A voyage through the Skagerrak. Part 2. Kiel → Grenaa

Night school

Two hours together as darkness covered Kiel Bay. I explained autopilot, instruments, course, speed, depth, watchkeeping. Nastya offered the first watch.

Almost training conditions: no wind, engine, autopilot straight towards Denmark. Four hours of letting the boat do dull, important work. I slept in snatches, up every thirty minutes to check.

First compromise. A watch formally covered; responsibility still the skipper’s, especially with someone’s first offshore night.

Following wind

Morning watch, genoa unfurled. Plenty of commercial traffic, so outside main routes and avoiding unnecessary crossings.

Following wind throughout: eight knots initially, twenty-eight for hours near the end. Unfamiliar after three years mostly sailing close to the wind.

A useful downwind discovery: ease the genoa sheet further for more depth, and it’s less prone to flipping sides with rolling and shifts. When the clew loses drive, the filled sail pulls it forward, preventing a flop onto the other tack.

Twenty-six hours, about 140 miles. Under sail, Rassvet held five or six knots confidently only with about fifteen knots astern.

Route decisions underway

Langeland surprised me: DW and Route H shipping routes leave small craft limited inshore room. Manageable, but not relaxing.

Watches:
1. four-hour shifts work;
2. keep the timetable strictly;
3. daytime, everyone in the cockpit, it slips;
4. night exacts the cost in attention.

Night never fully arrived. Sun down at ten, glow until four, then day emerged from it. Darkness supplied, but sparingly.

Grenaa

Grenaa meant waiting out strong winds, replanning, tying up and exhaling. Then exploring.

Kattegatcentret, port, town centre. At the aquarium, straight through the shop, souvenirs bought, onward to fish, shark feeding, seals, coffee, most of the day inside.

Only leaving did I see ticket barriers opposite the shop, the exit. We’d entered through it and visited free. Awkward.

Lunch at Havets Bord: a mountain of fried, boiled and smoked fish, peeled prawns and little roe. Could fish alone fill me up? All later meals cancelled, including dinner. Experiment settled.

Pause

Wind wasn’t the only delay. A strange illness struck: right-temple headache into the eye, nausea, confusion. About forty-eight hours, gradually easing. Nurofen and No-Spa didn’t help.

Pressure, dehydration, migraine, stress, seasickness, exhaust fumes, something else? Main thing: don’t sail with symptoms I don’t understand.

Choice: keep aiming for Stavanger and more long passages, or Oslofjord, then short coastal hops south along Sweden’s west coast.

The plan breaks. Safety must come first; resembling the dream comes afterwards.

#passage