Where the wind takes us

14 July 2021

Where the wind takes us

After about 15 months of not sailing on the OOSTERSCHELDE, I came ‘home’ again last Sunday. In Boulogne-Sur-Mer I took over the ship from Bernt Folmer for a four-week trip to Bremerhaven. This means that we have to sail an average speed of about 0.5 knots to arrive on time! That gives a lot of possibilities!

Yesterday the guests came on board, most of whom have already been vaccinated, the rest had done a PCR test. But to minimize the risk, everyone did a rapid test upon arrival, and we have extra rules on board.

This morning we left the port of Boulogne and switched off the engine as quickly as possible. It is great to be under sail, so the plan is to keep engine use to a minimum. And since we have time, even the direction is not very important. And that is a good thing because, because the forecast predicts northerly winds. So, we’ve decided to sail down the English Channel to the west and then (probably) sail north into the Irish Sea and otherwise we’ll go up west of Ireland. That depends a bit on a high-pressure area that is now just west of Ireland. If it comes to the east, we can sail up nicely behind it. But if it stays there or expands further west, it’s going to be a big detour and we’ll have to work for every mile north, because then we’ll be tacking up the Irish Sea. But even then, this seems a better route than via the North Sea, because the North Sea has gradually been completely built in with wind farms and traffic separation systems and tacking with a ship like this is impossible

The rough plan for the coming weeks is therefore to sail up the west coast of the UK towards the Hebrides, then we will try to visit Faroe Islands and Shetland Islands, possibly Orkney and maybe even Norway. But this is all still very far away and of course completely dependent on the weather and the Corona restrictions in force at that time. So, we’re taking the next few weeks as they come and not try to plan too far ahead. We’ll see where the wind takes