To Mousa, eventually

Dear Reader(s), you will remember that our intrepid fivesome were, at the end of the previous episode, marooned in Balta, and that Balta is a windswept, foggy winderness whence tomorrow may not come. However, tomorrow did come and it was indeed, another day.  It was another windy and foggy day. 

My beloved cooked chicken. It was a special recipe called "Chicken Balta". 

Balta in the windy fog has little to recommend it, apart of course for the chicken.  And so on.

Next off, Burravoe.

Burravoe is nice.  The marina is entirely good and intact (unlikely Balta which is, to be frank, unintact).

Burravoe also has a fleet of four Albacores.  It was Regatta Day.  Amy and Tim were recruited to fill in for absent locals who, we understood, may have been delayed as a result of having to celebrate a wedding on the Isle of Yell.  Amy helmed for a very nice man who turned out to be The King of Yell.  Tim crewed for another very nice man, but he was not the King of Yell. The King of Yell came from Chichester. This was surprising but did have a reasonable and quite understandable explanation which I will not explain yet, or possibly ever.

Tim and Amy did well and won prizes. We all had fish and  chips.  We saw an otter. Burravoe was indeed, very nice.

Sunday, 21st July.

Off to Vidlin Voe.

Vidlin Voe, as well as being rather a pleasant sounding name, is a pleasant place, with a nice marina and very nice people.

Vidlin Voe is also on "The Mainland", making it convenient for taxis etc.

Magnus (Team H's personal driver) arrived early to pick up three-fifths of our intrepid team.

We said "Goodbye" and were sorry to see them go, but at least we knew they would be safe with Magnus.

(for an account of Team H's subsequent journey to Sussex, please download their report "Four Hundred and Eighty things to do at Sumburgh Airport in the fog" and its exceptionally successful sequel "Four Hundred and Ninety things to on a ferry in fog".

Monday, 22nd July.

To Out Skerries.

Out Skerries is probably the most friendly island in the world.

On the way to Out Skerries we saw a whale (forgive the non sequiter), Footloose were following but unfortunately missed it. (This idiom was constructed mainly for my pleasure and that of my son, who will probably pale at its subtle complexities).

We were met at the pier by the Harbour Master and a man on a bike.

Last year 47 sailing boats visited Out Skerries.

The pier is lined with black lorry tyres which themselves are covered with special black stuff.

Some Norwegians arrived from Bergen and went for a swim.

We went for two nice walks.  It was sunny.

There was man with a lawnmower mowing the airstrip.

Another man explained that the newly erected port hand marker in the south entrance to the harbour was in the wrong position and that, as a result, the ferry was refusing to use that entrance.

I wondered if this controversy had been specially engineered in Brussels to aid social cohesion.

Next morning the Norwegians had a pre-breakfast swim.  We didn't.

We left by the South entrance.

Footloose ran aground briefly.

Tuesday, 23 July.

We arrived in Lerwick.

Lerwick means "muddy bay" in Viking.

The marina was quite full.

Mainly Norwegians and Icelanders.  The Norwegians visit Lerwick as a "weekend trip” from Bergen which is only 48 hours away.  Because it is summer, weekends are much longer at these latitudes. The Norwegians like to go shopping and buy stainless steel cooking utensils. The Icelanders seem to sleep a lot.  Most people smile and are very friendly, especially when Ingela is taking their ropes.  Ingela wears shorts.

Whilst in Norway we went shopping (at the Co-op), we visited the museum and the castle and we went out to supper.  Next day we walked to the "Viking Bus Station" and had a nice ride in a bus to see Jarlshof which is a fascinating archaeological site.  The Vikings in Lerwick don't often go out with their traditional headgear fitted.  I found this disappointing.

Thursday, 25th July.

We motored towards Mousa.

We had an especially happy day.

We anchored off Mousa and Jean cooked chicken. We all enjoyed our Chicken Mousa.

It was a wobbly night at anchor.

Friday, 26th July.

We all went ashore and visited the Broch of Mousa.

This is a 2300 year old house, built in stone and 13 metres high.  It is best preserved Broch in the world and looks remarkably like a power station cooling tower.

One day I will post some photographs on this blog. Unfortunately Mousa, which is uninhabited doesn’t have broadband.

Here it is.

Northwards and beyond

Hello again, Dear Reader. Much has happened over these long weeks north of the internet ... a land without WIFI, penguins or even texts, a land of mystery, Vikings and fog, a land of intrigue and awe.  I could go on.

Today we are weather-bound in the "shelter" of the Balta Sound on Unst, considerably north of Watford.

Back to the plot, so far ... but briefly.

Sunday 1st July.

We went to Shapinsay and moored in Elwick Sound where only 800 years ago King Haakon stopped with his fleet of 100 longboats on his way to Largs to do battle (which he lost). How might history have been different if he had won, but as he didn't, I won't discuss this further (yet).

We flubbered ashore and walked along a very long straight road which wasn't built by the Romans.

Shapinsay.

We hired bikes and "did" Shapinsay. We inspected and enjoyed Burroughston Broch (100 BC).

Shapinsay is the preferred home of the otherwise extinct Orchadian Vole. However, we saw no voles.

We cycled across a sandy swamp but failed to find Shapinsay's second most important monument The Odin Stone (perhaps it had been nicked).

Home via the teashop for a Shapinsay Flapjack (comment still in construction).

A good day. (We didn't bother with Dog Geo Caves, for obvious reasons.)

Wednesday.

Peter and Sara arrived.  Much celebrating and they cooked us supper.

Thursday.

Tim arrived.  Further celebration.

We refuelled the boat at Lidl and stored the victuals under Tim's bed.

Friday 5th July.

Off to Otterswick on Sanday Island, our staging post for the big push to Fair Isle.

Otterwick was the scene of one of my ideas  .. it seemed very sensible at the time, at least.

For a number of very sound maritime reasons, we joined up 6 lengths of rope to connect Albatross to Footloose. For safety reasons I securely attached a fender (belonging to PB) to the middle of this line.  We had supper, the fender drifted off, the line got caught around our anchor and I had to drive the flubber most of the way to Norway. It all ended happily and I have avoided having too many good ideas since.

Saturday.

We sailed to Fair Isle.

We all like Fair Isle.

We had lovely walks.

I got attacked by Bonxies.

Tim got attacked by Bonxies.

We had an excellent supper at the Fair Isle Bird Observatory.

Two lovely days on Fair Isle.

8th July

We sailed to The Shetland Islands, anchoring in Bigton Wick on the east (left) side behind St Ninian's Island, beside the finest sand tombola in Europe.

We had nice walks.

9th July

A rough and roly ride to Scalloway.

Scalloway (pop. 1200) is Shetland’s second city and has a very nice shop that sells everything and a castle which we explored.

Next day.  Off to Walls.

Anchored in Walls, we were invited to join the  Round Foula Regatta, unfortunately we declined.  We later heard that only one of the five entrants finished, collecting the £500 first prize.

Jean, Tim and I all WENT FOR A RUN.

Thursday

Off to Papa Stour.

We anchored without seeing where we were anchoring because it was "slightly misty". Radar is a good thing.

Papa Stour has the "best caves, rock arches, tunnels and stuff in Europe".  It really does.  We had a wonderful walk together.  The Bonxies considered attacking Tim but thought better of it.

Saturday 13th July

To Aith where we eventually rafted out from Footloose on the harbour wall just in front of the lifeboat.

We plugged into the lifeboat hut's washing machine's electricity plug and filled up with water and food.

We had a wonderful tour of the lifeboat and the crew promised to come and rescue us at any time should the need arise.

We liked Aith, its sports centre, pier and shop.

We scrubbed and polished the boat and made ready for Linda and Amy's arrival, and they did.

15th July.

A foggy roly sail to Hamna Voe.

Many places in these islands are called "Hamna Voe" possibly because of limitations in the Vikings vocabulary which is based mainly around words for harbours, islands, inlets, islands and puffins.

Hamna Voe is "poorly charted" but very pleasant even in the mist.

PB explained to me the importance of proper chart work and passage planning.

I reaffirmed my belief in the sound practice of following closely behind anyone (eg. PB) who appears to know what they are doing.

16th July

Whale Firth

Complete absence of whales.

Did see a Basking Shark, wasn't collecting a lot in its guitar case.

17th July THE MUCKLE FLUGGA ROUNDING

No fog, a nice sunny day.

Team Tim and Linda went walking, Amy was on Footloose.

We rounded Muckle Flugga, Gannet colonies and all.

Very nice.

Arrived Balta Sound.

Picked up Linda and Tim and Amy.

Balta Sound Harbour has a pontoon but it is broken and sits on the harbour wall awaiting repair.

Balta exports talcum powder from Unst.

It will take a little more than talc to remedy the crews' collective dermatological and hygiene issues.

We opted to anchor off rather than enjoy the harbour.

Balta has the most northern pub in Greenland and the foggiest post box in the Faeroes, not to mention the only shop in Iceland.

Last night it got a bit windy.

We didn't drag our anchor.

I slept till 10.

Today I wrote blogs.

Tomorrow is another day.

Stromness to Westray to Kirkwall

We left Stromness on Thursday 27th June 2013 at 0650.
we motored out of the marina, past a grounded boat attached by a line to the Stromness Lifeboat.
Apparently there had been much excitement, a "Mayday" even, but now all looked calm, if shallow. Easily done, running aground, that is.

Out through the terrors of Hoy Sound (against the end of the flood), a pleasant reach northwards along the west coast of Mainland.
On, past Rousay, into Westray Sound; little wind now, but 4 knots of tide behind us.
Port towards and through Weatherness Sound (having carefully avoided Point of Dogs Bones, which sounded ghastly and looked shallow).
Port again up the north east coast of Westray and eventually into Pieroport.  Berthed Pieroport 1300.

Pieroport Marina.  Water, electricity, showers at the ferry terminal, friendly neighbours. What more could we ask for?
We walked into the village.
The main shop sells almost everything. So does the post office.

Supper on board.
We opted for the healthy option (mainly because neither the main shop now the post office sold anything unhealthy).
After supper we were invited over "for drinks" by our lovely neighbours on "Longbow" and also met our other lovely neighbours from "Rebel".
Our healthy supper was hugely improved by good company and some Single Malt.

Friday.
We walked to the north beach. Lovely white sand.  Jean spotted a Ringed Plover. We explored the castle.  We like castles.  Noltland Castle was well worth visiting. Back to the boat via the village.

Saturday 29th June.
The weather up here is somewhat variable.  You get, for example, wind then rain, then wind and rain, and so on, and at times sunshine.
In order to sure of getting to Kirkwall this year we decide to go for the "weather window" that appeared to exist that day.  This worked fine and we made it all the way to Kirkwall, burning hardly an ounce of diesel on the way. This time we went east of the Point of Dogs Bones and exited Fersness Bay south of Faray unscathed. On down the west coat of Shapinsay, past Vasa Point (inside the Skerry of Vasa  ... "Skerry" comes apparently from the old Viking word "skerry", which means "quite generally worrying especially when foggy in a longboat when the GPS is down".

Safe arrival in Kirkway.
Fish and Chips for supper.

Sunday.
Windy and wet, then sunny, etc.  Sunday Newspapers. Write blog.
Tomorrow, perhaps Shapinsay.
It depends on the weather.

Stromness, St Mary, Longhope, Stromness.

The trip back to Stromess was a doddle.

Easyjet wasn’t difficult; The hotel in Inverness was “inexpensive”. The coach was comfortable. The ferry was excellent. Albatross was still floating.

The potatoes hadn't kept well.

I had a list of important maintenance tasks.  My beloved had her kindle.  We had a pleasant day together.

At last, I found the reason why the boat fills up with water when the engine runs  … it’s done this since birth.  The Engine exhaust elbow has a crack in its welding.

Doom.

What to do?

I consulted BHQ  (It’s very good to have a retired nuclear engineer available for advice 24/7). 

New elbows are just over £200 and are widely available in England.

The local garage recommended Hamnavoe Engineering “on the industrial estate” (in the big shed behind the primary school).

Hamnavoe Engineering (BSA too high to measure) is now and will always be my most favourite establishment.. anywhere in the world.

We wandered in, complete with leaking elbow. 

I explained to a nice man that my elbow was leaking. 

He looked at it  and said “the weld has a crack in it, see here and here.”

He wandered off with my elbow, returning after about 10 minutes.

“I’ve re-welded it, here you are”.

He should have said, “My name is Michael Angelo, welder from Heaven, Nobel Laureate in Stainless Welding, Philanthropist and Saint .. here is your  beautifully re-engineered elbow.”

I said, “Thank you, how much do we owe you?”

He said, “Nothing, that’s fine.”

My newly repaired elbow

We sped home, refitted the elbow. It no longer leaks when the engine runs.

Unfortunately, the bilges still fill up when the engine is running, but no longer from a leaking elbow. Such is life.

Anyway, time to go sailing.

Tuesday, off to explore Scapa Flow.

First stop, St Mary’s.

We anchored, flubbered ashore, went for a walk.

Back on board we had supper and watched The St Mary’s Sailing Club Tuesday Evening Snipe Racing Series. 

Tuesday evening at these latitudes is light till about 11.00 p.m.  This is a good thing as, in common with all evening racing series, the wind died as soon as the starting gun had been fired.

Snipe racing at St Mary's

We chatted to the sailors after the race.

“Where are you from in that big white thing?” (I think they meant “that boat”).

“Sussex.”

“How long did that take?”

“About a year and a half.”

I decided to give the Snipe sailors some tips.

“Don’t you know how to rock a boat in light airs?”

In a stroke the innocence and good sportsmanship of Snipe racing in Scapa Flow lay in ruins; never mind, next week they’ll be finished before the pub shuts.

Windless racing on Scapa Flow

It’s lovely sleeping at anchor, until the wind gets up and everything starts creaking and groaning  … and that’s just the skipper.

Today, pleasant sail to Longhope, the main village in Long Hope and the famous lifeboat station.

We anchored for lunch.

This evening, back in Stromness.

Tomorrow, Westray, so we’ll be out of communication for a few days.

Provisioning for northern climes.

Flapjacks

Flapjacks ... as made earlier

Ingredients:

100g/ 4oz butter/marge/oil  (but don’t use ‘light’ margerine or spreads that have extra water in them)

100g/ 4oz soft brown sugar

2  tablespoons of golden syrup

200g /8oz porridge oats

pinch of salt

Method:

Put butter, sugar and syrup into a large saucepan and heat until melted and mixed but do not boil.

Draw off the heat and stir in the oats and salt.

Grease thoroughly a baking tin/ roasting tin, add mixture.

Bake at 180C Gas Mark 4 for 10 - 15 mins. (ie a medium heat.  If in doubt, use a lower heat for longer; if you over cook it will go rock hard when cool)  The mixture should be bubbling slightly through to the centre, and  browning round the edges when you take it out of the oven.

Mark into squares while still hot (about 10 mins after you take it out) but leave in the tin until cold.

Should make 8 pieces.

Better in larger quantities.

Not recommended for dogs.

Something about sheds, dogs and rhododendrons

Sheds are important. It is important that you have a shed and also that it is nearly as big as your friend’s shed.

Sheds are where stuff is kept. It’s important that you have plenty of stuff and that your shed isn't too tidy. 

Boat owners and dog lovers need several sheds.

It important that a dog is not allowed to explore his master’s shed unsupervised.

My shed (note complete absence of dog).

As well as sheds we have rhododendrons. 

Here are our rhododendrons.  Bonzo helps them to grow vigorously.

Orkney’s best kept secret

In early April we visited a tiny patch of woodland, in a south facing hollow, on the northern-most island of Mildaig.

The Vikings called this place “Blaklokke Oya”* or Bluebell Island.

The woodland, known locally as “Tull Skog” contains the only remaining stands of deciduous broad-leaf forest anywhere in the Orkney Islands. 

Apparently there is something very special about this little island’s position in the Gulf Stream, its protection from the north-easterly winds and the curvature of the hillside that has nurtured this remarkable place.

Early bluebells in Tull Skog

*Selvfølgelig, dette er alle en komplett løgn!