Carra Tidings

7th-9th Aug

It was lovely to have friends Andy and Sharon join us from Finland and spend the weekend with us. Our first guests onboard and great to see that finally summer had arrived in the Baltic – teeshirt and shorts weather + plus enough wind to sail. The picture at the top of the page, Andy took and is the view from our boat in the marina at sunrise.

Our destination for the weekend was a little natural harbour called Ladau. We had just anchored when we noticed a man waving us away from a house – resisting the temptation to wave back – we moved the anchor to appease this unfriendly native. We were much further than the 200m required by law but we would rather have peace and quiet. Mags and Sharon went swimming off the boat a tropical 21C – though still not hot enough for me.

It was a lovely evening just chatting and laughing in the warmth of the evening sun. Some young kids of one of the neighbouring boats kept us entertained. First catching a fish, followed by a drunk father trying to kill it and filet it. Then the enterprising kids did a tour of all the boats proudly displaying their wares in a plastic bag. We even got the sales pitch in English – but it was an old couple that took pity on them and parted with some kroner.

The next morning was glorious but not a puff of wind as we set off. Fuel stops are few and far between in the archipelago and fortunately there was one close by and we were able to top up the tanks. Our gauge still showed full – yet we were able to fill up with 130 litres! We are still trying to solve the fuel tank gauge problem but I think we are going to have to replace the sender. There was still no wind and we motored back – taking it in turns to helm – as it was just too hot standing in the sun for any length of time.