in the middle of Brønnøysund there was one plot with no automatic lawn mower

One day I announced that Fi would be returning soon, and we could tell here all about our vet visit and upcoming operation.

And we were soon on the move again to get to Trondheim, the airport for the next race and the location for Bernie’s little op.

After a sporty sail down the coast we stayed at Leka, a small Island for the night.

Outside Trondheim we spotted some traditional sailing craft like the one we saw in Brønnøysund.

A line of thunderstorms welcomed us to Trondheim. We didn’t get hit by lightening but the atmospheric conditions played with the wind instruments that showed over 80 knts wind speed, with no actual wind.

Trondheim is an attractive town with many older buildings. Bernie and I set about sniffing every inch of the city.

They have erected a statue of a man easting an ice cream to distract the seagulls from the real thing below. We need one of these at Manly beach in Sydney.

Trondheim uses the full Norwegian colour palette

Whilst Bernie had a big sleep they chopped a lump out of his leg. It later turned out to be benign.

Bernie woke up with a cone on his head. He soon figured out that if he charged around the boat thrashing his head around, everyone got out of his way.

We found the river in Trondheim that sweeps through parks and old buildings.

We moved to a new harbour in the centre of Trondheim in anticipation of international guests arriving.

The world watched as Emma closed in on the legendary Fastnet rock

Bernie went back to the vet to get his stitches removed. He was so excited to come home with a bigger cone!

The music museum and more importantly the waffle stall were at the end of the dock.

This is the oldest commercial steam vessel in Norway and does tourist trips on the fjord.

We found a cannon that was so poorly designed it needed extra legs so it didn’t overbalance.

Eventually it was time for our triumphant Fastnet warrior to return. Would she understand I had been to Hell and back to bring her home?

After a month in harbour it was time to cross the sea to a new country.

Fi left… twice

August 8, 2023 / fiandadrian

An honest account of my experiences of going totally out of my comfort zone. The photos in this blog are a combination from me, Marie, Clothilde, Sean, Kate, Rebecca and Sylvia. Thank you.

If you had told me a year ago, I’d be ticking off a bucket list item of completing the Fastnet race in one of the hardest years of the Fastnet, breaking halyards, doing night watches and spending a week in a small space with 5 other beautiful strangers I would have laughed. But this I did.

Before I start, a little about Emma. She is a 52 foot aluminium cruising vessel with a lifting centreboard. She has a large sail at the front called a “solent”, a smaller sail just behind that called the “staysail”, a main sail that can be made smaller by reefing, and it has 3 possible reefs, each making the sail smaller – so this means we can change the sails around for the different conditions. She also has a light wind sail called an asymmetrical spinnaker which is a pretty pink and red colour and is really powerful. Inside she has 6 berths, plus the central table that can be converted into a giant bed for pyjama parties. 2 bathrooms, a generator, 2 fridges and a large freezer.

Right – Fi did some racing. Here we go.

One grey afternoon, we walked to the airport in Brønnøysund to say goodbye to Fi (me) who was leaving for some new adventures.

A few months ago, I was asked by our lovely contact at Garcia (who built Away) if I wanted to do the Fastnet (one of the worlds biggest sailing races with 500 boats in this years race). As I picked myself up off the floor, and stuttered some words at Adrian about it in no discernible order, Fi and Adrian Sailing decided to become “Fi Racing and Adrian on Dog Sitting Duty” for a short time. I said “yes” having no idea about ocean racing, but that’s what I do – say yes to opportunities. Why not? I’ve sailed Away for 2 years in ocean swells and gale force winds, around tiny islands in Sweden and Norway, around massive ships in the Kiel and the standing mast route in the Netherlands. Plus we’d done the south coast of England, the Solent and the channel, and the north coast of France – plus all the other stuff. All good training for what was coming.

First up was the La Trinite/Cowes by Actual race, which would enable us to qualify as a team to race in the Fastnet.

I left Brønnøysund bound for an evening in Paris, then on to La Trinite sur mer the next day to meet up with the mighty 52 foot Garcia Exploration, named Emma which was to be my home for the next week. I met the wonderful team, Clothilde (skipper and the lovely person who invited me), Marie, Kate, Sean, Sylvia, Rebecca and Mark (owners of Emma).

From left, Clothilde (skipper), Marie (co-skipper), Sylvia, Me, Kate. Rebecca arrived a few hours after this was taken. Don’t worry we’ll see her.

After a big day of getting to know each other and prepping, I suddenly found myself untying lines, and in the La Trinite/Cowes boat race. Sitting on the windward side of Emma I pondered my life decisions as I reached out to some super massive sail boats for a high five.

We pass the start line and headed west to get out from the harbour and its islands and into the sea. Then, heading north, we did lots of tacking as the wind was on the nose. It was hard to learn tacking on what is basically the same boat, but entirely different, whilst at the same time figuring out where I fit in this new group. My experience with groups of people over the last few years has been… Adrian – and being the borderline painfully introverted, unconfident but capable type that I am, I was suddenly thrust into a group team situation and found myself calling on resources I hadn’t called upon since my working days (team work, communication etc etc) and crikey I’m rusty. Adding to that, my life consists of picking nice weather windows to travel in our home to exotic places, spending time with Adrian and my beautiful dog. Its all quite relaxed and enjoyable, and ocean racing is… well… challenging! My first watch was from 12 midnight to 4:30AM and so I learned a lot in the dark on a new to me boat, with new to me people. To say my poor little brain was overloaded is an understatement, and to be fair, I think I did okay.

Helming upwind. The autopilot had decided not to work so there was a lot of manual helming on this race.

The next few days were a blur of night watches, dealing with no wind at all, dolphins, storms with a fully reefed Emma and shouting at ships at the same time, before we finally found ourselves gybing up the English coast, and navigating the tides through the Solent before finally getting to Cowes and the finish line, and that much anticipated glass of French wine. 3 days, 7 hours sailing and 411 nautical miles.

Whoo upwind! Still smiling even though the autopilot was out.

Yep, dodging ships at 03:30 in the morning. I shouted at one… But they moved for us.

Marie and Kate hoping we’re going to hit the tide correctly for the Solent passage.

Passing Hurst Castle through the north channel.

Clothilde calling up race control on the VHF. We arrived at 12:37 at night. No one was particularly interested as we were last.

I think I didn’t eat a hot meal for 3 days, as I was just putting food in for fuel, sleeping, trying to keep clean, and sailing. Huge challenge. I think as a team this was so great. We learned by the end of the race how to really mesh as a team and we nailed the finish. Oh my gosh, we have qualified to do the Fastnet race.

After a great sleep, we enjoyed the next day in Cowes, went to the awards ceremony and dinner, and planned to leave that night at 2am, or was it 12:30…? French time (boat time) or local time? We were all so tired, but we got the right tide to get out of the Solent, and back into the channel to get to Cherbourg for some more training and sorting out of Emma.

In Cherbourg, we were really fortunate that Mark (one of the owners of Emma) had organised for sailing great, Pete Goss, to come and mentor us for a few hours on Emma. We learned a lot from him, and these lessons we are taking into the Fastnet.

Good chats with Pete Goss! We took notes for sure! Loads of lessons to be learned and a growing to do list to prepare Emma for the Fastnet!

I get back to my home on Away, and my lovely little family a few days later, and we enjoy settling back in. It felt so good to be back in my comfort zone, Away, our home that we know how to sail without even thinking about it, that is set up exactly how we like it for sailing ease and safety. All the things I take for granted are here with me and I am oh so grateful for our world here.

We head south to Lervik in Norway and meet some wonderful new friends on the dock. Ahhh to be back cruising. It really is bliss, and whilst I know I can complete the Fastnet with Emma and her wonderful crew, Ocean racing is probably not going to be something I’m doing on a regular basis. I like chill out cruising too much – which comes with its own challenges of course! But at least I can turn on the motor in no winds, and pick the best weather window to leave, or change destinations on the fly.

Ah cruising again. Beautiful Norway with the wild flowers.

We have a reasonably leisurely trip down the Norwegian coast a day or so after I get back. Huge thanks to Norway, for demonstrating to Adrian what the La Trinite race was like – no winds, 35 knots and triple reefed etc all in just one 30 mile passage. Once in Trondheim, I had a flight booked back to Paris, and then to Cherbourg to meet back up with lovely Emma and the crew to prepare Emma for the Fastnet. Whilst I am away from Emma and the team, there is a flurry of activity at the boat to get things done, and I study tide charts, autopilot settings and spinnaker pole setups in preparation. Oh yes, and I get some tricky sailing under my belt. Good practice. Thank you Norway.

After a day in Trondheim, I pack up my backpack again and head off to Cherbourg and the lovely Emma to prepare for the Fastnet. As I write this (post Fastnet) it is actually hard to remember what happened exactly, but I’ll give it a go.

The Fastnet.

I arrived in Cherbourg and went straight to Marie’s for a night of planning and cooking. My contribution would be to drink the wine and provide the entertainment whilst Clothilde and Marie created yummy smelling french dishes to be frozen for our race. After a good nights sleep after my big day of travel we were off to Emma to do some prep work – which mainly consisted of turning Emma the cruising boat into Emma “the kind of more like a race boat”, boat – i.e taking off all the non racing gear like kayaks and extra tins of food, and much to my dismay the stash of whisky and wine.

With Emma a lot lighter, and the team feeling pretty ready, we had our “photoshoot” with Garcia so they could social media the crap out of us (provided we were successful of course) and then we were off to Yarmouth where we had a berth booked for the night before the race. Oh I didn’t mention the cool jackets – how cool are the jackets!!!!! Matchy matchy!

Naturally we sent the photographer up the mast.

Clothilde and Marie at the skippers presentation.

We had some good practice coming across the channel. We picked perfect wind against tide to come into the Solent near the needles which, as we would find out, was excellent training. The forecast for the start of the race the next afternoon was looking more and more bleak.

Braids are mandatory. It may seem trivial, but it keeps the hair out of ones face.

We squeezed into Yarmouth, then squeezed through the bridge leading to the creek at Yarmouth, then squeezed up the creek, then we all held our breath as Clothilde professionally squeezed the 52 foot Emma into a space that I would not even have attempted to put Away into (Away being a full 7 feet smaller). PHEW, we were in! A night of planning, weather routing and sleeping is to be had. Oh yes, and we had to figure out how in the world to get out of the tiniest berth possible, without breaking the boat, breaking other boats, going aground or hurting ourselves.

The next morning, we have a chat again with Pete Goss who gave us some great last minute strategies and a good pep talk, then we were off, fortunately with enough water under us not to go aground, and enough people on board to shout when other boats were too close. We were so happy to get out of Yarmouth and into the 25 knots in the Solent.

Sufficiently unsqueezed in order to take a smiling photo.

Sailing downwind, we headed for the start line area, put up our storm sails up and passed the “identity gate” – right, we were ready for the start. The wind was building and building so a reefed main was up, and the staysail. Tacking towards the start line, we were 5 minutes from starting, and made our final tack to point for the line. All excited faces! And bang.

Storm sails up and passing through the identity gates.

What happened? The staysail is suddenly flapping weirdly. Shit, the halyard has broken. Kate and I run to the bow and pull down the sail, and strap it in. What to do? We can’t put out the solent, there is far too much wind and it is forecast to build and build – right storm jib it is. Finally we cross the start line and begin tacking up the Solent behind the fleet, with the storm jib. We quickly learn that the storm jib does not tack very well, and we do complicated tacking by pulling out a little solent, then tacking, then pulling the solent back in. So hard.

After a while of this the mayday calls started pouring in. People were going overboard at the needles, one boat was sinking, others had broken masts. Pip Hare passed behind us with her Imoca, with apparently the same problem as us, they had broken their staysail halyard I think… Carnage. Marie in her wisdom popped her head out from her bunk and suggested we anchor and let this system go through – Oh yeah – we can do that! And so we spent the night where we started. Yarmouth.

After an evening of anchor watch, we put a new halyard on the staysail (which by now also had a broken furler) and got going out of the Solent and into the channel. I was off watch at this time, and was sleeping. When I woke we had taken the north channel at the Solent exit, and we were passing Swanage and still tacking. As the days went on, we tacked the coast of England, choosing to go straight through the Portland race with strong wind against tide at dinner time which made for a wild ride. Happily no Beef Bourgogne was spilled.

Night watch as the sun just starts to light things up!

Probs should reef if my bunk window looks like this.

We chose to stay out in the channel at Salcombe which at the time seemed a silly idea as we lost all the wind. But we sent Clothilde up the mast to see if she could fix the staysail halyard anyways. As she was up there the wind came back, and we quickly brought her down as the wind built up to over 20 knots again. Turns out that the boats near us that stayed close to shore when we went out got smashed by this squall that came in and they retired due to weather, whereas by the time the squall got to us, it has lost some of its power and so we just enjoyed the ride out to lands end. Fortunately it was also at this time we realised that our autopilot (now named Charlie) didn’t have the right sized fuses, so with them changed we had a solid autopilot again! Phew!

At the Scilly Islands, we lost the wind again and were doing Christmas tree tacking backwards and forwards saying hello the Scilly’s a few times. We took the opportunity to update our families and of course social media. We also took the opportunity to rest a little, as we knew a new weather system was coming and it was going to be over 30 knots whilst we crossed the Irish Sea. And sure enough, I awoke the next day to a triple reefed main, staysail and a heeling over boat. And rain. We sailed in this until the fastnet rock, where it was shrouded in cloud. We saw a blob.

Trying to warm up in the PJ party. I was freezing after this watch.

After tacking around the rock, Emma suddenly came to a screeching halt. The team was looking around everywhere… What’s happened??? There were no fishing pots around. Centreboard was quickly raised. Nothing, then lowered again and suddenly we were off again. PHEW and thank goodness for our centreboard. We believe we hit a drifting fishing net and we heard another report of someone else hitting it too. It was kind of fortuitous, as because of this dramatic turn of events, we did actually get to see more of the Fastnet as the clouds cleared slightly.

A little bit more. Thank you weird fishing net.

Heading back to the Scilly islands, we enjoyed the feeling of being over halfway – although it was about this time I was a little down and thinking that this was my life now and I was never going to get back home. Its funny what the mind does. It was this evening that Marie brought out her beautiful quiche which frankly lifted my mood to no end as I had been there when she cooked it prior to the race and it looked so delicious I was looking forward to it all week! So with a full tummy, and a brighter frame of mind, I went off watch and hit my bunk, falling asleep listening to delightful giggling upstairs on deck and feeling really safe.

The next day I awoke to stories of the spinnaker falling in the water as we had broken another halyard – so no spinnaker for now – also when it was brought back on board it had a 3m tear in it. I used my now honed pole skills and got us going wing on wing for a while until we could change course and the solent did its job.

As I woke up for my next night watch, we were in the shipping lanes and we had a fun night of calling ships, dodging fishing boats, and racing to the Alderney race. The Alderney race was the final hurdle for us before the finish line, but alas, the wind didn’t want to come, so we missed it by about 30 minutes. For those of you who don’t know, the Alderney race is a tidal stream north of Alderney and it can run at over 9 knots, and if we got stuck there, we’d literally be stuck going no where. So the watch at the time made the decision to go north of the race, costing us more time, but meaning we were safe from the currents.

Arriving in Cherboug, we had the solent, the staysail AND the storm jib up to get us speed to finish. Our friends on Voyager (another Garcia) came out to meet us with all the available husbands (alas Adrian was on dog sitting duty in Norway) and cheer us on as we finished the line! We were so so so excited to see them and cross the line! Whoo hooooooo! Cheering and maybe some tears from little old me! Sails down, motor on and some choice tunes to head into harbour. My favourite was blaring Elton John’s “I’m Still Standing” as we came into harbour. YEAH YEAH YEAH!

Yeah crossing the line! Whooooooooooooo!

We had fans on the headland who took this cool pic of us crossing the line. As much sail as we had up!

Once docked, it was celebrations!!! All the families were there, friends and partners. It was mad! Even the press came down and interviewed us. As I was the only loner, I was either on the phone or asking everyone when could we please pop the champagne???????? FINALLY, photos done, kisses, cuddles and congratulations all round were done, there was a glass of bubbles in my hand.

Emma safely docked in the best spot in the marina.

Wow, what a ride. Would I do another – yes probably, but it would have to be the same amazing team I just did it with.

There was about 450 boats that started, and about 200 retired. We finished because we are TENACIOUS!

The best part of a week of my life was spent on some amazing type 3 fun. What a ride.

To Rebecca – thank you for lending us your boat for this adventure and thank you for your endless positivity and support. And especially for cooking going through some of the roughest water I’ve ever been in!

To Sylvia – I loved falling asleep in my bunk listening to you and Kate laughing and competently sailing and keeping us safe. Thank you for your tenacity and your wind dancing.

To Kate – Thanks for the great night watches and story sharing. Thanks for supporting me when I wasn’t feeling super confident. I so appreciate you!

To Marie – Thank you for your friendship and support, your clear head and good decisions. Thank you for keeping us safe, and making me laugh. You’ve taught me a lot.

To Clothilde – thank you for being the skipper and bringing such a positive attitude to everything you do. You kept morale high, kept us racing, laughing and safe the whole time. What a legend.

And we were in the press! You can read on the RORC website.

Please enjoy some of these little clips too.

Keep rollin. Going through the Portland Race wind against tide.

Goodbye Arctic: sharks, glaciers and mad walks

July 17, 2023 / fiandadrian

Our time in our remote granite walled anchorage came to an end and we motored out looking for wind. We needed to get south to find an airport for Fi’s next adventure.

The wind in northern Norway at this time of year had not been big red sail wind. Big wind shifts and constantly weaving between islands doesn’t make the big red sail happy. But today we had some open water and found a consistent (ish) light breeze.

We sailed with Lofoten visible in the distance to contrast the big red sail.

Whales passed us, then we spotted dolphins and then…

We thought some dolphins had come to play, but as they approached we realised they were actually small sharks! I grabbed the phone, quickly tried to turn it on three times and snapped this memorable image of sharks with Lofoten in the background!

During the evening the wind was too light even for big red. But the reflections were kind of cool.

We were expecting a more modest anchorage after the previous few nights, but it looked ok as we pulled up near a white sandy beach and a whale swam past us heading south. Summer in Norway is absolute bliss.

Even by our new high standards this was a pretty spectacular spot and not too crowded.

Next day we had a look around while we waited for the wind to fill in.

And some sandy beaches. A dip in the water was as breathtaking as the scenery.

At lunch time we headed off to make the best of some northerly winds.

Big red sail two days in a row! This island was our view for 6 hours as we headed down the coast.

An AIS target called ‘Norwegian Submarine’ appeared, so we sped up to make sure we passed as close as possible. Sure enough it was a Norwegian submarine, or perhaps a foreign submarine cleverly disguised as a Norwegian submarine.

We made the most of the northerly winds and sailed into the ‘night’. The wind finally died as we closed in on the coast and we motored the last few miles into Bolga around 2 am.

Sunglasses and beanie are mandatory equipment for a midnight watch and firing the laser.

As midnight struck we energized the flag pole laser and shot a hole in the sky.

We burned this hole in the sky which looked quite pretty, although there was nobody else around to appreciate it.

With wind from the south for a few days we decided to rest, regain our sanity and explore Bolga.

The season for growing is short, so lush green and colour appear almost overnight as the grey and white receed.

In Australia this would be fenced off with some over judicious signage warning us of certain peril. In Norway its the not-wheelchair-friendly part of the intermediate round-the-island walk. The useful rope has no doubt been added after too many tourists slid from the slippery rocks into the just-above-freezing water, especially when there is snow and ice on the rocks.

Of course when you have this level of natural balance and ability to find those micro finger holds there is not much to go wrong. It looks like I have a chalk bag which is standard equipment on an intermediate walk, but its just a poo bag holder.

Bernie watched on as we showed him where the best paw holds were after falling in the water.

The island had been home to fishing people who dried ship loads of fish on the rocks during summer until the early 1900s. We chose to traverse the south side of the island first as it was open the squally southerly weather. This is Norway so the protected northern side was also somehow open to the squally southerly weather.

The path headed up a cliff and some non wheelchair friendly sections where even big ears needed a lift. And then, Mum are you sure we go into that hole?

Yes Bernie, you should know by now, all island walks in Norway go through mountains.

Dad did you fit through that hole in the mountain?

After our walk we noticed many motor boats arriving at the island and people setting fire to huge bonfires. We realised it was mid summer and everyone was out for a party. Not only was the restaurant open (they often close at most times of the year and days of the week), but it was packed with revellers creating a vibrant atmosphere that we had not been expecting. We had a great dinner and chatted with loads of people. Bolga was a great place to visit and very beautiful.

Looking for our next anchorage, Fi noticed that the glacier we missed on the way up was only a few miles away. After filling up with diesel, we headed round for a look before it melted.

A peaceful dock at the end of the fjord with a view of the glacier.

The view from the boat. Pictures taken in 1920 show the glacier accessible from the water. Our guide book from a few years back described it as an hours walk to the glacier. Today its more like two hours.

We set off for the glacier on our bikes before the first ferries arrived and followed the path up to the ice.

The glacier meltwater looked inviting for a quick dip, but after toeing it, the biggest surprise was that it actually flowed more than the glacier.

Heading south from the glacier the winds pushed us between the islands until they died completely and we parked on the arctic circle for a while. After a pleasant evening motoring, sailing, motor sailing, avoiding ferries and ducking under low power lines, we dropped anchor in a quiet bay for a few hours rest.

The winds decided we should park here for a while before leaving the arctic.

Dropping anchor just before sunset or sunrise or sunlowish.

The potential winds the next day were just that, and we motored to a quiet little spot just north of Forvik. By design this spot was a breakfast distance away from Forvik.

The next morning we took the brave step of travelling the 5 miles south to Forvik, before coffee.

We had visited Forvik on the way north. There is one excellent reason to re-visit Forvik and its not to sniff the daisys.

This is why you come to Forvik, for the locally roasted coffee and locally made cake.

We discovered they are now open for dinner too as the season is in full swing. A slightly overcast day with the slight chance of thunderstorms was enough to justify staying in port and sampling the dinner menu.

15 miles south, Brønnøysund was to be Away’s home for the next 10 days. After a short trip we found, with some relief, there were plenty of vacant spots in the harbour. Reversing into a berth in a solid crosswind was worthy of some adventure scars on the hull, but nobody died.

Away parked up, nose sticking out per usual to catch unwary motorboats.

But not before a suitable ‘I’m leaving my husband behind to look after the dog on his birthday’ dinner.

I’m not leaving while that nice lady who feeds me is in that terminal building!

Next time its Fi’s racy adventures and too much sniffing around Brønnøysund.

Adding Colour – The Anchorage

July 12, 2023 / fiandadrian

After a month of atmospheric grey days, Norway delivered colour. It was as if a light switch had been flicked on.

We decided to leave Tromsø and motor south. With 24 hour daylight and not much hope of wind we decided not to stop for the night and kept travelling preferring to have longer to relax at our destination.

We managed to spot this passing ship in the middle of the night

The next morning we arrived at a small harbour which promised rock paintings and walking. The docks in the harbour were too small for Away, so our second option was a fjord another hour further on.

We had enjoyed a month of grey freezing conditions and now it looked like there were going to be several days of sunny (even double digit max temperatures!) windless weather so we decided it was worth risking an anchorage surrounded by mountains that can deliver sudden katabatic winds.

When we motored into the bay it looked fantastic and it kept getting better, and better:

View into the anchorage…yep new colours: blue and green!

After we anchor we can hear cascading water and head ashore to find a meltwater stream nearby.

We settle in beside the stream and enjoy the sun.

The wind dies completely and the reflections are magic.

There are some summer houses at the entrance to the bay, but otherwise its only moose, fish and birds living here.

Next day we head to shore for more of an explore.

Mustering our inner norsepersons we enjoy an exhilarating dip. There is a top layer of cold fresh water which is attention grabbing, but the deeper water is just gently numbing.

*Granite walls rise 700m above the anchorage.*

Mussels are abundant in the shallows and make a tasty dinner.

That evening two local moose stroll by. Bernie got a sniff of them from the boat and gave them a good woofing. They did not return.

We went for a walk further up the stream. No tracks here except those left by the local wildlife. There is no happier dog.

If the anchorage is so good maybe we can catch a fish. 20 minutes dragging a lure behind the dinghy and this guy joined us for lunch.

Does anyone know if the reflection of a chemtrail is dangerous too? We were lucky as this one just missed us.

The wind suddenly gusted to 25 knts on our last night to remind us its not always calm here. Shortly afterwards long periods of 0 knts returned.

Its even out of the sun at night making sleeping a little easier.

Sadly it came time to leave. An eagle crossed our path reflecting in the water as we motored out. What an amazing experience.

Our experience of this anchorage ticked many boxes: quiet, scenic, good walking, dog friendly, swimming, wildlife, fishing and foraging. It would have been easy to spend a month here, but we knew the experience would be quite different as the winds returned. It was noted in the guide book that when the clouds came down over the grey granite walls some cruisers had described the experience as being in a grey tupperware container with the lid on.

Travel experiences are based on such a small sliver of time. Other people in this same anchorage could well experience the katabatic winds we were warned of, or perhaps, it is indeed like a tupperware container. But for us, we can imagine no more a perfect moment in time than this place when we were here. Its always like this on this adventure, people warn us about places, and we go and have a great time, or we have a terrible time at place that others have really enjoyed. Travel is all about context and we were lucky enough to have this absolutely perfect couple of days.

A holiday in the sun

June 22, 2023 / fiandadrian

We arrived in Tromsø on the Sunday after our pretty exciting trip in (see the last blog for whirlpool fun), and parked up next to the sauna. We had burgers at the local burger joint which is done up (to my delight) in a Nintendo 64 Mario Bros theme.

A view of the local church rom the marina. It catches the light in so many different ways.

Green pipes and everything! My brother asked me if I ate a mushroom and grew any taller? I said no, that I’d eaten a burger and grown wider.

The next day was Monday, so the shops were open and we explored town a little bit. We also packed our bags! We’re going on a little holiday! We are hoping for sunshine!

This was the Gestapo headquarters. There is a memorial outside to those who died under their violence.

Sometimes its nice to have a little break from sailboat life, and so we had booked the Hurtigruten from Tromsø to Honningsvåg, which is a little further north on the island of Magerøya. Magerøya is connected to the mainland, and to the north of the island is Nordkapp, or North Cape, the northernmost point of Europe accessible by car.

Boarding time came (17:30), and we hopped on the boat with Bernie, and settled into our cabin. The trip was overnight, and the boat was excellent. Breakfast and lunch buffet, and dinner at your leisure at one of their establishments on board. They also have hot tubs, and a sauna so we enjoyed the hot tub on the back of the boat after dinner and watched as the snow capped mountains went past, and enjoyed not being responsible for the trip.

Bernie was pretty pumped! Until he remembered he gets stuck in the room on ferries.

This was about the moment he realised that this was a ferry. He hid under the bed.

Honestly, I didn’t think they’d go under this bridge. But they do, with a few metres clearance on either side and on the top.

You might remember we witnessed 2 Hurtigrutens passing each other and beeping their horns when we were sailing further south. Yes they do this every time they pass another one, and announce it on the loudspeaker.

The next morning we arrive in Honningsvåg at about 11am, drop our bags at the hotel and explore town. Honningsvåg is a nice town, fishing as usual is one of the main industries and has been for a long time. The North Cape is about a 35 minute drive, so we source a car for the following day.

Quite a pretty town with the BEST bakery and food we’ve had in Norway.

Norwegian jumper out for my Norwegian holiday!

After a bit of a chill out in our hotel once we got the room keys, we ventured to the restaurant downstairs and enjoyed one of the best meals we’ve had in Norway. I had the cod, and Adrian had reindeer cutlets.

The following day we had a couple of hours before we were picking up our car for our road adventure, so we took the opportunity for a hike up into the hills behind the town. There is a large lake and this is where the drinking water is sourced.

Beautiful views from the hills behind town.

Looking back towards town from the hills, we saw this Hurtigruten expedition boat come into port. It will be going to Svalbard.

Around lunchtime we pick up our car, throw Bernie in the back and we were off to North Cape, arriving in time for lunch and to take Bernie up to the North Cape monument – the most northerly part of mainland Europe that you can reach by car. We can’t believe we’ve managed to take him from Sydney, to Paris, through the Netherlands, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, the Aland Islands, around to Norway and then all the way to North Cape. And backwards and forwards to the UK in between.

Can you see the reindeer? The white spot in the middle. Don’t worry, we see a lot more!

Bernie’s first look out to see from the top of mainland Europe.

Bernie and I have come a long way from our first meeting in Dural, NSW Australia almost 10 years ago!

We also take the opportunity to quickly visit a couple of the other towns on the island, before dropping the car back, and heading out for another meal.

Yup more reindeer. These ones are mowing the local football pitch.

This far north, the Sami people herd reindeer (amongst other things). They live across northern Europe including Sweden, Finland, Russia as well as Norway. They are different to the Scandinavian’s who primarily inhabited the southern parts of this area until they realised the north was rich in fishing (and now oil and gas resources). They speak a different dialect and rely on the land, fishing and animal herding to live.

The next morning, at some horrible time of the morning, we were back on the Hurtigruten, and back in our same cabin heading south towards Tromsø. We arrive in Tromsø at midnight, pack up our gear and the dog and we are back on Away. We don’t necessarily feel rested after our little trip, but we had a great time and we enjoyed the break from being the skippers.