2nd time lucky

Moorglade's Voyage
Ted Wilson
Thu 9 Jun 2016 10:20

Our position is 59:23.35N 18:47.916E

Distance covered 38.2 Nm

The anchor came up clean compared to the previous day and we motored out of the narrow entrance only for the engine temperature gauge to start rising again. We turned back but as we re-entered the anchorage, it sorted itself out so we turned round again and headed out into the sound. The wind was light and from behind, so we sailed for a bit until it died away to practically nothing and then motored again.

There were several warships in the sound, some from Belgium, and one from Holland, but calling itself merely ‘NATO warship’. They didn’t seem to be doing a lot, just hanging around but later in the day they started asking each other if they wanted to come out to play and then some of them chased each other up and down , while radioing that they were opening fire. (We didn’t hear any explosions though). One ship was radioing for permission to fly helicopters off, but always at times when we weren’t in their vicinity.

  The one with the helicopter

   

Warships at play. A264 is seemingly already going down!

It was a very hot day and the excitement of the warships was soon behind us and we were back to motoring along the passages through the rocks and islands enjoying the sunshine. We had planned to go to a small natural harbour called Grisselholm, which looked to provide adequate shelter from the strong Northerlies forecast to come through in the evening and night. It had a narrow entrance but when we got there it looked as though it would provide the shelter we wanted but unfortunately we couldn’t get the anchor to set, so we decided to go a bit further on to an even more sheltered harbour, even though we would not get there until later than we wanted. As it is light to varying degrees most of the time, sailing at night is not an issue in spite of the rocky hazards.

  Encountered along the way but not sure what his conveyor belt was for

  Entering Grisselholmen

  Entrance to Krokholmviken

the entrance from the safety of the bay

 

Anchorage at Krokholmviken

  Worrying about the anchor set

 

Krokholmsviken, between the islands of Krokholmen and Sack is sheltered from all conditions and is a reasonable sized, deep bay surrounded by hills, after a narrow passage between high rocks. We managed to get the anchor to set after some fiddling about and we seemed to be secure. One other yacht was in the bay tied to rocks. As the wind got up we swung around wildly but apparently without moving anywhere while the other boat left the rocks and anchored as well, but a long way from us. All things considered we had a fairly peaceful night in spite of the 35 knot winds our anemometer recorded. (I would guess it was even stronger outside.) When we came to leave the next morning the anchor was so soundly dug in to the thick mud that at one point we feared we might not get it up, so our fears about dragging were obviously unfounded.