Evolene - Nauticat 42

12/8/25 - 18/8/25 Our parts arrived!  It wasn't until Thursday mid-afternoon (14th) and whilst that felt like forever for a couple of sailors itching to get going, in reality it was only a couple of days later than expected. In the days prior we caught up with general boat admin.  Stuart enjoyed a couple of runs and a haircut!  I went for a fascinating walk round the east of the headland, passing an international autonomous boat skills tournament for students (I found the Scottish flag but not the team!), historic German WWII armaments, a cosy restaurant at the headland (Ladekaia) which I expect would be idyllic for watching the sunset and walked back through the city's pretty botanic gardens.  We also enjoyed elevenses at a super lovely cafe (Nabolaget) that was typically Scandivanian and effortlessly chic, and lost ourselves in the city's excellent second-hand bookshop (and picked up a few more novels at 80p a piece)! Elevenses! Wangsmo Antikvariat bookshop Talking...

6/8/25 - 12/8/25 Storms can bring sailors even closer together, both in location and in camaraderie, and as we sat out the Norwegian version of storm Floris, it was lovely getting to know our neighbours better.  There were various impromptu gatherings on the pontoon during the day, collectively inspecting lines and fenders, viewing each others' boats and hearing past stories and future plans.  The yacht across from us, Infinity, comprised a Brazilian crew enroute to The Netherlands.  Rafted alongside us were Australian-Chinese sailing sisters aboard their new Garcia Exploration 45, Mulan II , recently returned from Svalbard and heading to France for the winter before plans to complete the Northwest passage (across the top of Canada) next year.  And just ahead of Infinity  was  Bodyguard !  It was great to see Dennis and Arianne again and we would go onto spend another couple of super lovely evenings with them over the course of our stay in Trondhe...

28/7/25 - 6/8/25 Wow, what a week!  I had planned to update this blog after Lovund but weather required us to scamper south and put in a few longer days of sailing to reach Trondheim before the remnants of Storm Floris blew through. After saying goodbye to Rory, Katharine and Oscar the boat felt oddly empty!  We had become so used to living onboard as the five of us, it was suddenly back to just Stuart and me for company... just as well we had lined up drinks with fellow cruisers later in the evening!  We had crossed paths with Graham of Impaler  back in Orkney when he took some beautiful drone footage of our departure from our anchorage at Kirk Sound and then again in Lerwick, but as we headed north east out of Lerwick to  Å lesund he was going due east to Bergen.  Having gone our different ways and explored our various routes, this was to be his last night in Norway before heading to the Faroe Islands and it was great to be able to spend time with him and...