We are back in Sweden for the last part of the refit at Adams Boat Care. For a new entrance we are replacing the two separate hatches by one retractable hatch. The materials for this were delivered a few weeks ago. There are bets at the Hallberg Rassy yard whether this will be a success 😃😎.
After the 2nd vaccination of Toine and a work session at the office we have 10 days to sail from Bruinisse to Vindön. We want to sail as few days as possible because we are still working and this is not our summer holiday. The weather is fine from Wednesday evening 23 June to Sunday 27 June. A total of 500 nm in 77 hours. On Wednesday evening we sailed from Bruinisse through the three locks to the waiting berth at the railway bridge in Dordrecht. On the Volkerak we have great sailing and on the Dordtse Kil we have a current with us. The night was a bit restless with ships passing by, causing large waves every now and then. We leave the Oude Maas at 6.30 with the current behind us and at 8.30 we can pass through the Spijkenisse and Botlek bridges. So, all the hurdles towards Sweden have been taken 😃. The last couple of weeks there have been a lot of traffic jams, so it's not that obvious 👌.
The whole of Thursday we sail along the coast to the north with a little bit of sun and a very light wind against. In the night we cross the two shipping lanes with a full moon and some light in the northeast. It doesn't get really dark. The next day we have a light wind from behind and this is a good opportunity to try out the new gennaker. The whole day we sail between 4 and 5 knots; without the gennaker this would have been motors 😊. At the end of the day the wind subsides and we remove all the sails. We motor into the night and again it is a quiet night. There is little shipping around us, what an empty piece of sea this is. The whole route after the shipping lanes we don't have to give way to anyone. On the last day the wind picks up and we set all the sails. Around the corner at the head of Denmark we go shameless. Our 4G reception is so good that we can follow the qualification and F1 race as well as the football finals 😎. The wind increases to a bft 5 and occasionally 6. It's a lot of fun sailing and it's a good thing we changed to reef 2 in the main in time. We are still doing more than 7 knots. It is a cold evening and night and intensive sailing because of the chance of a jibe. Those warm suits that we bought on Mariste's advise do a very good job! When Toine takes over the watch at 3:00 a.m. he rolls in the mainsail because of a too big jibe and we continue on the genoa and the engine. At 5:30 we enter the calm of the Swedish skerries and a little later we drop anchor in a sheltered bay south of Ellös. We are there 😃😊 ... now first some sleep.
During the past week we have been working during the day and regularly move to a new anchorage in the evening. Thanks to the unlimited 4G subscription of Proviced We can work all over Europe on the boat without any problems. A super service, that would not have been possible with our old T-mobile subscription without having to buy more gig's each time.
Our first spot is north of Grundsund. We have a delicious dinner in the restaurant we know from last year. Good to be back in Sweden 😃🇸🇪.
The second spot is further into the bay at Björnsund. It is a lovely sunny day and we make a nice evening walk on the shore.
The third spot is in a sheltered bay between two islands with a very narrow entrance. The entrance is between the rock and to the left of the red post 😊. With a view of the ferry and the opportunity to do that wonderful 10km walk on Friday (my 2-week long walk day) which we also walked twice last year 👍.
This weekend we are moored at Kalvön, the island we looked out on from the house we temporarily lived in last year. It is sunny with summer temperatures; even the bimini goes up. We eat from the Kamadoe Joe and sit outside in the cockpit until late. Saturday (yesterday) is a real summer day. I even go swimming before breakfast. Later in the morning we take a brisk 2-hour walk on the island with a lot of climbing and descending; a good workout. Back on the boat even Toine takes a dip in the still quite fresh water 😎. At the end of the afternoon we take the dinghy to Henån to do some shopping and get sushi. During the day there are groups of sunbathing and swimming people on the shore and in the evening we are alone again, except for a wild camping couple.
Now on Sunday we are on the other side of the island overlooking last year's house. Early this morning the wind turned and we were suddenly very close to the shore. This afternoon we will watch F1 and at the end of the day we will go to Vindön at Adams Boat Care.
Life is good on board of the SeaQuest 😊😊.