Stage 4: Baltic Germany

Saturday 26 May

We stayed at Moltenort, watching dinghy sailors, canoeists, motor boaters and sailors all mixing in and around the marina. It is a very friendly place. The village is pleasant too - probably a good place to commute from if you work in Kiel. We cycled along the edge of the fiord to Laboe, to visit the U-boat museum and memorial.

The tower dominates that side of the fiord, and houses a good museum about the history of the German navy. It was interesting to read the modern German view of the two world wars - both condemned as unnecessary and unwinnable. We started climbing stairs up the tower, surprised to find that we were the only ones on a rather exposed staircase on the inside of a large open, empty square tower. After about 300 steps, we heard other people, and found the top of the lift! The view was stupendous over the fiord and north towards Denmark.

There was a U-boat to walk around, too. Crowds of people were on the beach, many swimming. We had a paddle in the very warm, shallow water, then turned back to the U-boat memorial.

The bronze sea eagle on the top of it has been taken away for cleaning, but inside it is a very sobering experience. There are rows of bronze plaques listing the names of all the U-boat submariners who were killed in the two world wars (nearly 35000) along with where they were killed and their dates of birth. They were all about 20, their boats were sunk all over the world, but very many in the English channel, and the sheer number of names is horrifying. 

Sunday 27 May
We sailed to Eckernforde, which is about 20 miles up the coast. It is a bank holiday weekend -Pentecost, apparently, so there were lots of sailing regattas. We had literally hundreds of dinghies sailing out of the Olympic site just a little way up the fiord. Luckily, most of the races were just inshore or just offshore of the course that we wanted to take, but a few dinghies darted across our bows. As we came into Eckernforde, a muddle of larger yachts resolved itself into a race heading out of the fiord. We gybed onto starboard, and a big gap opened up as they tacked either side of us. We came to the sailing club which we visited last year, which seems to have some part in the regatta, so we expected some noisy evening events evening events.

Actually, the evening was quite restrained, but we were woken at 11pm by fireworks. They were set off near the leisure centre in the town, which meant that we saw them over the fiord. They were very good indeed, with colours, such as a vivid orange and purple, which I'd not seen in fireworks before.
Monday 28 May
We decided to cycle to Schleswig, which is about 27 km away. The direct main road has a cycle path beside it, but the cycle signposts directed us a quite different route, getting us quite lost and confused at times.

We started alongside a lovely lake, wandered through small villages and fields, and ended up on a hilly section which kept on dipping down to the Schlei and climbing back up into the woods around.

At about lunchtime, we found the Viking museum, about 4km this side of the town, and had a good lunch before going around the museum.

There were some nice objects, but surprisingly few of them, considering what a major town Heddaby (Haithabu) was in Viking times, controlling the main portage route from the Baltic to the North Sea.

There was also a reconstructed Viking village - quite nicely done, and in a gorgeous position down by the lake or inlet of the Schlei as it would have been.

Once we'd done all that, we decided to cycle straight home, rather than go into the town of Schleswig. We got slightly lost on the way home, but it was a super scenic ride, and probably the best part of 40 miles, all told.








Tuesday 29 May
There was a warning of gusts this morning, and then the wind would be north east again - the direction in which we wanted to go, so we stayed in Eckernforde for another day. Shopping in the morning and a bike ride through empty leafy lanes, with lilac and may in the hedgerows, to the Schlei. It was a place where a ferry crosses, about 5 miles from Schleswig.

The river bends among wooded hills and there are a few houses - the sort of place your granny should have a holiday home for those long summer holidays, mucking about in boats and swimming in the river! There was a family swimming, and a granny, and dinghies, but maybe this wasn't an Enid Blyton story!





Wednesday 30 May
We finally left Eckernforde this morning, with a fine reach down the fjord with the drifter up, until the wind rose and we had to turn closer into it, when the drifter was furled and taken down, and soon a reef was necessary. It was a quick sail up the coast to the Schlei, which is the next fjord, but this time with a very narrow mouth, opening out to a wide shallow lagoon and the winding channel down to Schleswig. We moored close to the entrance, in Maasholm, which we visited last year. There are two older Sirius 32's resident, and we picked a place next to one of them.

Thursday 31 May
We left early, because the weather was forecast to get worse during the afternoon. We just went up the coast into Flensburg fiord.

It was a lovely sail in a nice force 3, with just one tack to get around the lighthouse at Kalkegrund, which seems to be in the middle of the fiord, but marks the end of a shallow spit, although the local boats sailed inside it. We actually just entered Denmark for a few minutes before tacking back into Germany - we didn't change the courtesy flag, and noticed that many local boats had a Danish courtesy flag rigged permanently. By lunchtime, we were moored up in Getling Mole, a very well organised marina rather a long way from anywhere, really. The forecast increase in wind did not materialise, although it did rain in the late afternoon. Winds are supposed to be very gusty tomorrow, so another bike ride is planned.

Friday 1 June
By the morning, the wind had really kicked in, with steady wind speeds of 20+ knots and gusts well over 30. Our plan to ride bikes over to Flensburg, straight into the wind, was shelved, and we went to Kappeln, about 15 km, but due south rather than west, instead. It was a nice rural ride along a cycle path beside a not very busy road, with tall green grass, dark green woods, blue sky and deep blue sea.

The town is a rather nice jumble of old buildings with some new pedestrian areas, and a fine large church which has two storeys of galleries and a detailed carved altarpiece.

The town is on a narrow part of the Schlei with an opening bridge, which was run in a much more relaxed pace than the Dutch ones we went through.

There was a museum of old boats - well, a reserved pontoon labelled as such, where you could wander and look at a variety of boats at your own risk.









Saturday 2 June
We stayed another day at Gelting Mole, in order to get to Flensburg by bike. The wind was still in the west, but not as strong as yesterday, but there were some strong sudden showers. The distance is about 30 km, so we decided to stay on the excellent bike track alongside the main road, rather than the wandering bike paths along more scenic, hilly and devious routes. We had about 3 showers, when we sheltered in bus shelters, which broke up the journey a bit, but it did seem a bit of a slog into the wind at times.

When we finally arrived, we locked up the bikes to a handy bike rack and dived straight into a brewery/restaurant for a well-earned beer and meal.

Then we wandered along the main street - all pedestrianised and very full of shoppers. We admired the old merchants' houses (the hofs) and the courtyards behind, and the church with two Danish model ships and some extraordinary wall paintings.

One of these showed a bishop being tortured on the rack, with his intestines being pulled out. The others were a bit less gory.

There is a ship museum, in the same sense as the one in Kappeln, a bit of the harbour dedicated to old wooden boats, some with labels to tell you a bit about them, some well preserved, some not.








The ride back was much easier because the wind was behind us, except that my back tyre developed a slow puncture. The best way to deal with it was to ride flat out for about 2 miles, pump it up while Gordon caught up, and then dash off again. Actually, Gordon was nearly as fast as me, so he was able to take a share in pumping, and it gave us an excuse for frequent rests, which probably helped us get back in little over 2 hours, including about 10 stops for pumping!

Stage 3 - Through Germany to the Baltic Sea

Tuesday 15 May
We took the advice of the harbourmaster in Lauwersoog to leave at 8.30, to give us enough ebbing tide to get us out into the open sea. He also warned us that there are new restrictions on the areas in which you could sail - blocking off one obvious route east. We looked up on the Navionics chart on the iPad, but the restrictions were poorly defined. (In practice, other boats seemed to be sailing and fishing in parts that appeared to be restricted on that chart.) 
As we left, a large dredger was heading for the lock, but it filled it completely, so we moored up and waited, not for long, though, before the lock was turned round for us. We were able to sail up the channel, amongst many fishing boats, some returning home, some still fishing. There are many complicated channels through the mud banks here, and the buoyage, though excellent, is confusing. A few tacks, some of them over bits marked on the chart as drying (but all within the buoyed channel) took us out into the open sea. There was a swell, but otherwise no big waves. At this point the wind died, and we had to motor for a bit, but we took the opportunity to try out the sextant.

Our positions were terrible - lots more practice required! Once we arrived at the Huibertgat channel into Borkum, the wind had returned and we sailed, with a strong tide at up to 7 kts, with the drifter doing what it does so well. Again, we had a number of fishing boats to avoid. Eventually, we arrived at the main Ems channel, furled the sails and motored into the friendly sailing club in the Burkana harbour (WSVB) just behind the now-tatty and rundown marina. Forecasts for tomorrow are not good - we'll stay an extra day and see what Thursday brings.

Wednesday 16 May
The wind was whistling with speeds above 30kts at times. It was a good day for a bike ride to explore Borkum. There is a small holiday town about 5 miles from the harbour, connected by a little train. The rest of the island is sand dunes, with some fields and plenty of holiday cottages and bike paths everywhere. 

Thursday 17 May
Ascension Day - himmelfahrt (possibly) in German is a holiday, so most people take it as a long weekend. Expect crowds on the islands, we were warned. We set off with a light westerly wind, but after the gales the previous day, we expected some rough sea. We got out into the channel leading to the Ems past Borkum, and the sea steadily rose to waves of at least 3m. It was uncomfortable, but Alshira coped well, and we were able to sail, mostly close hauled, right out from the island, and past the offshore reefs. Finally we were able to bear away to point towards Nordeney, but the wind was too light to make decent progress, and we had to motor-sail. The seas were still large, so it was uncomfortable and pretty unpleasant. A German coastguard boat approached and radioed us to ask lots of questions about where we had been and so on - all very polite and friendly. We heard them talking to all the other boats out, in turn. Eventually we got into the Schuchtgat channel into Nordeney. The seas were confused and rough, but as we rounded the island, all became calmer than it had been all day. We motored into the harbour, found one of the only free places, and moored up.

Friday 18 May
This was a rest day, so we did the shopping and got the bikes out. We rode through the town - a mish-mash of spa town and rather ordinary hotels and houses, and then along the excellent bike paths as far as they would let us towards the east end of the island. We went up the lighthouse, a fairly ordinary brick structure, but with 250 steps to the top, and a super view. The sun came out and it really started to feel like summer. We had intended to leave the following day to Helgoland, but received a text from Colin Kennedy on his trip back to the UK with his new Sirius, Layla, that he was going to get to Nordeney on Saturday, so we stayed an extra day to meet him.

Saturday 19 May
We got the bikes out again, to ride to the middle of the island, and then walk through the dunes. It was shorts and tee shirt weather apart from a brief and relatively warm shower.

The dunes were quite bleak with large areas of bare sand or mud. At the back of the island they gave way to flat, featureless, slightly damp uncultivated grassland, populated by rabbits and birds.

In the evening, Colin with his crew, Alistair and Piers, on Layla arrived. We helped them moor up, drank their beer, and all ate dinner together in the marina restaurant. They told us about their route along the Eider and Helgoland, and we told them about the German and Dutch harbours that they may stop at on their way. We learned later that they headed to Lauwersoog the following day - a long day, but with a favourable NE wind.

Sunday 20 May
Rather than bash into the forecast NE wind, we decided to try one of the watt routes inside the islands, to go the length of Nordeney, to the tiny island of Baltrum. We left 2 hours before HW, and sailed the first half before having to put the engine on, and drop the sail for the narrow drying section, marked with very frequent withies. The least depth we recorded was 1.7 m. We motored into Baltrum harbour, and moored up to a pontoon. There were a few motor boats, and a couple of Dutch-style sailing boats. A huge queue of people were waiting for the ferry at the end of their long weekend holiday. The island is traffic-free and extremely quiet. We walked through a reasonable proportion of it. We paid the harbourmaster who is also the air traffic controller for the tiny airfield! The vegetation on and behind the dunes was much more lush and varied than Nordeney. We dried out, as expected in the late afternoon, but must have sunk into the sand or mud, because we didn't really settle firmly.

Monday 21 May
The watt route to Langeoog was a bit more worrying, because it is shallower and there is really no alternative - all the books advise against trying to get out between the islands there. We checked with the harbourmaster/air traffic controller and he thought is would be ok about one hour before HW, so we left half an hour before that to be safe. Again, the way was marked with very frequent withies, and we got through with a least depth about 10 cm below the keel. Langeoog is a larger island, and a larger harbour, most of which has silted up. We had a look round the rather dull town in the afternoon, which is a good bike ride from the harbour.

No cars were allowed, again, but there were several horse-drawn wagons, a toy-town train, and millions of bikes. It looked as if the best day to attempt the Elbe would be Wednesday, and since we were unhappy about reports of the next island's (Spiekeroog's) harbour drying at LW when we'd want to leave, we decided to stay another day at Langeoog, and do the slightly longer passage on Wednesday.

Tuesday 22 May
We had a couple of rides into the town to shop in the morning, and rode to the far end of the island in the afternoon. The sun was out, the sand was warm, the sea was glitteringly blue, seals and lots of assorted seabirds were on the sandbanks. The island is divided quite rigidly into a northern zone of sand dunes, mostly out of bounds, and a southern zone of drained marsh, also mostly out of bounds. There are some fields in between, and even a sizeable wood between the harbour and the town at the western end. Our bike path was mostly along the boundary between the zones. We saw three hares, two males trying to mate with a female, while she tried to run away from us.

The island seems to be a destination for school field trips, and we met several groups of varying ages and enthusiasms, but on a lovely day like this, it's got to be better than school!

Wednesday 23 May
This looked to be a good day for the jump to Cuxhaven, although the wind all week is exactly in the wrong direction, so we steeled ourselves for a long bash by engine. We asked the harbourmaster if there was any problem in leaving the harbour, or sailing between the islands at low water - no, it should be fine if the waves are not too big, he said. We left two hours before low water and nearly went aground in the marina, but survived that. However, the channel between Langeoog and Baltrum had a strong tide running out, and surprisingly steep waves being blown into the shallowest part. We bumped the bottom and took a wave over the boat and frightened ourselves silly, but came through unscathed. That bit had been possible under sail, but then we turned into the wind, and the tides were such that we could not spend time tacking, so the engine came on for a tedious 58 mile passage into Cuxhaven, the last part in the Elbe has a very strong tide - we recorded over 9 knots. However, it was warm and sunny.

Thursday 24 May
In the night, the wind got up and the pontoon and boats in the Amerika Hafen marina all bucked and rolled with lots of groaning and crashing. We got up and put a snubber on the bow line which quietened some of the noise, but it was still a disturbed night.

We went into Cuxhaven town to shop and get some fresh fish - lots of choice here. We found an O2 shop where a helpful German assistant sold me a SIM for my iPad, so finally we can be in touch with the rest of the world. We sailed up the Elbe, in quite strong winds (as usual, on the nose) and very strong tides which kicked up a choppy sea, to Brunbuttel. The lock kept us waiting for an uncomfortable half hour, and then let us through with a small coaster and a customs boat. We motored up to the stopping place we have used before, to find a Dutch boat moored diagonally between two posts. We took several goes before we managed to moor up, but not as many as an Estonian boat which arrived after us, and took about 20 circuits before they got a line on a post and another 10 mins before they got a second line on.

Friday 25 May
We left quite early for the long motor along the canal. It was hot and sunny, so we largely left Jakob in charge and sat in the sun or did small jobs on the boat, just altering Jakob's course when necessary. You have to stop when 3 red lights show on the big gantries spaced along the banks. In previous transits of the canal, this has not happened, but this time it did. We slowed right down in one of the stopping places, and three large ships came past.

At another point, we saw a really huge cruise liner behind us, but calculated that it would pass us just at one of the few side channels in which we would be allowed to anchor. We darted in, and watched the liner tower over the trees as it passed. We then followed it the rest of the way to the lock.

We had to wait about 20minutes for the lock, but we were the only boat in it, and we paid the 12 euro fee, and passed into the Baltic, at last. We went straight across the fjord to Moltenort, and hadn't been there long before we were greeted by Janet and Horst, the Cruising Association reps, who invited us for a beer at an old lightship where their local club has its headquarters.

Stage 2 - Through the Netherlands

Monday 7 May
This was a rest day to recover, tidy up, buy the tide tables, and have a good meal in the restaurant.

The huge marina in Ijmuiden was surprisingly empty - definitely out of season.










Tuesday 8 May
The tides were wrong for a passage up the coast to Den Helder, unless we wanted to start at 4am or arrive very late, so we decided to go via Amsterdam. We locked into the North Sea canal with just one other boat. There was quite a lot of commercial traffic on the canal, though.

Through Amsterdam, at one point, three ferries were crossing in front of us in different directions at the same time as another was overtaking us.

It was a relief to get through the lock and opening bridge and emerge into Markermeer.

As soon as we could, we raised the sails, and had a fine sail up to Volendam.











Wednesday 9 May
The harbourmaster appeared just as we were leaving - we had failed to find him in his office at several attempts - however he gave us a discount since we'd not been able to use the showers. The wind was just perfect for the drifter and a long run up to the lock at Enkhuizen, which we got through in record time. As soon as we were through, we raised the sails again, and ran to Stavoren.

At times the sun was really warm, for the first time on this trip, we were able to sail in ordinary clothes !

It has a super plush marina, half empty out of season, but a very helpful harbourmaster. Forecast is not good for tomorrow - we expect to stay another day, at least.









Thursday 10 May
We stayed at Stavoren, with a bike ride to Hindeloopen, for two days, before the wind died just a little. Stavoren is a nicely run marina, with all the facilities you would expect, and apart from a plague of gnat-like flies, which got everywhere, but were too dopey to avoid being swatted, it was worth visiting.

Saturday 12 May

Hindeloopen - the primest of prim Dutch towns











Saturday 12 May
We finally moved on, because the forecast said the wind would moderate. We had a fine sail up the IJsselmeer but the wind was still strong, mainly over 20kts, with gusts up to 30. Strangely, the waves were smaller once we passed through the lock into the Waddensee, and with a strong tide, we belted up to Harlingen with speeds of over 9kts at times. We were particularly pleased to beat a motoring Moody 33, even though we sailed the whole way and had to tack a few times. I'm sure we had a more comfortable ride, too. We moored up in the Noorderhaven in time for lunch.

Sunday 13 May
Although the forecast for today was good, the ones for following days were not great, so to avoid having to get stuck in Terschelling or/and retrace our steps, we took the wimpy option of the canal route to Lauwersoog. On the way we met two Dutch couples in serious sea-going yachts, one bound for Finland, one for Norway - like us making progress eastward in the canals! We didn't feel quite so wimpish after that. We hoped to get into Lauwersmeer before the lock keeper knocked off at 7pm, but he had already shut up shop when we got to the lock at a few minutes before 7, so we moored up in a side channel near the lock for the night.

Monday 14 May
The lock is supposed to open at 7am according to Brian Navin's book, but it actually opens at 9. We moored up and waited. Once the lock keeper arrived, he came down to help us in the lock and to chat about the weather, and let us through very quickly. We unfurled the jib and sailed up Lauwersmeer in a fresh south west wind to the marina at Lauwersoog. It is much the same as on our last visit, but free wi-fi, possibly courtesy of a cafe just over the dyke. As is becoming a recurring theme, the forecasts are a bit iffy for the next few days. We might make Borkum, or we might be here for a while!