A crazy night

A crazy night

Sunday morning I left Bornholm, going towards Germany. The weather was not too good, strong winds and high waves even outside of Bornholms marina but I could do 6-7 knots in the right direction so I was really tempted to go anyway. That was probably the worst decision ever made this trip, the waves were increasing as I got out on the open ocean and I couldn’t put the wind vane rudder on because I had to dodge every single wave. Which was meaning I couldn’t make any food or do anything else than steering the boat. I was wet from top till toe and hungry obviously when suddenly our already broken genua-sail broke even more so I had to roll it in and start the engine. It went quite fine and I reached the German coast when I ran out of gas. After a few tries I managed to put some diesel in the tank during the big waves, but it turned out that I had made the engine totally dry and I couldn’t start it. I had no other choice than putting the large sail up, which went better than expected and I continued my trip. I took shelter behind the large island Rugen and the waves got a lot smaller, so I could put some warm clothes on and grabbed a couple of tins of corn. I decided to head for Sanssitz but it was starting to get dark and I realized I had to sail in to the narrow, unknown harbour by night. I actually did that really well and found a spot to moor on the inside of the large peer surrounding the town. I was really happy when had made the boat in to safety and went to sleep instantly.

Now I have fixed the engine, am rested and in a good mood so tomorrow I will continue my journey and head for Rostock. I’ve been learning many lessons out of this route so I hope I won’t do the same unnecessary mistakes again.

       

At last I want to say respect to all of you alone-sailors out there, you are mental!

Karl