Week 1 day 1 09/06/2013
It took the whole of the nice bright morning to sort out our gear and pack the canoes,
but we finally headed out in our tee-shirts in sunshine towards the island of Fango.
We were quickly caught by a sudden increase in the wind and then heavy thundery rain so we soon needed more gear and then finally had to stop and try and warm up over the cooker as the rain became torrential and we were all soaked and cold. This was rather a dispiriting start.
Some strong paddling got the circulation back and the day improved before we reached Gubbo Kupa, a small island famous for its high rock.
We found a fine location for the tents in a wooded valley cutting right across the island.
As the evening light faded we climbed the rock, looked out over the surrounding archipelago and witnessed a really striking rainbow.
Week 1 day 2 10/06/2013
The second day began clear and sunny enough. We repacked the canoes which were dragged up on a rather stony beach above a unpleasant soup of yellow/green algae which seemed to collect in some of the bays in this area.
One of the main activities in the day, when cruising in a sailing canoe, is stowing stuff and we had obviously not learnt how to do it very efficiently yet on this trip. Someone must have left a life jacket hanging in a tree to dry. Unfortunately this was not discovered until we were too far away to go back.
Not long after starting the clouds came over followed by heavy thundery rain.
We tacked on towards the NE and by lunchtime entered the sheltered sound leading to the village of Harstena.
By this time the wind had died completely, necessitating a mile or so of paddling to reach the village.
We went ashore for a break and a walk around. Despite having plenty of houses, the village was nearly deserted, as it is for most of the year. People only tend to come and stay in their holiday cottages from 21st June onwards. There is reported to be a fine bakery selling fresh bread each day, but there was no bread for us, indeed the premises looked as if they were being rebuilt.
We wanted to fill our water containers to the brim at this last habitation, lest we find no fresh water in the coming days. We tried a tap near the landing place but it proved to be salt water! Then we met the doctor. He was a more or less permanent resident on the island and was able to tell us that; yes, there is a well with a hand pump which gives very fine water but, unfortunately, he said, it’s some way off, in the middle of a wood and it’s very hard to find, but there is a sign! It was indeed hard to find and the sign proved to be no more than a short white painted piece of board with a sharpened end and no lettering, pointing off the path into the undergrowth. The pump was a real old cast iron example.
It rained heavily again. We went up on a rock from which you could see the channel leading out to the North.
The sun came out again and we sailed on, close to the outer edge of the archipelago for 3 or 4 miles.
to reach a spot with a small lagoon and a flat green area that I had earmarked from Google Earth as a likely location for a camp. This proved to be too boggy and without easy access for loading and unloading the canoes. However, across on the adjacent island 150m away the others had found a fine smooth area of rock dipping down at a very shallow angle into the sea, perfect for hauling the canoes out, with a flatter section nearby for the tents. This turns out to be the most common arrangement for an ideal campsite in this area of the Baltic, so you need a geodesic tent that does not have to be pegged out.
Week 1 day 3 11/06/2013
I woke and got up an hour too early having misread my watch, so I walked round the small island on which we were camped and found a small unoccupied summer house.
The wind was just right to allow us to lay due North all the way up the long outer leads between the rocks reaching Kupa Klint in time for lunch.
This is another island famous for its tall rock and the view from it, but it is a little harder to climb than Gubbo Kupa and we had difficulty getting Greg up it with his broken foot, only recently out of plaster.
But the view from the top was worth it.
Early afternoon saw us bowling up towards Arkosund with a fine reaching breeze
A stop at the quay for ice cream by way of refreshment and the purchase of some smoked fish.
Then on through a shortcut via a quiet reedy canal more reminiscent of the Norfolk Broads than the Baltic islands. It was fortunate that there was little wind and speed was slow as Greg and William hit a rock in the canal.
On the far side the offshore wind strengthened as we left the shelter of the land and led to some hairy moments. Nick and I hove-to to wait for Greg and William in the other canoe to reef and catch up. While struggling to see the chart on the screen of my phone in its waterproof case, I realised that we had drifted straight over the rock I was trying to avoid.
We had no particular campsite in mind but now had our eye in for spotting appropriate terrain and it did not take long to find a suitable location on an island shortly before the exposed stretch across the mouth of Braviken estuary leading to Norrkoping. The wind died with the light.
Week 1 day 4 12/06/2013
Dawn brought a fine sunny morning with a light breeze from the West, ideal for the somewhat open passage direct to Oxelosund. This was a bit of a relief as we had felt that this section of the coast might prove a problem for the canoes if there had been a strong wind and sea from the East. We were in a hurry to start in case the weather did not hold, but it still seemed to take about 2 hours to pack up the camp and stow the canoes.
Gradually Oxelosund came into view on the horizon and by 11.00 Am we made it to the beacon at the entrance
We stopped at the more Northerly of the two marinas which was nearly empty. I noted that, as an alternative, if the main harbour entrance had been too rough, we could have entered this marina by a shallow canal from the West. We made a short visit into the rather unremarkable town and William inadvertently left his wallet in the marina cafe.
We sailed round to Old Oxelosund, a collection of rickety timber jetties and old buildings huddled between the coal piles of the steelworks, but very picturesque nonetheless.
We had a very pleasant long lunch at the Bygdegarden restaurant,
then sailed out of the North East entrance and across another shorter open sound which leads to Nykopping
and into a whole new archipelago of more densely packed, greener islands with more nice camping possibilities.
Week 1 day 5 13/06/2013
In the morning it was evident that the weather had turned. It was overcast with an increasing wind from the SE. Fortunately the route for the day was slightly North of East and mainly sheltered behind islands except for one open stretch.
It began to rain and progress tacking became rather miserable. We holed up on a small island just short of the open stretch to have a brew of tea and warm up.
The exposed stretch needed a lot of concentration to deal with the larger waves and we were glad that neither canoe capsized as it would have been hard to deal with in the conditions.
I wished my top was actually waterproof!
We past Stendorren nature reserve which, on a nicer day, would be a pretty place to stop, have lunch, and go for a walk, but did not appeal in the driving rain. Further on, we tried to find a restaurant on the island of Savo but it was not yet open for the season.
Now very cold and wet we set off across an open area near Kallvik, aiming to head through a short narrow canal in the NE corner. Unfortunately the wind had come round a bit more to the South and the course seemed a bit too downwind for comfort with the amount of sail we had up. In the leading canoe, I headed across to the island on the East side and turned up into the shelter of a small bay to reef and regroup. At the last moment Greg noticed a chain of submerged rocks across the mouth of the bay and yanked the centreboard up and out of its case. We made it over into the smooth water with no damage but Nick and William following in the other canoe were occupied with trying to lower their foresail and did not notice our problems. They ran onto a rock at full speed and broke their centreboard.
We beached the canoes among some reeds and considered what to do.
It was getting late in the afternoon and we now had little alternative but to camp close by if possible. Fortunately the island did offer a possible camping place, not far away under some trees and so Nick set about making a fire from the damp wood available.
The rain stopped and we put our clothes to dry on bushes near the fire and had a fine meal of salmon steaks with a dill sauce. The evening was then spent doing an emergency repair on the centreboard which used a whole tube of Araldite.
Week 1 day 6 14/06/2013
The morning was still windy so we thought we’d better take no chances and start under fully reduced sail i.e. with the mizzen mast and sail set in the socket just forward of the centreboard case and the foremast and sail stowed below. Fortunately it was not far to Trosa, our destination for the end of week 1. However, there was still one stretch open to the South East and it seemed likely that some larger waves had had time to build up.
This proved to be the case, so we had another passage requiring absolute full concentration. I was glad of the reduced sail area as it made things less hectic but it also gave less force to balance against when coping with the quartering swell.
After crossing the open section we took a break on a small rocky island before finally working our way through some narrower channels to arrive at the Trosa campsite.
All in all a satisfactory end for the week 1 crews;
But my own day was far from over. If I was going to manage to retrieve the van from our starting point near Fyrudden and collect the next crew, I needed to catch the 3pm bus out of Trosa. There was just time so I ran the 3 km to the town and had a frantic time trying to find the right stop, but caught the bus. A train, another bus and a bit of walking got me back to our first campsite. A long drive then got me to Skavsta airport about 15 minutes late to pick up my son, who was going to crew for week 2. In that time he had managed to hitch a lift direct to Trosa and was sitting in a bar next to the river by the time I finally got back.
Week 2
Trosa is a sweet little town gathered around a canalised river with plenty of bars and restaurants, much visited by tourists. It has been called the “Venice” of the North, or sometimes “World’s End”.
We had rented a cabin at the campsite so as to have a bit of relative luxury during the day off allocated for crew changeover. Nick and “big” William were leaving to catch flights back to the UK and being replaced by Barbara and my son William.
More food and booze needed buying in Trosa as it might be equally hard to guarantee finding anywhere to shop among the islands as in the first week. We had planned the provision of alcoholic drink meticulously, including buying enough for both weeks in Denmark on the journey over as it was cheaper there but unfortunately I had forgotten this fact when packing the canoes for week 1 and we had taken all of the booze with us in the canoes and drunk the lot! Carrying enough food drink and water for 5 days was a challenge, particularly as we did not live on packets of dried food but ate pretty much as we would do at home , with full meals cooked using fresh vegetables etc. I had been worried about additional weight causing a canoe to float too low in the water to allow it to be bailed out if capsized. Greg found a solution to this by putting a large amount of the additional food and drink in a large & sturdy inflated Otleib bag in the cockpit of each canoe below the helmsman’s seat. The theory was that if the canoe filled with water, the sealed bags would act as their own floatation to support the weight of the additional contents and not weigh the canoes down.
