On 15 September 2023 we completed our longest passage to date, a 4-day sail from Nazaré on the Portuguese west coast to Porto Santo in the Madeira archipelago. Life on passage is a mixture of inactivity and constant activity. The boat is in continuous motion, it rolls from side to side or up and down …
Life onboard means of course eating onboard, and the more we can cook onboard, the more economical our trip will be. Generally we always eat breakfast onboard, although we have taken advantage of harbors like Zeebrugge where they delivered fresh baked bread and pastries every morning; or shopped in A Coruna where we could pick …
After leaving Luarca, we have been sailing west along the northern coast of Spain, landing in A Coruna on the 15th of August. The first night there we spent at anchor in front of a lovely beach, then the next morning we moved over to the harbor, ultimately spending four nights there. The harbor was …
Sailing across the Bay of Biscay has been a milestone for us. Partly because it has a bad reputation for having rough seas, and partly because it would be our longest single stretch so far. We are making our way down to Las Palmas, and looking for a weather window. It looked good early in …
When we packed for our trip, we thought sun, summer and warm days. So far we have had about 4, the rest have been at or below 20 degrees C or about 68 F. This morning it was 14 degrees at the harbor, in the low 50’s F. Therefore if you are looking at our …
We think we know why there are no popular YouTube channels cruising the North Atlantic coasts. It’s not been easy cruising! We have seen amazing views, had a lot of dramatic weather, and moved from point A to point B. But not so much good sailing or summer-type weather. However, we have spent over 40 …
We set sail on 25 June from Gothenburg, and it has been a fantastic trip so far. Some days it’s hard, but we knew it would be hard and after some sleep or chocolate it is usually better! We are keeping a trip log in the beautiful log book that Magnus father hand-made for us, …
When looking for a weather window, most sailors try to find one with the best sailing conditions. Unfortunately, we haven’t had much to choose from, so we took the one with the least headwind. Given the recent high winds, that translated to an average of 10 m/s or about 20 knots, which is a decent …
Before I knew anything about sailing, I thought that a lot of wind was good for sailors. Actually, what you really want is a “lagom” or just right amount of wind, preferably from the direction opposite of where you are headed. For our trip so far, we have had mostly headwinds and lots of them. …
One thing that I keep learning as I travel, is how you can have preconceived notions about people or cultures that you have to re-evaluate. When we were in Germany, we were met by really friendly and open people. The harbormasters and staff have all been very helpful, we had four different employees of a …
The past week has been spent sailing down from Denmark to Germany and through the Kiel Channel over to Cuxhaven on the mouth of the Elbe river. We are staying an extra night in Cuxhaven, as there are strong warnings against going out against westerly winds, and there will be southerly winds tomorrow, which will …
Sometimes you get a little more wind than you are expecting. We checked and checked the wind yesterday, and also the wave height and periodicity, and decided that even though it was predicted to be around 13 m/s average winds, we have sailed several longer trips in those conditions and know how Lulu handles (very …
We set sail a week ago now, and have made it to a lovely little harbor in Denmark, Øer Maritime Ferieby in Ebeltoft. Sailing has been great, from a super calm and easy sail down to Kungsö in the southern part of Gothenburg, to a trip down to Bua near Varberg where we met up …
We had absolutely perfect weather for our sail from Lindholmen in Gothenburg, sunny and warm, a cooling breeze that was great for sailing. Lulu was dressed up in her party flags and looking lovely. Thank you to everyone who came to see us off, it was wonderful having a little crowd cheering as we left …
In November 2022, we ordered a new sail from North Sails here in Gothenburg, a “Tradewind” sail. The sail is customized for sailing when the wind is around angles at or close to straight from behind, (downwind – wind between150 to 180 degrees). It is a relatively uncommon type of sail; essentially two foresails made …
Since Lulu spent the winter in the water, we needed to lift her up and clean her hull and perform basic maintenance. We chose Öckerö Harbor in the Gothenburg area, and it was a great place to get work done, we recommend it highly. Not only did they have everything needed to get the work …
This past weekend we began the slow installation of our Spectra Ventura 150 watermaker. It is a thing of wonder, able to convert salt water to fresh water, using the solar energy generated by our solar panels. Since it will be just the two of us onboard, we don’t need a big watermaker, and the …
Over the past month, Magnus has been working on upgrading our electrical system. It started last year when he ordered a new lithium battery bank, which didn’t arrive until April. In the meantime he has been collecting Battery Management System (BMS) devices, DC/DC devices and tools to manage the wiring in preparation for the installation. …
Recently we took a class on “Caring for your Diesel Motor” with the Swedish Cruising Association, our sailing club. It was a good overview of how a diesel motor works, and even though Magnus and I are at vastly different levels in terms of understanding a diesel motor, we both learned a lot. Fortunately for …
We like the environmentally friendly aspects of sailing, and it’s important that we don’t contribute to the pollution already in the ocean. Therefore, part of our preparation has been finding environmentally friendly options for as much as possible of our regular cleaning needs. That means soaps and detergents without plastics, and using baking soda and …