Gulliver II Norway/Baltic 2009

Day 10,11,12. Sunday Monday & Tuesday

Where was I? Oh yes, we were in Bulandet, and some of the neighbours came along to say hi. After that, the grown ups (Mum, Richard and Jackie) all went off onto Jon and Astri's boat for an evening of singing, which sounded lovely. Not my scene, really, so I stayed aboard Gulliver for an early night.

On Sunday we stopped in a tiny little bay which was sheltered by a small island, covered in shrubs and trees (60° 58' 470N / 004° 58' 270E). We anchored up and rowed over to the little island - my rowing skills are.... well, crap really. We kept going round in circles! The island seemed to have never been walked on before, so I decided to stick my metaphorical flag in the ground and name it Roziland. Geddit? After an unsuccessful attempt to walk round it, I just decided where I'm going to build my house, and went back to the shore to watch Jackie swimming in her brand new I-told-you-it-would-come-in-useful! wetsuit.

After the excitement of discovering a new land and Richard more successfully rowing us back to Gulliver, we motored down to Grunna Sund, a little anchorage not too far from Bergen. It's an inlet, about a mile and a half long and not very wide, very picturesque. We motored right down to the end, past several little islands big enough for just one wooden house and a handful of trees on them. The water was nice and still, only occasionally stirred up by youngsters wooping and speeding by on small boats. They were harmless enough (as Richard pointed out, much better than kids hanging around outside a shop!) and there were rows of boat sheds along one side, so must've been a boat club of some kind.

On Monday we motored out of the inlet and down the coast to Bergen. Only took about 3 hours so we were there by lunchtime. We moored up alongside another yacht, as it was pretty busy in Bergen harbour. I always find it a bit weird when you tie up next to someone else's boat, and have to walk across it to get to and from the shore, but it's quite common.

Bergen is apparently the most rainy place in Europe. Well it didn't let me down and proceeded to rain for most of the day. I did a bit of exploring; there are some cool old-old wooden houses that are all wonky and haphazardly leaning on each other, preserved in a little square just over from where we were moored. Full of tourists though. I am torn between avoiding tourists as much as possible and resigning myself to the fact that I actually am one.

We all walked Jackie and her 6 pieces of luggage (which in total weighed more than her, and that's no exaggeration!) over to the ferry port so she could continue her travels, then stopped by the markets, and headed back to Gulliver. Motored over to Bergen Sailing Club for the night, and now it's Tuesday morning, the sun is shining, Richard is scrubbing the decks and Mum's gasping over how much food we still have on board. We have to get Gulliver ship-shape today (see what I did there) as we all fly back to the UK this evening, with my 12 day holiday and Mum and Richard's 2 month adventure coming to an end.

Thanks for listening folks, I've been great. Tune in again later in the year for more from the dynamic duo and their adventures on the great Gulliver II.

Over and out.

Day 9, Saturday. Waking up with no trace of a hangover (stick to vodka and diet coke all night kids, I swear it's the key to not getting a hangover) we stuck on some more washing. I have to say, as expensive as it is to buy food and drink ashore, it's pretty cheap to moor up for a night at these harbours. About 100 kroner, which is around a tenner, is all it is for a massive boat like Gulliver, and that include a plug in to the electrics, water, use of the toilets and showers ashore, and at Kalvåg there was even free washing machines and tumble dryers.

The houses at Kalvåg are really nice; they are (as usual) all made of wood, however quite a lot here are on stilts and painted white (the norm seems to be either dark red or dull mustard). Richard has been wondering out loud over the last couple of days how the houses and harbours stay so white when he hasn't seen anyone at all outside cleaning or painting. In fact we've not really seen anyone anywhere when we've been close to the shorelines; adds to the isolation and relaxation of it all, I reckon.

So we did some more washing and I said morning to Pru and Mike and then I took Snoopy for a walk, although I don't think he liked me too much. We got about 20 meters inland then he just stopped, and refused to go any further. He just looked at me, peering through his floppy white fringe, with that 'Yeah, I don't think so darlin, I wanna go home'. Oh, how I hate getting those looks. Happens far too often. So back we went to Guida and Pru came out, at which point Snoopy perked up quite a lot and we walked him right round to the shop. Bumped into mum and Richard on their Brompton bikes, who had stopped in another local shop. Mum bought 2 felt headbands, which is apparently only her second clothing purchase of the whole 10 week trip. I cannie believe it, I tell ye.

After bidding farewell to our new friends, we sailed down through the islands, past Florø and Askvoll. We were right up close up to some, but it was still over 100 meters deep. We were going along at a good 7 - 8 knots with just the genoa up, and it was lovely and sunny, even though the forecast was rain. From a recommendation mum got in the felt headband shop, we decided to stop overnight at Bulandet.

It's pretty windy here, but as seems to be the case everywhere, as soon as we got near the pontoon, several people got out of their boats to help us get secured. We're getting pretty good at berthing now (one of the guys already moored here has since told us he heard Richard shout 'Port to!' and was impressed that us 3 girls immediately got the fenders tied and had the bow and stern lines ready in a matter of seconds).

It seems pretty nice here, although I haven't been ashore yet. This is the most westerly inhabited point of Norway, and is one of a group of 350 islands, which in total actually only have a total of 450 inhabitants between them. There are several impressive bridges linking the islands which must've cost a fortune; apparently the inhabitants have to raise quite a bit of the money for these bridges themselves. Seems a lot for 450 people to do, but I hear they are very successful fishermen.

Not long after we were all settled in, some of our neighbours came to say hello. We entertained native Norwegians Jon and Astrid (who brought us over some delicious homemade still-warm bread) and British sailors John and Jane, who are sailing over to the Orkneys tomorrow. They're just heading off now, and we're about to make dinner. Good thing too; after a hard day lying on the deck in the sun, I'm starving.

Tonight we met Pru and Mike. And now everyone is drunk. Not just drunk... deee-runk. That's all that needs to be said. See picture for evidence. Ahh good times x

Day 8 - Friday

We left Silda, saying goodbye to the mermaid that sits at the end of the big stone wall, and set sail. We had a good day sailing between the islands and through Måloy, and after successfully getting through my first day without a nap (what?! No nap! Pah.) we pulled into the welcoming harbour of Kalvåg.

By the way, for all you sea faring types, sorry there's not much technical stuff here. To be honest, all I've grasped so far is 'port' (which is left, I work it out as both have 4 letters) and 'starboard' (right, I work it out as it's not the left), 'bow' (front), 'stern' (back), 'line' (rope, mainly said when tying up to a pontoon), 'spring' (a rope secured to the centre of the boat, then tied to pontoon at either end, to stop the boat going backwards and forwards too much), tacking (sailing in a zigzag pattern when the wind in coming from in front of you), jibe (winch the genoa from one side to the other, that's the exhausting bit, fingers crossed it's doing wonders for my bingo wings) and the 'head', which is the all important bog. Oh, and the sails; the genoa, the staysail, the main, the mizzen and there's also a mizzen staysail which isn't up at the moment. Most of you will already know all this terminology, but for me, it's definitely progress.

Anyway, back to the more important stuff, i.e. explaining the next blog entry (which was actually posted last night, but for some reason is coming up after this one).

So we pulled into Kalvåg and a lovely Welsh chap came out of his boat to help with our lines on the pontoon, saying how nice it was to see some fellow Brits pulling in. He is sailing on Guida (sp?), a lovely sailboat that was next-door to us, with the lovely Pru (hi Mike and Pru!). They've been at Kalvåg for a few days, waiting for the winds to die down a bit before attempting the death defying Stad headland, on their way to an island near Molde to help build their daughter's house. They came aboard Gulliver for a drink, and after supplying us with some much sought after diet tonic, we finished our poisons and went into the pub/restaurant on the harbour for some shockingly expensive drinks.

After one (you can only afford one without taking out a second mortgage) we headed back towards Gulliver to make a start on dinner, when somehow we got sidetracked and ended up on Guida, where we also met Snoopy, Pru and Mike's little westie. We proceeded to drink much much more, (you'll be pleased to hear there's been no shortage of vodka or diet coke so far, so I'm happy!) and after some wonderful drunken conversation we realised it was around 11pm and we still hadn't eaten dinner.

So we stumbled back (only about 5 meters down the pontoon, but it was still a bit of a struggle) and I attempted to help cook, but luckily Jackie (who had remained sober) took over the cooking duties and fed us drunken reprobates a delicious curry before we crashed into bed for a very sound nights sleep.

Day 7, Thursday

After an epic lie-in, I woke up to find we'd actually already been sailing for a few hours. The early starting crew saw a lovely looking Gotenberg ship, which I got to enjoy a while after it had disappeared via the magical medium of the digital camera.

As we left the vicinity of fjord, the landscape turned back into rolling hills and small islands. We sailed from Oksenoya, past Alesund (which we couldn't go to as there was a bridge with only 15 meters clearance; we need at least 20 for Gulliver's tall mast!) all the way to the renowned Statt (a.k.a. Stad) headland, which is always pretty rough going. So rough in fact, the Norwegian lifeboat provides an escort service to small boats going round it.

It was pretty fun, with massive waves. I quite like it when the boat's tipped over so much. It was probably only about 30°, but it felt a lot more. Once we'd got round the treacherous part, we tried to anchor next to an old monastery, but the conditions made it impossible. I'm going on repeated information here, because I actually slept through most of this, choosing the comfort of the pilot berth and a blanket over the freezing and slightly queasy cockpit during the Statt adventure. I have to say, napping on a rocking boat is proving to be one of my favourite pastimes.

When I awoke we were just coming into a little island called Silda, which used to be a fishing harbour. Mum and Richard have already been here; they stopped on the way up the coast a couple of weeks ago. Jackie and I decided to scale the mountain at the heart of the island (i.e. took a fairly gentle path to the top of the hill) and admired the spectacular 360° views of mountains, hills, sea, little towns and the little man made harbour that Gulliver was moored in, which has thick stone walls protecting it from the temperamental ocean.

Dinner on the boat, followed by a film that I highly recommend - Like Water, Like Chocolate. It's a Spanish subtitled film and it's completely barking mad. Richard hated it; us girls loved it. Maybe it's a reflection of our respective sanities.

Woke up to the lovely sway of the Geiranger fjord waters, stretched, looked out the window and saw several even larger cruiseliners. Argh! They're pretty ugly and tacky. But I'm biased as I'm on such a lovely sailboat :)

Mum and Richard went on a bike ride, then we motored back through the fjord the way we came and stayed near the entrance, in the lovely Oksenoya again. It was even stiller this time round. I attempted cooking dinner of fish and vegetables, which I found quite stressful in a small unfamiliar galley! I was convinced I was going to set us on fire, or gas us out, or worse still, make the broccoli soggy. You know how mum gets about soggy broccoli.

(For those waiting with baited breath, the broccoli was indeed soggy, but no fire or death, so I chalked it up as a win)

We're eating such healthy meals I'd like to think it might have a positive effect on my waistline, but then I remember that I spend most of my day sitting still and am eating quite a lot of cheese and biscuits in between meals, so I'm probably expanding instead. We've eaten all meals on the boat, which is good because eating ashore would cost an absolute fortune! The boat is still packed full of supplies, even though we're all leaving in 6 days. I'll do the best I can to get through it all in that time.