Month: July 2014

Melting in the Arctic

 

vl for blogWow, the weather was fantastic.  For 4 days running it was 25 degrees in the shade.  Not often do we hear grumbles because it is too hot and there are not enough t shirts on the kit list!  We did proper swimming on 3 separate occasions – the water was even reported to be warm!  Eagles soared above us in the blue skies, and a few porpoises came to play – but not very lively. The sun shone on us for our BBQ and the flat calm that came with the sunshine enabled us to weave our way in to  tiny littly harboursOf course, the weather in Lofoten Islands is very changeable, and we paid the price for the sequence of hot days with a very foggy afternoon – making it feel quite eerie  as we crept between the breakwaters at Laukvik.  Luckily this fog quickly burnt off the next morning – to be replaced by bluer but cloudy skies and some fantastic wind.  We seemed to have a little bit of everything, check out the photos!

narrow harbour entrancebbq ins sunshineshorts and t shirtssarah swimming at vettoya web

Midsummers day in the Lofoten Islands

vl in skrova

After sailing 368 miles we are back in Bodo following our Midnight sun trip.  A few dull grey days at the start with plenty of wind and then blue skies and sunshine – but not much wind.  Still plenty of great scenery to look at , and quite a few eagles soaring past.

Although strictly not the longest day, the Norwegians seemed to be celebrating midsummer on 23rd June this year – or was that because it was the first nice night for a BBQ.  As we meandered up the narrow fjords of Tjeldsund and waited for the tide there was evidence of ‘bonfires all along the shore’.  I tried to take photos, but the smoke didnt seem to show up too well.

We went a slightly different route to usual due to the wind strength, and ended up visiting a few new places to discover that we didn’t really fit in the harbours and were better anchored outside!  Our favourite was Blokken, an old fishing port with a long pontoon and a really peaceful anchorage in the bay.

blokken DSCF0152s

Its been a while since we went to Svolvaer – as always it was very busy, but we did get a really good view of the famous mountain called ‘the goat’.  The thing to do is jump from one pinnacle to the other, and with binoculars we could see a couple of people trying to do just that.

goatNot sure I would fancy that.

We had a great time – and reached the decision that we would definitely return to these Norwegian Islands for Summer 2015.  Dates should be published by September 2014.  However if you cannot wait that long to sail with us on beautiful Velvet Lady we have just added our Real Deal Sailing Holidays in Lanzarote to our Schedule.  £675 per person all inclusive on board.  Check out our Schedule here