A sailboat is a high maintance means of transport. A lot of parts can possibly quit service, in our case it is the windlass. We will have to deal with that today. But first things first: We arrived at Oban in time to drop off Chanan, who had to catch a bus on Friday morning. We took our time to clear up the boat a bit, to do the laundry and to stock up on our supplies, and we had…
It took 24 hours to get the Swing Bridge working again. This we were told, is the usual time needed for repairs, still we were sooo relieved. We could move on to climb the 4 steps of the Muirtown looks. 25 more were to follow, all in all 29 locks and 11 swing bridges. From Clachnaharry lock where we entered into the canal up to Corpach it’s a stretch of 50 nm, a scenic trip from coast-to-coast through the Scottish…
River Ness Inverness was the last bastion held by the Jacobites in the days of Bonnie Prince Charly in 1745. The site of his final defeat in this last Jacobite uprising, the battlefield of Culloden, we wanted to have a look at. Recently the Netflix series Outlander has made the Jacobite cause more commonly known. But only here we understood in full the complexity of this conflict, which was more than Highlanders against the British. It was more like a…
The last 100 nm on our way to Inverness we devided into 3 legs. After rounding Rattray Head we made out for the Firth of Moray changing our course to west. How lucky for us that the wind now came from south. This meant a very comfortable sail, fast and upright and with a flat sea. The favourable wind and the sunny skies would stay with us for the next three days. Rattray Head Whitehills The coast of the Firth…
We had waited for another day for the wind to decrease before departing from our safe haven in the river Tyne. We used the hold-up to take a nice long walk to Tynemouth, located at the mouth of the river Tyne Sailing from the Tyne to Peterhead in Sotland meant crossing the Firth of Forth, where westerly winds accelerate and also stirr up higher seas. The weather was still not totally settled but the forcast was favourable. With two reefs…
Newcastle upon Tyne The North Sea is currently in uproar caused by a gale of 9 Bft. We are stormbound in the marina of Newcastle for the past two days, which is perfectly ok with us, as we had planed to take our time to explore Newcastle and Durham, both English cities with a rich history since Roman and Medival times. Newcastle upon Tyne The foundation of Newcastle dates back to Roman times – the castle was errected by the…
„Jolly Jumper“ the boats were often called in the legendary cartoons of Mike Peyton. It would have been a suitable name for Arielle too, as she jolly jumped over the waves on our ride over here from the Netherlands. With a nerve-racking noise every can or bottle was rattling and clattering in our storage lockers. But thats‘s the second part of the story, which began quite comfortably. After a drizzly morning the sun came out and we had moderate winds…
Wir sind gestartet… endlich!! Heute vormittag um 11:00 MESZ haben wir die Landleinen gelöst, sind bei ziemlich frischen Wind nach Kornwerdersand gesegelt, haben dort in Recordzeit die Schleuse passiert und sind raus auf die Waddensee. Vor Harlingen, wo es dann ins schmale Fahrwasser Richtung Inseln geht, wollten wir den Motor starten, weil es dort zu eng zum Kreuzen ist… Fehlanzeige… es tat sich nichts. Wir erst ratlos dann leicht panisch, sahen unsere Pläne schon gefährdet und haben um Hilfe der…
This is our plan – we will keep you updated on our progress
It’s still six weeks to go, but preparations are under way. We bought the adequate maps and pilot books and with everything we read about sailing in Scotland, it seems like we are moving a little further out of our comfort zone. We upgraded Arielle with a hydro generator for energy and we bought some more 10L jerrycans for stocking up on fuel. And we dug out our unspeakably old oilskins… you never know. For protection against midge attacks we…