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However, as far as the first part of our trip is concerned, Bristol Blue, Scorpius and Keeha have done such an excellent job of reporting, so we need not dwell too long on that area. We met up with them in Mexico and kept track of each other regularly, until we started moving faster ahead, and lost touch by the time we reached Cuba. (We miss you guys!). Baby, it's cold outside! Anyway, Nor Siglar arrived in Halden, Norway, on July 23, 1993 after a reasonably uneventful crossing of the Atlantic from Antigua via Bermuda and the Azores. Norway is experiencing the coldest and snowiest winter in the last ten years and the Skipper is freezing his...off after spending two winters in the tropics! It has taken us a little while to get the boat comfortable for living onboard in this climate, but we are now snug and cosy in temperatures to minus fifteen degrees Celsius which is the coldest yet. We have installed two electric heaters; one baseboard and one freestanding "Heat Machine Plus" that we brought with us from Vancouver. Since Nor Siglar is wired for 110 volts we have a heavy-duty isolating transformer between the 220-volt shore power and our ship's 110-volt intake plug. The baseboard heater is wired directly to the 220-volt shore power. When the temperature drops below minus five degrees Celsius, we start up the good old FAB-ALL diesel heater which is working like a dream after sitting around doing nothing for a couple of years. We also had to put foam insulation in the bilges since the floors got very cold, and some extra foam along the walls of the cabin where we sleep. The engine room is heated with a strong 120-watt heat lamp. In spite of this, the exhaust pipe froze up one time and when we started up the engine, the exhaust and salt cooling water come out the wrong way through the salt water cooling sea cock. The boat is moored at the mouth of a river where the current keeps the water ice free around us. We are nevertheless worried that the sea cocks could freeze if something happened to the electricity during one of our frequent absences from the boat. We have lots of family and friends here, so we often go visiting for long periods of time.
Going back almost two years, after transitting the Panama Canal in April of 1992. We spent two weeks in the wonderful San Blas Islands before heading north to Rio Dulce in Guatemala for the hurricane season. When thinking back on our travels so far, we have probably enjoyed the western Caribbean the most, i.e. the outer islands and reefs of Honduras, Rio Dulce and the highlands of Guatemala, and the shallow, nerve-wracking, but excellent cruising and snorkelling waters of Belize. We also visited Cuba (Hemmingway marina by Havana) for two weeks in November of 1992. This was just before the Americans put on the restriction that no vessel, including pleasure crafts, could call on any USA port within six months of visiting Cuba. Although conditions were pretty depressing, people were very friendly, and we had some of our most memorable experiences there. We took an interesting train trip through the interior down to Santiago de Cuba on the south coast. Returning to Havana, we had a harrowing experience on a Russian plane built ;in the early 1950's , sorely in need of maintenance. Our stay in Cuba deserves an article by itself, but apart from what has already been reported in Currents, nothing much has changed there as far as boating is concerned. We spent December 1992 and January 1993 in Fort Lauderdale to get the boat ready for the Atlantic crossing. In February we took off for the Bahamas, Turks and Caicos (excellent), Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, British Virgin islands and the French West Indies before ending up in Antigua, our starting point for the crossing. Apart from the actual sailing, we did not enjoy the eastern Caribbean as much as the western part, mainly because of the heavy-duty tourism caused by the abundance of cruise ships and charter boats skippered by unfriendly, inexperienced European playboys. Life in the beautiful anchorages was often abruptly changed from total bliss to utter despair, when these characters would come in to drop their anchoróusually on top of oursóonly to settle down to a night of partying...Oh well, it wasn't all like that, but we did find the western Caribbean lovely and peaceful in comparison, with lots of opportunities to meet the native population. Also, a feeling of close friendship and camaraderie between fellow sailors was very much evident there. This we found lacking in the eastern Caribbean. Heaven "&" Hell On may 2, 1993, after two weeks of boat maintenance and the (in)famous race week, we left Antigua for the approximately 1000-mile passage to Bermuda, the first part of our Transatlantic crossing. With reliable easterly tradewinds between fifteen to twenty five knots, we had a fantastic sail all the way with minor exceptions. Almost halfway, during a short squall, we ripped the main sail above the first reef point. This was easy to remedy, as we just put a reef in and kept going without losing any speed. Then on may 9, just twenty miles off Bermuda and literally out of the blue, we were hit by a strong gale from the north. We had not made allowance for such a drastic change in wind direction, the easterlies had been so steady. There had been no mention of it in the weather forecasts. So this one hit us square on the nose and we had to fight our way for ten hours to cover the last twenty miles. We took on more water in the cockpit during that day than on the whole trip so far. At times, the cockpit was filled with over one foot of water but it drained quickly, so apart from getting wet and cold for the first time in a year, we got through it. With the big Gibbs Light out of commission k we only saw the island about twenty miles out when the gale hit us. We thought we'd never make it in before dark, and were reminded of the saying that "Bermuda is a heavenly place to be but a hell of a place to get to." Dangerous reefs circle the island as far off as thirty miles, and many ships and lives have been claimed on these, particularly in the old sailing ship ear. Anyway, we just made it into beautiful St. George's Harbour before dark. Had we not found the narrow cut in time, we would have had to spend the night outside. It was too dangerous to go through the reefs in darkness. Our friend, Sidney Corbett, ex-postmaster General, was down at the dock in a flash welcoming us with a bottle of Goslings Black Seal rum and ginger ale, which make up the potent and appropriately named Bermuda drink, "Dark and Stormy". Needless to say, this went down without any problem after the last twenty-mile struggle. We were also relieved to have come right through the Bermuda Triangle without incident. Bermuda is like an enormous Buchart Gardenóa super place to spend a holiday if you have lots of money. Tourism is the island's main source of income so people are extremely friendly. It is a great place to bicycle since the island is so small and the speed limit is only thirty miles an hour. Although the roads are narrow, we never felt in danger, as the motorists are polite, recognizing that most people on bikes are tourists. We spent three enjoyable weeks in Bermuda, doing the usual boat maintenance, waiting for crew, favourable weather and psyching ourselves up for the next leg to the Azores. In the middle of may, several boats left to join others on the way to the Azores directly from Antigua, in spite of storm warnings just east of Bermuda. And rightly enough, they go hit badly, and for a while, five boats were missing, two of which eventually went down. Luckily, the crews, five from each boat, managed to get into their life rafts. All were rescued except one who fell out of his life sling while being hoisted aboard the freighter which found them. The five in the other raft were picked up by another sailboat. Since both boats were large, about sixty feet, we thing the crew may have been inexperienced, maybe young daredevils, rushing back to England for a race in Jersey. They had participated in the Antigua races two weeks earlier and the boats were racing machines. It is likely that the youngsters had too much canvas up. In any case, it was nerve wracking listening to the Bermuda Harbour Control and the US Coast Guard rescue stations searching for the boats, eventually making contact with some of them. All were in the same area for which we were heading. One of the boats that left early came back and tied up next to us. They had an injured crewmember who had fallen and cracked a vertebrae in the neck. On May 28, Hebert Bunce arrived from Vancouver and we were scheduled to leave a couple of days later. However, we got beaten to the punch by another weather system lurking further south in the Caribbean which was heading in our direction. By June 1, the official opening of the hurricane season, this weather system had developed into Tropical Disturbance No1, moving northeast at sixteen knots blowing thirty to fifty knots and expected to pass eight to ten miles south of Bermuda. With this forecast, we moved away from the dock to a small cove where we would be much safer if the island got hit by the "big blow". This turned out to be a good move, and we were snugly anchored behind a little island which sheltered us from the gale. Again, we were listening to the radio and a couple of sailboats didn't make it into St. George's Harbour in time before it hit. They rode it out safely, however, and the disturbance passed about thirty miles south of us, giving us strong gale winds of over forty knots but no problems. We kept anchor watch during the night till it calmed down around three o'clock in the morning. The next day, we were away through the narrow cut of St. George's on our way to the Azores. We expected this 1760-mile leg to take somewhere between fifteen to twenty days, depending on the wind.
The first week we had ideal conditions with southwesterlies of ten to twenty knots and sunshine. Then we had a few days of total calm, which gave us a chance to swim, sunbathe and do lots of reading. However, on June 13 (superstitious?), we ripped the main sail again in a brief squall. It was just as well I (the Skipper) was on watch so I could swear only at myself. But I guess I did some dandies since both Anne and Hubert got out of their bunks pretty fast to see what was going on! This time the sail tore above the top reefing point so we couldn't use it any more. We lashed it around the boom and carried on under reefed genoa alone for the rest of the trip. Even so, we managed to maintain our average speed of five knots. The only other casualty on this passage was when Anne got hit on the nose by the toilet seat while she was on her hands and knees throwing up during the same blow. There was blood all over ómore like a battlefield than a sailboat... Anne was on the ham radio twice a day with her contacts in Ottawa and Norway, Both my parents in Ottawa and Anne's Mother and family in Norway were therefore able to follow us every step of the way and knew where and how we were doing all the time. Do take that ham course! After fifteen days and 1950 nautical miles on the log, we arrived safely in Horta on the island of Faial in the Azores. The Azores, and in particular Horta, has been a stopover for ships crossing the Atlantic right back to Columbus' days. He was blown into the Azores by a terrific storm on his way back to Spain after his first voyage to the "New World". Horta is a quaint little seaside town, famous for its "wall" filled with graffito by visiting sailors from around the world. Literally thousands of signs (700-1000 boats per year) decorate the dockósome extremely artistic. Hubert and I made a joint effort in doing our part. We spent a couple of weeks in Horta doing the usual repairs, resting up and, of course, sightseeing. We even climbed the highest mountain in Portugal on the island of Pico. It is a live volcano, 7500 feet high and quite a hike, so we were sore for days afterwards. Like Bermuda, Faial is also wonderful for biking. However, it is much more hilly and proved to be more strenuous than we had bargained for at times. But we sailors need the exercise, right? Anne's nephew, Jim Brevig and his wife, Anne Ziffer, from New York, joined us in the Azores for the last leg to Norway. They treated us to a very fancy dinner at the most exclusive restaurant in Horta (not for our budget!) before we were off again on July 3. We were a bit worried about getting into the famous Azores High, which is an enormous area of high pressure,, usually lying east and northeast of the islands and in which you may be totally becalmed. This is one of the well known doldrums from the old sailing ship era. On the advice of our excellent weatherman, Herb, in Bermuda, we headed north-northeast the first several days until we picked up the westerlies. These are the remains of the westerly gales that blow steadily from Newfoundland right across the Atlantic almost to the British Isles. After a few days of east-southeast winds of five to fifteen knots, we found the westerlies. So we lucked out and managed to sail almost all the way to the British Channel in ten to twenty knot winds. Then they turned more south-southwest, twenty to twenty five knots. By now Jim and Anne were full-fledged sailorsóAnne even fully operational in the galley. Cockroaches, Whales "&" King Size Tunas This time we didn't have any excitement except when a cockroach crawled across Anne's (the other Anne's face when she was sleeping. Her screams woke up the rest of the crew who thought she had been murdered or something. This led us to an all out war on the beasts. We tried everythingóborax mixed with condensed milk and sugar, sprays, etc. óbut to no avail. When we got to Norway they were gone. Must have frozen to death! Our experience in the Atlantic is that the fishing is not as good as in the Pacific. However, after having had the lineout for several days, we finally got a beautiful bluefin tuna which was so huge that we had to use our axe. The cockpit looked and smelled like a battlefield, and Anne, who had been feeling good for many days, got sick again. Thank God this didn't keep her from eating the tuna which we had for dinner four days in a row. Unfortunately we had to throw out most of it since we can't have the fridge running all the time when we sail. It takes too much electricity. Since Anne (my Anne) is the only one who ever sees whales, she was the one who was visited by one again on her watch. This one was swimming along just beside the boat for quite a while, only a few feet away. After a while it blew a few large blows, slowed down, crossed behind us and disappeared north to the unfriendly waters of the Norwegian Sea. At least this one didn't try and go under us like the one on the Pacific side. There, in the Gulf of Papaya, off Nicaragua, we actually "fell" on top of one during a gale. The whole boat shuddered, and we were terrified that it would come back and give us another (maybe final) jolt. This never happened, and we were elated to escape with the scare. During this same blow, a crew member got injured in an accidental jibeó a very bad cut on his legóso we will never forget the Papagayos. Do take that first aid course before you leave home... Trials "&" Tribulations in the British Channel Back to the Atlantic. We had heard lots of bad stories about the British Channel; fog and mist, strong currents, fluky winds, hundreds of freighters and ferries, cold and miserable, and on and on...All these things are true. The first night I had given instructions not to use the radar until spotting a light on the horizon. The radar is very hard on the batteries and I thought the visibility was quite good. I had just taken over my watch from Anne and was still a bit blind from the cabin lights when I suddenly saw a bunch of lights right in front of me. What appeared to be a big city was in fact an enormous freighter on a straight collision course. It virtually came out of nowhere. We managed to turn the boat around just in time to squeeze up along the side of this huge monster only about one hundred feet away. From then on, the radar was on through the rest of the channel. Otherwise, we managed to sail through the channel on the British side in about three days before we got into the North Sea. During this whole time, the visibility was so bad that we saw England only once, and that was the lights from the South Hampton area for about an hour one night. We would have liked to have gone up the Irish Sea and through the Caledonian Canal in Scotland rather than the English Channel, but unfortunately, Jim and Anne had to bee back in New York in twenty-three days. So we went non-stop to Norway, covering 2300 nautical miles in nineteen days. This gave them some time to visit with family also. It is amazing how our average speed was always a bit over five knots. I guess it is because we usually motor or motor sail if the speed drops below two knots or so. Although we don't motor that much, in forty-one days and 5200 nautical miles from Antigua to Norway, we motored a total of five and a half days, using only one tank of fuel. A pretty cheap way to travel, eh? We had expected the worst from the shallow and stormy North Sea, but actually had to motor more there than on the rest of the passage. The biggest problem was to steer clear of all the oil rigs, fishing boats and ferries, but other than that, we had no problems. As we came closer to Norway the winds turned northeast, so when we thought we were almost "home free", we had to start tacking up the Skagerrak and covered twice the distance before we got our first glimpse of the "old rock". On July 22 at 1500 hours we sighted the Norwegian coast for the first time. This was a big event for all of us, but particularly for Anne and me who had finally reached our first goal after about two years at sea and over 14,000 nautical miles under the keel. Out came the Aquavit, "Skaal, Skaal!" and up went the Norwegian flag, the Halden Sail Club burgee as well as the royal Norwegian and Royal Vancouver Yacht Club burgees. (P.S. we ALWAYS fly the BCA burgee) Anne had been on line with the Halden radio amateur gang for days and they had arranged a big welcoming party at the dock in Halden at 1500 hours the next day. At the mouth of the Iddefjord we were boarded by local newspaper reporters who sailed with us the rest of the way while taking pictures and interviewing. We arrived at the Halden dock bang on time and there, Anne's 88-year-old mother was at the head of her clan, giving the farm-girl-turned-sailor a royal welcome. After milling around for a couple of hours on the dock with family and friends, we thought we'd better check in with customs and Immigration located on the same dock. We were a bit worried about permission to keep the boat in Norway more than six months. However, the officers didn't need any papers, nor did they want to stamp our passports! The Customs officer apologized for not coming down to the boat, but he didn't want to disturb our welcome. We literally had to invite him onboard, and once there, there was no inspection , just amazement that we had come all the way from the Azores. In Halden, Customs deals mainly with car traffic across the border from Sweden, hence the relaxed attitude towards offshore pleasure crafts! Incidentally, there was no charge for the one-year cruising permit, which is absolutely amazing as everything else is so expensive in Norway! We spent most of August and half of September cruising the south coast between Halden and Kristiansand. You have basically two navigational choices when cruising in Norway. You can sail just outside the thousands of small islands and reefs lining the coast or take the inside leads. The inside passages are beautiful and interesting with picturesque houses, cabins, quaint villages and small towns. But the navigation can be very tricky so you must have good charts and know exactly where you are all the time. Fuel and provisioning are very expensiveóabout seventy cents per litre for diesel. Food, on the average, is about one and a half to two times what we pay in Vancouver. Forget about eating out, since you will pay at least $50 for a dinner without wine. Moorage, on the other hand, is not so expensive. Most places cost from $10(small towns) to $20 (large towns) per night, but they are generally very relaxed and some places don't even charge you if you use someone else's moorage which is paid on an annual basis. Showers are horrendously expensiveómost are two dollars for five minutes! Don't count on buying booze here in Norway. A bottle of average whisky is about $60 and a dozen 350-milliliter bottles of beer cost $40. However you can get a bottle of good quality wine for $10. Propane is very difficult to obtain and very expensive. As far as we know there is only one place in southern Norway which will fill your bottle with a North American valve. That is a place called Aga Aprogass on Sjursoya near Oslo. It costs $45 to fill a 20 pound bottle, gut to buy a new full bottle costs $140. An Aga Progass truck will transport your bottle free of charge to and from Sjursoya on its regular weekly run from most towns of any size. The summer months of June, July and half of August are extremely busy so you will have a difficult time finding moorage and anchorage. But May and the latter part of August onwards can be very nice and quiet. Prices for tying up go down drastically after August 15 when school starts. Temperatures usually drop significantly after that time as fall comes early around 60 degrees north. We plan to stay in Norway till the end of May when we will head up into the Baltic to visit Sweden, Finland and St. Petersburg, before sailing south into the Mediterranean by Christmas. Till then: good skiing everyone! We're off to Lillehammer to see the Olympics! Ha det! Copyright © Anne Brevig & Martin Vennesland. www.norsiglar.com | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Wintering onboard Nor Siglar in Norway during the cold Lillehammer OL year of 1994, the Skipper decorates the cockpit for Xmas