From Hou we sailed on to Juelsminde where we had an appointment the following morning for a service on our heater.   This was only a short sail over and quite straightforward, so I took the opportunitiy of learning how to set waypoints into our Navigator system.   We actually made it to the correct destination too without any mishaps !   

Next day,the ”heater man” came as promised, did what he had to do to the heater and many hundreds of  danish kroners later we were ready to leave.   This time we were going to take a longer leg, and sail down to south Funen.  As we were sailing near Fredericia some porpoise (”marsvin”) swam around Sunray.  There must have been around 6 of them, I think.    There was a very light wind and plenty of sunshine, so we had a very calm day.    

We decided to stop in Årøsund and try and look up some friends we knew there.  Unfortunately they were not around that evening but promised to meet up with us in two days.   

OK, that means that we had to not sail for one day, but we thought it would be worth it and anyway, what’s our rush after all?  So we sailed to Sønderborg through what we both agree must be the prettiest scenery in Denmark to wait for them there. 

The following day was therefore a ”rest” day.  We visited Sønderborg Castle, (the marina is just next to it), and later in the afternoon, our friends arrived.  We spent the rest of the day with them, chatting, and having dinner together too, it was such fun to meet them again.    Oh, I nearly forgot to say that I ate my last danish hot dog today too!

  Christian X's bridge, Sønderborg   

Friday morning, last goodbyes to Denmark as we sail off to Kiel.  Suddenly all we could hear on the VHF radio was german and all the other boats we passed had german flags, so whenever we saw a danish boat, we gave a really hearty wave!   

We stopped at the Baltic Sea entrance to the Kiel Canal in Holtenau.  Tomorrow we should sail the 100 km long canal to Brunsbűttel.

Now we are looking forwards and not backwards anymore.  The humour on board is on a steady upward rise and adventure waits for us ahead.  

We have started to settle into our new routines, i.e. early mornings for Vicki and a small lie in for Per, meaning that we actually wake up at the same time.  It’s still pretty cold at night, so the boat is like a fridge in the early morning – we would like to take this opportunity to thank the ”heater man” from Juelsminde!  

This morning I bought ” Brötchen”, so now we are becoming really cosmopolitan!  (Vicki baked bread again today, so we have extra rations – the bakery in the pantry  is really becoming successful!).

Right now (Saturday 14.20) we are halfway through Germany, and even though we are sailing in a beautiful yacht, all the people promenading along the canal are laughing at us …… I hope it’s because of RAYMOND, our trustworthy plastic duck ”mascot” who is skipping and dancing happily behind us.  

The good sign was, that the first two container ships that passed us along the canal were both registered in Valletta, Malta’s capital city and our final destination … so all we need to do is follow them home! 

The weather is so different to what we are used to in Kaløvig.  Ever since we arrived, we have had gales and storms, and of course always blowing from a south westerly direction, exactly where we want to go!  Our windmeter has already gone up to a record 18 m/second!

Difference in tidal water height at Cuxhafen

So once again we took the opportunity to unpack our bicycles and see what Cuxhafen has to offer:- we went to a ”Sing along” concert in German on the beach, to the launderette and we spent a lot of time with our two new english friends – Rob and Peter.

Peter is a very quiet man, in fact only after a couple of days did we find out that he is a professional sailor, making a living out of sailing boats from A to B.  And only after the third day did we find out that he had sailed single handed across the Atlantic in a 21 ft boat (ours is 39 ft!).  Rob has just bought himself a Najad yacht just like ours, so we had a lot to talk about too!

German Bight, cold, dark and rain

After a few days in Cuxhafen in a regular storm, the weather suddenly changed and the sun broke through the grey skies, and the wind died down a little.  This meant that we (even though Vicki was still unsure of the situation) weighed anchor Wednesday 30th May, 2001 at 20.00 hrs to sail the circa 100 Nautical Miles (17 hours) to our next destination – Borkum.

A cold but practically wind-still night sail all the way, but with quite a swell left over from the gales.

We were following "Arietta", a boat which was exactly like Sunray – with Rob and Peter as the crew – until we arrived near Borkum and turned southwards, saying goodbye to the professionals who of course were sailing on.  We were looking forward to a small picturesque island, something like Rømø (in Denmark) for example, where we could relax!

Tired and weary we arrived at our destination, and that’s when our eyes nearly popped out of our heads - our "paradise island" was not only Land’s end, but the World’s end! :(

Borkum is actually an ex-German-navy base from World War 2, now changed into a Youth Hostel base.  The whole area looks exactly as though the German navy has just deserted the place …. if the Harbour Master had shown up with a machine gun then it would have looked like something out of a James Bond film!

Well, he, i.e. Harbour Master Luke, didn’t, actually he is a dwarf, with a pony tail all the way down his back, who we are pretty sure has not seen a bar of soap for the last month (we don’t even want to try and guess when his wife (Gemma) last washed either) – and he could speak fluent DANISH!

We made so much fun of him (without him knowing), we almost peed in our pants!!

We’re also quite sure that the ”Youth Hostel” is some kind of "open prison", because the "youths" we saw seemed like rough characters - we kept a safe distance from them.

The wind has picked up again and this is the situation as it stands: seeking shelter in an open prison in a WW2 scenario, and all the time looking at the water to see if James Bond is going to show up in his wet suit with a tuxedo underneath – fun J !

The windmeter has reached 20 m/second, we’ve doubled the lines to shore, all our extra lines are tied from the mast to deck to support the mast which is shaking 10 cms to each side.  What a nightmare!

Today, 3rd June, we just had to leave the boat and go into town because it’s just impossible to keep our sanity on a boat that is rolling and shaking so much - even in harbour.  

The storm has died down now, but the wise locals: ”Long-haired Luke, Gemma the Artist, Atom Willy, the drunken Dutchman with the big rubber boots and ”das Rote Punkt” (the Red Dot)”, whose company we enjoyed over the last few days – say that we must wait for at least 2 tidal changes  before the 3 meter high swell and the 4 ½ meter high waves (add those two together to appreciate the height!)  have died down enough for us to sail in the North Sea again – and, honestly, we’re not interested in sailing out there again if possible!

Therefore, once again with the help of more locals, this time Jörgen from Germany and Riitta from Finland, we were shown an alternative canal route from Borkum to Ijselmeer in Holland.

We’re not sure if we will manage because our boat has a draught of almost 2 meters and the canals are only approx. 1.8 meters …we are trying this as I write!

Our time schedule is destroyed!