Carra Tidings

Leaving Nexo, we rounded the southern tip of Bornholm, with its sandy beaches, glistening in the early morning light but sadly accompanied by the plonk plonk of the engine. Tying up in Hasle, completed our circumnavigation of Bornholm. We opted to a wait day, so that we could sail to Sweden rather than motor – giving us a spare day. So that we had time to visit the People’s Assembly (Folkemødet), along with 60,000 people (1% of the population). Every year, in a tiny village of Allinge, a remarkable part of Danish democracy takes place – where they discuss matters important to Danish society – aiming to understand each other’s view point. The discussions took place in marquees and on many boats crammed into the harbour. The harbour, that we thought was small, when we went there in 2015, now had Tall Ships and boats crammed into every available space. 4000 young people were actively engaged in the debate. There was one workshop, which was in English, so we decided to go – to discover it was a youth workshop, we felt a little old! Politicians were there to listen, learn and answer questions from all. There was no shouting, it was a true dialogue – an inspirational event – we could learn much in the UK.

Our decision to delay, was well rewarded, with a cracking 11hr sail back to Sweden, safely crossing/ dodging the ships on the busy shipping channel. A cheese toasty for lunch, hit the spot

– a perfect moral boast. Our toasty press, being one of the more useful, spur of the moment purchases at a boat show. Originally, we were headed back to Ystad but with the wind dying, altering course to sail closer the wind, enabled us to sail for longer. Landfall being the small harbour of Gis Lovs. The other benefit, meant that we had to motor less the next day, a relief, as it was hot and windless. To cut off the bottom left-hand corner of Sweden, we planned to take a short cut through a canal with a bridge that only opened every 2 hours. We had to carefully time our approach, as the long thin canal didn’t leave much room for circling with others waiting for the bridge. Once through, we moored for the night, before heading to Malmo, where we would be leaving the boat for a week, whilst we returned to the UK.

Malmo was a cool city – and our marina was right in the heart of it.  It was perfect to leave the boat, totally sheltered. Though the harbour master did

warn us to put out as many fenders as possible, as we had one side exposed to the guest places. We had 2 deflated fenders that needed inflating. Who knew that different fenders had different adaptors to inflate them…. and we didn’t have them….. after hours of trying to get air into them, we were thankful for the saggy balls that we had created. Better than nothing!