Capraia - Sweden 46

I'm lucky enough to be enjoying a long weekend in sunny Scandinavia - having flown up to Oslo, Norway to join some Viking pals for this race on Wednesday.

The Skagen Race runs from Norway to Denmark, around 120 miles, and it's very popular in the region.

Pal Hallsteins boat Capraia wasn't built for racing. She's a very pretty heavy luxey cruiser, a Sweden 45, complete with dishwasher, plumbed in expresso machine, and more toys and gagets than I've ever seen on one craft. Plus this year she's fully loaded with cruising gear as they plan to move on from Skagen and commence a two month summer cruise up Norways west coast. So she was sitting well down on her lines (as you can see from the media shot above) when I jumped aboard.

But it's well designed, so despite her weight, when the wind builds and she's pointed in the right direction, Capraia can lift her skirts and move out at pace. Sadly even if she was unloaded, she will never win any race with the rating handicap she carries. But guess what? I'm not actually here for the racing. But rather the post race party in quiet little Skagen.......

In my view, the end race restiveties in Skagen beats Cowes, Palma, Antigua or Hamilton Islands race weeks into a cocked hat. Honest.

In our lead up to the party, we enjoyed a fab 120 mile race. Started 2000 on Thursday in a fleet of 250+ yachts. Five up, Hallstein skipper, Hakkon and Tjertil up front, Leif and self in cockpit. And all swopping as needed. Luckily Hallstein was happy for me to do to a fair amount of helming, so I left the hard work to others, as we focussed on getting the best out of her.

Got a sweet start under Code 0 to get her right up the front of the leading pack close reaching south in medium breeze as we exited Norway heading towards the single rounding mark off the Swedish coast, before then turning for the finish over in Skagen, Denmark.

Forecast was for medium northerlies, and apart from the start, that's exactly what we eventually got.

Lovely warm weather. Sure, temperature dropped at night on the water, but we were all rugged up nicely. It's still the 'white nights' this far north so barely noticed any darkening of the sky as we first gently coaxed the boat through a two hour long soft patch around midnight (that saw us move closer to the back of the pack), then went up through the offwind sails as the wind veered round to the north and thankfully, built to its promised 15/20 knots.

That extra wind, a good choice in suitable foreward sails, and full time hard work by the guys on the foredeck helped us storm along working our way back up the fleet. Capraia kind of ploughs through the seas rather than skips over the top, but her powerful rig kept us doing high 9's (and topped 10.8 at one point) under kite. We overtook loads all streaming down the rhumb line, and can't recall anyone doing the same to us.

Two instances of overtaken boats trying to luff us illegally (nighttime race rules are over-ridden by international maritime rules) but never a drama.

When the sun crept above the horizon we surprised ourselves back up with the leading group and when shortly after we reached the Swedish rounding mark, we swopped kite for Code 0, hung a right, and began an early crossing of the last 40 miles to Denmark.

Tidal charts had indicated this was where adverse tide (lots of movement in this bit of water) was for the least distance, so we chose that as our power gate and charged through. Log showed at its worse it reached 2 knots against us.

But it was all Basically straight line sailing (except for the early soft patch), but as we swooped in to the finish Hallstein and his Vikings seemed well pleased with our placing - up close by competitors who were normally far ahead.

So weather wise, we got a bit of everything on this race. Nice to have such a challenging set of conditions - and nicer still to meet them.

Tough sail - titling. But we also had a real laugh, and getting back to somewhere in the first 10% (over the line) made us all feel good. And of course, making it in early to Skagen gave us more time than most to prepare for the evenings entertainment ashore.....

With 250 crews, maybe only 4 popular bars / clubs, this quiet little town heaves post race. It's so popular that thousands - literally - of Swedish girl friends also ferry into Skagen for the social. All good innocent fun, and Its my third time doing this. Simply great.

With Thursday and Friday nights full on drinking and dancing, both ending sometime twix 2 and 3 am, I've been happy to find a comfy seat at the airport and equally on the plane, so I can gently snore my way back home.

Great stuff. On. On. Especially for Skagen 2018......