Crossing the North Sea

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Inverness, Scotland - Slussen, Sweden 12/8-17/8-2014

Finally some pics from our North Sea crossing! :-)

After a couple of days spent in Inverness, at the east coast of Scotland, the weather allows us to continue our last 500 nautical miles left to Sweden.

As in the past few days, also our departure day is grey and very rainy... But this doesn´t stop the smiles to shine and grow big!!
 

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Time to leave the cozy Caledonian Canal... We only have two locks left, thereafter we are back in saltwater again :-)

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Bye, bye Scotland... Once again the winds are in our favour and and we happily take this great opportunity to start our crossing.

With the wind in our back and the current with us we get a great speed towards east __/)_

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The North Sea welcomes us with many different grey tones... Suddenly, we are totaly surrounded by nothing else but grey water, a endless misty horizon and a super heavy, grey sky...

Cold... wet... but ohh so beautiful!! :-)

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We also get grey company during our crossing...

The oil rigs are plenty, and we see many fishing boats and helicopters as well...

... but I don´t mean this kind of company, I´m talking about the playful, living kind!! :-)

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They are White-beaked dolphins, a large and very robust dolphin species mostly found in colder waters.

During most of my many North Sea crossings I´ve done so far, I´ve got the great opportunity to spend many hours in company with this playful dolphin species :-)

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The White-beaked dolphins are fast and very powerful swimmers and I really have lots of fun while enjoying this acrobatic, high energetic dolphin scenario!

In some parts of range they may as well create a "rooster tail" (see pic bellow) in the water and so they do this time :-)

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The dolphins stay around the boat for many hours :-) and I really wish I could jump in the water with them!

But as the sea conditions continue to be quite rough and the wind keeps us in a good sailing speed, I simply need to stay happy just watching them from above.

And for sure I do!! My new friends truly spread so much positive energy all around the place, and I enjoy every single part of it!

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When getting closer to Scandinavia, the grey tones slowly turn into blue...

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After 4 days of sailing, we start to see the Swedish west coast appear at the horizon.

We are close to Lysekil at the north-west coast of Sweden :-)

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The wind starts to increase quite a bit and we get a last speedy ride into the beautiful Swedish archipelago...

Finally in shelter and next to dry land again!

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The sun has set already long time ago and the night starts to knock on the door... Eventhough we all are tired, it feels really cozy to spend some time up on deck together enjoying the calm bay after our last quite bumpy nights at sea...

We started our sailing from the Azores the 23rd of July, a nice voyage including mainly good winds and wonderful marine encounters...

Cheers for 3,5 weeks of great sailing and good company!! :-)

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But the trip isn´t finished yet... From Lysekil we still have 20 nautical miles left to go to reach our homeport "Slussen".

The next morning, they grey tones are back again and the heavy showers make everything wet. But as I´ve said many times before, grey is beautiful and I love water!!

So we continue sailing and smiling in the rain... ;-)

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From bare cliffs at the west coast the surrounding changes into much more green and woody at the east coast of Orust, which is an island at the Swedish west coast, about 80 kilometers north of Gothenburg.

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Wohooo!! After more than three years, the boat is finally back at "home" again!! :-)

The 5th of June 2011, we left the Swedish west coast and started our voyage to the Red Sea. An adventure filled with amazing encounters and memories... An adventure which soon will be broadcasted at the Swedish Television!

TV-premiere for our film "Expedition Red Sea -half a century later"  Thursday the 4th of September at 9pm (local Swedish time) SVT1 (Swedish National Television)

One hour sail-and dive adventure with "The Muecks"!! ;-)

Stay tuned...