Tuesday was to be Steve and Anne's last full day on Moondog, and we had decided on Fjallbacka ( 58:35.9N, 011:16.7E)  as a crew change place, mainly because of its Star Wars like name...and of course good bus connections, like everywhere along this coast.

 

This was a rather grey day until late afternoon, and Steve realised it was the first such day he had experienced since we started ; he will have used up all of his weather luck for the year I fear. We left Hunnebostrand fairly messily, since we had a strong side wind across our isolated box mooring ( so no neighbouring boats to hold us in the box as we slid out ). We decided on caution here, since the vision of getting blown down the jetty and tangling with mooring poles was not appealing....so we just let go the stern lines and let the wind blow us 'side to' the pontoon. It was then a simple matter of tying a stern line, letting slip the bow and the wind quickly blew the bow out so that we could motor out forwards and have good control to dodge the mooring poles. I learnt here that these moorings are actually easier when they are fairly tightly packed.

 

This was to be another short trip of only 15 miles or so, and a lot of it was going to be motoring in very narrow channels, so we went out towards the open sea first, just to play for an hour in some moderate swell and about 15 to 20 knots wind. Lots of tacking back and forth using the smaller self tacking jib, and stilll making 6 knot plus upwind. This was quite fun, with spray flying, but eventually it was back to the inside channel and our route first to the wonderfully named Hamburgsund, off the Island of Hamburgo. To our surprise we were able to keep sails up for a run down the channels for a while, until everything started to get too narrow, and we dropped the sails in a quite confined space which allowed just enough time to head into wind for the drop. The sail handling on Moondog is very easy, and we can furl the jib and drop the main in seconds....the main in particular just collapses instantly as the halyard is released, straight into its sailbag...no drama.

 

After dropping sail we motored into a very sheltered bay and moored to a bouy ( we assume it was for visitors), and had lunch. Steve and I between us made a complete mess of the simple operation of mooring.....first time a failure in understanding between US and UK terms ( like' stop' and 'neutral') meant that a perfect pick up had to be abandoned. Second time Steve helmed us perfectly to the bouy and I dropped the line...third time we made it. It was worth it though to be out of the wind and just sitting in this secluded bay.

 

On leaving the mooring we motored through the channels and between islands to Hamburgsund, which was very pretty, with small red houses right down to the water , with their own private docks. These had clearly all been for fishing boats and their families originally, and it was good to see a reasonable number of fishing boats still there, mixed in with some expensive power boats and extensively remodeled fishing huts. Some of the private house docks had hydraulic boat lifts that came up from below water to lift the owner's Fairline or similar large floating gin palace right out of the water...very James Bond....just step out of the patio door into your boat, press the button and lower it into the water and off you go ! I assume that the remaining fishermen are just waiting for the market to recover before they sell their huts and plots for fitting out with similar toys.

 

Hamburgsund had a cable car ferry, with dire warnings on the chart to keep at least 200m away. The cable ferries are a particular treat because they can get you one of several ways...if they don't hit you as they dash out of their lair on the bank, the undersea cable that tows them across can rip off your keel if you get too close. No problems for us thouigh, and the ferry was very well behaved.

 

After leaving Hamburgsund it was more channel weaving and island dodging to our destination, and we managed some of it running with the genoa only and making around 5.5 knots, which was a bit of a surprise. It was on this stretch that we had our first real 'scare' on depth, or rather the lack of it. What should have been 5 m was reading 2.5, and so it was a case of slowing to a crawl, and feeling our way back to deeper water, keeping clear of some charted 'awash rocks' that we could not see for some reason. All very odd, but we got back to deeper water, and arrived safely in Fjallbacka and tied up. Very glad we only draw 1.4m !

 

Fjallbacka is a bit of a tourist town, but still very nice with many old buildings down by the harbour. It is famous as the home of Ingrid Bergman, whose statue looks out to sea towards the island she lived on in her later years.

 

Steve and Anne left this morning for Gothenberg, and I shall rest here today ( to the extent that it is possible to rest from a long holiday ), and welcome Nic and Christian on board tomorrow for the next legs to Norway and Oslo Fjord.