Debi and Jack sailing on SV Iroquois

We left the beautiful island of Laeso the day before yesterday and beat ourselves up against wind and waves to Egense. It's at the end of the Limfjord and a very nice if somewhat neglected sailing club. You have to follow a narrow dredged channel to enter the harbor. The mast of a sunken wreck just outside the markers reminds you of the danger. We had to enter a box stall with posts for the first time. And of course there was a strong cross wind. The first time we got the stern line on the post and ended up completely sideways to the dock, went out and tried again. The second time the fender got caught on the post, then the stern line got caught in a jam cleat, but somehow we managed to get the bow close enough to the dock that I could get off and pull it back through two stalls to tie it off. Maybe it would have been easier with boats on each side to fend off of. Yesterday we left there in rain and wind and sailed to Grenaa. It was a difficult day with the wind shifting back and forth from 12 to 23 knots and several squalls passing over. We entered the marina with gusts over 30 kts and again a crosswind for our second attempt at the box stall. This time we hit the windward post on the way in then our bow hit the boat in the next slip. Eventually we got in, but now we don't know how to get out.

We've been in Denmark a few days now. Here are some things we really miss about Norway... Hot showers. The first two places we stopped in Denmark had showers that just turn off and on, you had no control of temperature or flow. The place we're at now has hot and cold faucets and if you put on just the hot and no cold the shower is warm enough. In Norway you could make a shower hot enough to scald you if you wanted. Denmark is EU. There somewhere in the EU control rooms people have identified hot as something not to be left in the control of individuals. Temperature is to be regulated. Norway is new money, everything is extravagant, Denmark is old money and all about saving resources, they seperate and recycle here. Berries. Everywhere in Norway had 'local' strawberries (the small sweet kind) and terrific raspberries. Haven't seen any in Denmark.Norway is perhaps a land of only three seasons, winter, long spring/fall, and winter. We are seeing the Denmark summer, no berries and modestly warm weather. Yogurt. Norway has really good yogurt that's on the thin side, like I like it. All we've found here is greek yogurt.

In Norway everyone speaks English and is happy to do so, In Denmark English is not so widely spoken by the locals and everyone else is German. Norwegians are very friendly to Americans. Germans are less so. In Norway one moors along side (it uses more space) as opposed to box stalls here, box stalls are difficult at best and crazy hard in a cross wind, which is almost always the case. The cheese is better in Denmark and they have pork and based on a single sample the fish cakes are better here. Some things are just different but not worse. In Norway, we always had on more clothing than the locals. Yesterday we were in shirt sleeves here and lots of people were wearing winter jackets. To be fair for us Denmark is a place to get through (like Nebraska) on the way to someplace else and at the end of a long trip where ones desire to linger and look is limited. Plus they use here Kroner like Norway but it is not the same Kroner so our left over money needed to be exchanged at I am sure a great loss, at least the absolute amount was not too much and the bit we did exchange was the exact amount needed to pay for one night docking, The ability of the EU bureaucrats to plan is beyond imagination or perhaps entirely within it.