Category Archives: Norway

The long days in Tromsø are filled with the myriad of tasks required to get Widdershins on the water and daylight round the clock ensures long hours of tinkering and organisation and this would-be explorer is pulling out all stops to get ready to set sail. My good old friend Murphy is playing havoc with many plans of course – anything that can go wrong will go wrong – but a good dose of determination and a willingness to work hard seems enough to get over pretty much any obstacle. The countdown is on now but there is still plenty of work to do!

The new sails are installed, the new electronics including radar, Man Overboard safety tags, HF radio antennae, satellite phone, anemometer (wind recorder) and the SCUBA compressor are all installed or will be shortly. In fact with all the new gadgets cluttering the yacht at the moments it’s a bit like being a kid in a candy shop right now. Unfortunately having fancy new toys is no consolation for actually setting sail, and we are both eagerly awaiting the moment when the hull kisses the water for the first time this summer and the sails fill with a gentle breeze blowing us north.

The budget of the trip is also looking a little thin at the moment with many donors citing tough economic conditions to reduce or withheld money that was going to help us get on our way. The trip is definitely going to empty the meagre coffers of our own accounts … but then again, what is the price of freedom? Come what may, we will soon be sailing.

Call it perversity if you will, but while doing this trip on a shoestring takes away the comfort of a financial buffer, it also adds something to our project. One of the major visions we had when planning the trip many years ago was to demonstrate that with a bit of grit and a healthy dose of will power anyone can cast off the lines that bind them to one port and explore the world on their own terms. We hope to bring the wilderness of the world into many peoples home during our journey, but the bigger hope is that we encourage people to realise that the world is a big beautiful place and making small changes in the way we live will pay big dividends. Our lifestyle during the two in the blue journey will best be described as frugal …. but our lounge room will be the open ocean, our ceiling the blue sky and rather than taking our daily dose of wilderness filtered through TV documentaries wilderness will be our home for the next two years.

Of course all the major expenses have already been paid and our main financial wants relate to food, provisions and fuel at this stage…. But then again the seas are filled with fish and the wind is free. That’s not to say we aren’t still looking for additional funding to help us on the way! Every bit helps more than ever at this point, but knowing that we will sail come-what-may is a comforting thought. The wide open ocean awaits and we are ready to take up the challenge!

After arriving in Tromsø I had to say goodbye to Patrick and Norway. All this exploration and fun was a great chance to break away from the desk for a while, but my PhD called me back to the world of science … thus I now sit in the warm Swiss sun while Patrick looks after Widdershins in the constant, but somewhat less powerful sun of the Arctic. While I dive into statistics and (epi)genetics, Patrick will start preparing the myriad of things that still need to be done before we can head further North next year.

While sailing along the Norwegian coast we rarely had a chance to wear less than two pairs of trousers and about three jumpers under a wind- and water-proof jacket, and I had almost forgotten that June means summer for the rest of Europe. When I arrived back home in Zürich I almost fell over with heat-shock. Even though I arrived after 10pm the temperature was still over 25°C, hotter than it’s ever been during the whole trip! The second surprise was the sunset – it actually got dark over night, the first proper night since about two weeks! Up North the sun didn’t ever touch the horizon, it just kept going round and round forever. Patrick complains that the sun is stalking him as it circles the boat at night peeking through the windows to keep him from sleep…

Well, and now it’s almost two weeks since I’m back to workaday life. Of course analyzing my data statistically is not half the fun we had during our trip north, but it’s only ten more months until we start our big adventure.

Today was all about history: starting with the search for some early stone age carvings, which were supposed to be on the way to a medieval monastery. The carvings turned out to be quite difficult to find, since we only had a vague description from a lonely planet guide book, which told us which tourist operator could take you there, but gave no directions otherwise. Furthermore we didn’t even know what exactly we were supposed to be looking for. But after about two hours of chugging along the coast and examining every possible rock with the binoculars, we were lucky enough to actually find the carvings! Seems like not too much has changed in Norway over the past few thousand years: We could make out a ship, lots of deer and a few sheep (although the latter might also depict zebras … ).

After a beautiful day we tied up at island of Selja, in front of the ruins of a monastery from the early 12^th century. High above the scattered remains of the monastery there was a deep cave, where according to legend a Irish princess took refuge from a band of marauding Vikings. Devine providence proceeded to collapse the cave on head to save her from a fate presumably worse than death. This resulted in her becoming a martyr and a saint. However, we discovered that Vikings were not the only killers in the area – along the steep slope we found a more subtle assassin: Pinguicula vulgaris (no relation to penguins). These little carnivorous plants lure passing insects onto their leaves where they are snared on the sticky surface to be digested at the plants leisure.

Today we wake to blue skies in Norway’s most westerly town of Florø. First order of the day is to cook up a batch of pancakes to celebrate the change in weather and then we set sail for Nordfjord to explore another of Norway’s beautiful fjords … in fact as we move further north, the scenery is becoming pretty stunning in every way you look, with sheer cliffs rising in every direction and snow-capped peaks and glaciers peering out from the gaps in the clouds.

All this good weather and scenery is a much needed balm as yesterday everything did not go exactly according to plan. We had a long day pulling up the anchor at 7:30am and not coming to rest until after 10:00pm. We had an ambitious goal ahead of us in terms of distance to travel but the trip was much lengthened by the fact I forgot to top up the day tank with diesel. The result? The engine dried out and I had to spend the better part of an hour bleeding new fuel through the system while hanging upside down in an oily engine space in heavy swell. Of course I lost the required spanner down the dark recesses of the bilge never to be seen again, requiring various appellations to the Norske gods. This seemed to work – she coughed back to life after drifting helplessly on the seas for nearly an hour. Finally, while checking the fuel lines a final time on arrival I managed to break another essential item on the motor (the engine manifold intake – where the air comes in) requiring another quick fix involving wire and tangential thinking …. Rough but strong …..

After all that we finally descended on the town of Florø after midnight passing the welcome lighthouse superimposed against a beautiful orange sky. Thus I staggered into the town line an oil-covered spectre raised from the deep in search of a cheap hamburger at the local fuel station. The horror of this looming creature was somewhat diminished by the daylight still lingering at midnight this far north but I still raised some eyebrows.