From Sweden To Scotland

I flow out to Copenhagen on the 15 May 21 to collect my new sailing boat Stella Polaris. I had to organise various things prior to flying out to Denmark. Letter of authorisation from the old owner Saku stating I was flying out on business to skipper a sailing boat from Sweden to the UK and to get a PCR test at Brentwood London on my journey to Heathrow aiport before flying from terminal 5 to Copehagen.

I was suppose to get my PCR results before 12pm that evening of the 14th May so I could board the plane on Saturday morning at 09.55. I went to bed early thinking I would get my result before 12pm. I awoke about 3.30am and checked my emails from the covid test clinc. No test results crikey! After that I couldn’t get back to sleep. I left the hotel and got the bus to terminal 5, thinking is this covid situation going to be a problem? I sent an email to the Covid clinic at about 6.30am fortunately got an immediate reply with a negative covid test result, I thought great the rest should be easy? Wishful thinking?

I arrived at terminal 5 went to check in desk, the assistant checked my PCR test and my authorisation letter. It was mainly concerning Denmark? I told him I was transiting Denmark to Malmo by the shuttle causeway train. He was back forward to his boss on the phone, I didn’t have a official seamans card, however in the end he said if you book a train ticket now to Malmo and show me I’ll give you a boarding pass? I went online and booked my ticket from Copenhagen airport to Malmo Sweden. It only takes about 15 minutes to cross the bridge to Sweden from Denmark.

I went through security with out any issues and waited for my flight at the airport gate. Once arriving in Denmark all passengers had to have a Covid test at the airport with negative result before they allow you to leave the airport to transit to Sweden. I arrived at a stop before Malmo at Oresund. I walked up the stairs to get the bus to Holviken where I had arranged to meet Saku. 
The following morning we decided to leave Holviken for Landskrona further north up the Swedish coastline. My plan was to head to Gothenburg to meet an old work colleague before leaving to cross the North Sea to Inverness Scotland.

We left Holviken on 16 May at 11.00am hoisted the jib and main sail and motorsailed to our first port of Landskrona arriving at 18.45.

Landskrona was very quiet hardly saw anyone around the whole time we were there. It had an old fortification which reminded me of a dutch town I stayed in many years ago called Williamstad. The fortification is shaped in diamond formation with a moat surrounding it with a bridge to enter the fort. One thing that was noticeable was the number of none Swedes. Evidiently a few years ago the Swedes allowed large number of eastern immigrants to come and live in sweden.

They were friendly but being a nordic country the eastern immigrants were quite noticable. I know in the UK we have large numbers of cultures who live throughout the UK but we have large population whereas Sweden has very small population so large influx of none nordics is quite noticeable.

Our next port of call was Hoganas after an overnight stay we headed to Helmstad which was a much larger town with many more people around. We had a nice sail enabling us to use the spinnaker sail with Red Dragon Welsh motive and the white and green background.

Saku Decided to leave me at Helmstad as he had the opprtunity to get a Finnish boat sailing from Sweden to Finland. He left me around mid day on the 19 May. Saku was invaluble onboard showing me all the various things on Stella Polaris. He took the train south from Helmstad to Malmo and beyond.

Early morning at 05.06am on the 21st may I left Helmstad for Gothenberg and was able to sail with southerly wind with jib poled out to port and the main out to starboard. Arriving at the entrance to the main Gothenberg navigational channel near last light. I was negotiating the small outer island marked with a lighthouse when a Stena Ferry boat came past me from behind at great speed which really startled me! As I was looking down the channel to identify the channel marker buoys as it was getting quite dark. I thought crikey I wouldn’t want one of those large ferries to run at me at those speeds I would certainly end up as matchwood?

It was long labrious channel to the marina Mattias had recommended to me. I arrived on the 22 May at 01.00 another longish day. Funnily enough Gotherberg is the Stena line headquarters.

I spent 4 days in Gothenberg meeting up with my old work mate Mattias who lives in Gothenburg with his wife and daughter. I first met Mattias in Norway 15 years before working in rigyard in Stevanga called Rosenburg. He now works on Quality assurance for Swedish company who build large storage tanks.

I left Gothenberg on the 25 May and headed out to small outer island called Sandvikshammen to fuel up and buy some more last food items prior to my big sail to Inverness Scotland. After an overnight stay in the harbour I motored out on 26 May to Inverness. I headed north to round Denmark’s Strand Grenen the cape of the two seas. There was lots of shipping heading north on my port side (Left) until I rounded the cape headed west to the Skagerrak sea the wind increased to 20 knots and I was able to run down wind. Crossing the north sea I was close hauled meaning heading more into the wind. I had to tack back and forward to keep on my navigational line.

I knew the tricky part of the passage to inverness was the part where I would encounter offshore oil and gas installations. I had to negotiate those carefully? What made things more tricky was the poor visibilty with sea mist. It would mean I wouldn’t be able to sleep but be constantly on watch and vigilant. As I was going through the Forties oil field with misty conditions I put on my radar to see the location of the fixed oil field installations.

I noticed a plot which I thought wasn’t an oil rig I thought I must keep a close watch on that. The target got larger so I decided to move more to starboard and watched the radar screen closely. Suddenly the shape on the screen was the shape of a ships hull I thought that seems close? I looked out and like an apparation the ship came out of the mist to my port. Gosh I thought good job I had a radar onboard he was going the opposite way to me and like me he was negotiating the same oil installations.

Soon after I was in the Moray Firth heading towards Inverness. Its a big stretch of water and I sighted land on my portside first; Banff, Buckie and Lossiemouth and eventually Cromarty Firth, with the jack up exploration rigs moored together in the bay.

I soon had to negotiate the Forth George and Chanonry point. It was rather a dog leg and I followed the Avoch bay channel down to Kilmuir crossed over to the green buoy marking the run into, and under the Kessock bridge, to Inverness marina. I arrived safely on the 1st June at 09.00am.