In this publication10 photos
Ask sailors what takes most time: repairs. Remove that answer, and planning comes next.
Grigory and I can plan. Two years planning a drive to Danish Biltema for affordable boat bits. By May, another failed car trip. Logical owners’ solution: sail to the shop.
Thursday, 14 May 2026, four in the morning, Kiel towards Denmark. Textbook forecast: westerly eight to fourteen knots.
Longer doesn’t always leave first
A quiet assumption: Rassvet is almost two metres longer than Meerbär so I might pull ahead. VHF sixty-nine; Grigory even suggested I could light the barbecue before he arrived.
Reality disagreed. Rather than ahead, slightly behind. No race, but I trimmed as carefully as I knew, at my best speed. Over twenty-four hours, perhaps an hour’s difference.
A useful lesson. Length matters, alongside displacement, hull shape, bottom condition, sails, wind angle and strength. Perhaps more performance to learn from my boat; perhaps three-tonne Rassvet needs more breeze.
Radio pleasures
Radio chatter sounded more S.T.A.L.K.E.R. expedition than hardware-store shopping.
The fjord and a decision already obsolete
Inside Flensburg Fjord, farther west meant tacking. Wind died, large cloud ahead. Forty minutes at normal speed to the marina could become two and a half hours under sail.
I called Meerbär to say I’d furl and motor. Sensible until I furled the genoa, started, and met eighteen knots dead ahead.
Replan: a little north, some genoa again, nearly six knots. Best stretch instead of dreary motoring. Forty-two miles, nine hours, Sønderborg.
Biltema, Bøfsandwich and boat economics
Adjacent berths, walked to Biltema. First essential: Bøfsandwich, a Danish beef burger drowned in thick gravy. Neat eating impossible; I stopped pretending and accepted local rules.
Nearly €200 each shopping. A €150 bow platform particularly hurt; mine cost €300. Planning sometimes saves money, sometimes shows how much you overpaid.
Denmark means barbecue
Back with the satisfaction of a completed expedition. Grigory explained Denmark’s marina barbecue areas, marinated meat, fresh bread, vegetables and charcoal.
No more shopping: he’d brought charcoal and two beef steaks. Simple end: boats together, forty-two miles, purchases in cockpits, and dinner making the Biltema plan even more convincing.
#passage
Grigory and I can plan. Two years planning a drive to Danish Biltema for affordable boat bits. By May, another failed car trip. Logical owners’ solution: sail to the shop.
Thursday, 14 May 2026, four in the morning, Kiel towards Denmark. Textbook forecast: westerly eight to fourteen knots.
Longer doesn’t always leave first
A quiet assumption: Rassvet is almost two metres longer than Meerbär so I might pull ahead. VHF sixty-nine; Grigory even suggested I could light the barbecue before he arrived.
Reality disagreed. Rather than ahead, slightly behind. No race, but I trimmed as carefully as I knew, at my best speed. Over twenty-four hours, perhaps an hour’s difference.
A useful lesson. Length matters, alongside displacement, hull shape, bottom condition, sails, wind angle and strength. Perhaps more performance to learn from my boat; perhaps three-tonne Rassvet needs more breeze.
Radio pleasures
Radio chatter sounded more S.T.A.L.K.E.R. expedition than hardware-store shopping.
‘Rassvet, Rassvet, this is Meerbär, over.’
‘Meerbär, Rassvet, over.’
‘Rassvet, an area to avoid begins in two miles, over.’
‘Meerbär, understood, altering to three-five-zero, out.’
The fjord and a decision already obsolete
Inside Flensburg Fjord, farther west meant tacking. Wind died, large cloud ahead. Forty minutes at normal speed to the marina could become two and a half hours under sail.
I called Meerbär to say I’d furl and motor. Sensible until I furled the genoa, started, and met eighteen knots dead ahead.
Replan: a little north, some genoa again, nearly six knots. Best stretch instead of dreary motoring. Forty-two miles, nine hours, Sønderborg.
Biltema, Bøfsandwich and boat economics
Adjacent berths, walked to Biltema. First essential: Bøfsandwich, a Danish beef burger drowned in thick gravy. Neat eating impossible; I stopped pretending and accepted local rules.
Nearly €200 each shopping. A €150 bow platform particularly hurt; mine cost €300. Planning sometimes saves money, sometimes shows how much you overpaid.
Denmark means barbecue
Back with the satisfaction of a completed expedition. Grigory explained Denmark’s marina barbecue areas, marinated meat, fresh bread, vegetables and charcoal.
No more shopping: he’d brought charcoal and two beef steaks. Simple end: boats together, forty-two miles, purchases in cockpits, and dinner making the Biltema plan even more convincing.
#passage
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