Blowing hot and cold

We’ve had some amazing weather, great sailing breezes and harbour afternoons with 25° in the sun, then bitterly cold nights – ooh that electric blanket is a godsend.

Now Melodrama has been tied up in harbour for a third day, as a westerly storm blows through. We have a 60 mile crossing to make from Klintholm on the East coast of Denmark to the south coast of Sweden at Ystad. It’s not just the wind, which is gusting over 36 knots, that we can handle.

At this time of year, melt water flows into the Baltic and out to the North Sea, causing a south and west current. Combined with a westerly wind, this causes ‘wind over tide’, and a very short choppy wave, forecast to be 2m wave height, over 5 secs. Our wee boat would just slam into that and be very uncomfortable.

So we wimps are taking some shore leave here, and we’ll leave at dawn on Thursday when the wind and waves have subsided – we hope!

Unfortunately, we had planned to stock up on fresh food in the little supermarket in Klintholm, but it has closed for a week for refurbishing 😲 So we have been rummaging around looking for interesting tins, long abandoned in the bilges. Luckily, William has found the bus timetable, and a small grocery in a little village on the bus route, so all is not lost, and no worries about scurvy on board after all.