The Heroy municipality’s name derives from an old Norse term meaning “archipelago of islands.” The 1,700 islands and islets that make up Heroy are an absolute joy to explore, both in the tender and on foot along the archipelago’s many view hikes. Norway seems to have an endless number of exceptional boating locales, each one rivaling the ultra-popular destinations of our home cruising grounds, such as Desolation Sound on Canada’s west coast.

From the Flaever Islands, also in Heroy, we spent another three nights in the archipelago anchored at Leinevika, pictured above (Dirona is the white speck at center). We loved it there and could easily spend days, if not weeks, exploring the area. We toured in the tender, stocked up at our favourite Norwegien grocery store Meny, and made two excellent view hikes. Most memorable however, was an opportunity to meet Hallgeir Skorpen, founder of workboat manufacturer Westplast. Hallgeir took us on a tour of his facility and introduced us to his friend Atle Knutsen, editor of Bat Magasinet, the largest boating magazine in Norway, who later interviewed us for an article.

Below are highlights from December 9th through 11th, 2020. Click any image for a larger view, or click the position to view the location on a map. And a live map of our current route and most recent log entries always is available at mvdirona.com/maps.

12/9/2020

Battery Replacement Position: 62°18.94’N, 5°35.82’E We keep a Pelican case in the tender holding emergency gear such as a strobe light, flares, signal mirror, and EPIRB. Here we are doing regular battery replacement.

Sore Vaulen Position: 62°20.19’N, 5°35.79’E Running the channel Sore Vaulen towards the bridge between the islands Nerlandsoya and Bergsoya. The channel is narrow, but well-marked for large ships, with a port and starboard navigation marks visible just ahead of us on either side of Dirona, and more in the distance.

Leinevika Anchorage Position: 62°20.73’N, 5°40.67’E Our anchorage in Leinevika in 96 ft (29 m) on 300 ft (91 m) of rode.

Hallgeir Skorpen Position: 62°20.50’N, 5°41.39’E On a tour in the tender, we stopped to look at some Westplast workboats that caught our attention. Westplast founder Hallgeir Skorpen, who had seen us arrive in Dirona, answered some of our questions and generously offered us dock space in his yard and also a tour of the facility. The model pictured with Hallgeir, a Westplast WP960, is designed for the seismic survey industry and is similar to the workboats we’d seen outside. The mechanism outside the hull near the helm is used to lift and repair damaged cables streaming behind a moving seismic survey vessel.

Oceanic Vega Position: 62°20.50’N, 5°41.39’E A picture at Westplast of the Oceanic Vega seismic survey ship at work. The ship, an X-BOW design built in the nearby Ulstein shipyard, can support a configuration of up 16 seismic streamers (buoyant marine cables connected to hydrophones) separated by 100 m or more. The streamers must be towed at a constant speed, so when a cable needs repairing, a workboat such as the Westplast WP960 will fix the issue underway.

Leinevika Position: 62°20.50’N, 5°41.41’E Photograph in the Westplast office of our anchorage, Leinevika, taken looking west from (270 m) Vardeheida at dusk. The Westplast yard is at bottom center, on the peninsula to the right of the large marina. We’ll definitely have to get up Vardeheida to enjoy the view while we’re here.

Dirona Position: 62°20.52’N, 5°41.33’E Dirona at anchor in Leinevika.

BoaBarge 33 Position: 62°22.23’N, 5°45.31’E The BoaBarge 33 we saw yesterday under tow from the Green Yard Kelvin shipyard near Ulsteinvik.

Pedestrian Bridge Position: 62°20.56’N, 5°38.10’E The pedestrian bridge across the waterway in Fosnavag operates on demand. When someone wants to cross, they push a button on their side to close the bridge.

Cat Ladder Position: 62°20.43’N, 5°38.33’E Cat ladder outside an apartment in Fosnavag.

Idar Ulstein Position: 62°20.38’N, 5°38.40’E The Search and Rescue boat Idar Ulstein at its station in Fosnavag. The nearby Ulstein yard built and mostly financed the vessel as a gift in memory of the Ulstein Group’s longtime CEO and Chair of the Board, Idar Ulstein, who was a major supporter of the Norwegian Rescue Service.

Tender Position: 62°20.59’N, 5°37.86’E Tying the tender off at Fosnavag to buy some groceries. The grocery store is in the yellow pictured, so is super-convenient.

Meny Position: 62°20.58’N, 5°37.81’E Jennifer, at right, loading a cart in our favourite Norwegian grocery store, Meny (“menu” in Norwegian), in Fosnavag. Their produce and meats are of particularly high quality.

12/10/2020

Synste More Position: 62°20.73’N, 5°40.65’E Ole Magne Kvalsvik, a reporter for the local newspaper Synste More, came out to interview us a few days ago while we were anchored at Syltejforden. The article, “On a boat trip for eight years” appeared in today’s newspaper (Norwegian only). View page 2.

Bat Magasinet Position: 62°20.50’N, 5°41.40’E Atle Knutsen, editor of Bat Magasinet, the largest boating magazine in Norway, took this photo of us heading ashore in the tender from our anchorage at Leinevika. Atle was visiting with his friend Westplast founder Hallgeir Skorpen, and contacted us for an interview.

Tender Position: 62°20.50’N, 5°41.41’E Westplast founder Hallgeir Skorpen let us use his boat shed for our shore excursions in the area. That’s one of Hallgeir’s two pleasure craft moored behind us. As you would expect, both boats are in pristine condition.

Trailhead Position: 62°20.29’N, 5°41.13’E At the trailhead for the hike to 885-ft (270m) Leinebjornen.

Westplast Position: 62°20.40’N, 5°42.10’E View to the Westplast facility from altitude 722 ft (220 m) on the Leinebjornen trail. Visible are several of the distinctive yellow Westplast workboats that caught our attention yesterday.

Bergsoya Position: 62°20.28’N, 5°41.40’E The island of Bergsoya, viewed from altitude 359 ft (109 m) on the Leinebjornen trail. Dirona is visible at the right of the picture (click image for a larger view).

Leinevika Position: 62°20.45’N, 5°42.18’E View into Leinevika from altitude 784 ft (239 m) on the trail up Leinebjornen. Westplast is directly to the right of James and Dirona is anchored roughly at the center of the picture (click image for a larger view). The area is a wonderful complexity of bridge-connected islands with navigable channels between them. We’re on the island of Leinoya, directly above James head is Bergsoya, beyond is Nerlandsoya (we brought Dirona through the channel between these two yesterday), and at right is Remoya, with the peaks of Runde just visible at far right. And several large islands are behind us and not visible in the picture. Every island has great hiking—we could spend days, if not weeks, exploring here.

Mainland View Position: 62°20.45’N, 5°42.18’E View east to the snow-covered peaks on the Norwegian mainland from the trail up Leinebjornen. The city of Ulsteinvik, home of the Ulstein shipyard, is partially visible at left.

Vardeheida Position: 62°20.40’N, 5°42.64’E Looking west from Vardeheida, the 885-ft (270m) summit of Leinebjornen. It’s 2:20pm and the sun already is getting low in the sky. Directly behind Jennifer is the southern side of the island of Bergsoya and beyond are the Flavaer Islands where we anchored two days ago. Slightly left of the cairn is where we saw the large number of offshore supply vessels in storage near Moltustranda .

Holiday Display Position: 62°20.63’N, 5°41.50’E Most Norwegian towns we’ve visited have a lit tree- or star-shaped holiday display in the hills above the community. The tree-shaped display on Leinebjornen above Leinevika is lighting up as the sky darkens.

Spitfire Position: 62°20.72’N, 5°40.65’E Spitfire has really taken to our Christmas tree. He’s actually knocked it over several times while playing with the ornaments.

12/11/2020

Tender Position: 62°20.64’N, 5°36.41’E Tying the tender off at Kvalsund Harbour on Nerlandsoya for a hike up 1,410-ft (430m) Storevarden.

Trailhead Position: 62°20.83’N, 5°35.49’E At the trailhead for Storevarden, plus several other trails. The green figure means an easy trail and blue is medium. Other colors are red for challenging and black for expert.

Radio Tower Position: 62°20.95’N, 5°34.95’E Communications tower atop 879-ft (268m) Teigetua on Nerlandsoya. We could see the tower clearly from our anchorage at Leinevika.

Teigetua Position: 62°21.18’N, 5°35.21’E The sweeping view north from 879-ft (268m) Teigetua on Nerlandsoya on a wonderfully clear and calm winter day. At left is the island of Runde, with Remoya at center, Leinoya right of center and Bergosoya rightmost. The large group of buildings this side of Bergosoya is Fosnavag, where we shopped at Meny. Dirona is just visible anchored off the western tip of Bergosoya (click image for a larger view).

Local Features Position: 62°21.14’N, 5°35.12’E Sign at Teigetua labeling local features visible from the top.

Choices Position: 62°20.97’N, 5°34.95’E After returning from a detour to Teigetua, we resumed the trail to Storevarden.

Kvalsund Harbour Position: 62°21.00’N, 5°33.43’E Our tender, at top center, tied off to the wall inside Kvalsund Harbour.

Storevarden Position: 62°21.00’N, 5°33.43’E Taking in the fabulous view from 1,410-ft (430m) Storevarden. The city directly opposite is Fosnavag on Bergosoya.

Skorpa Position: 62°20.40’N, 5°32.09’E Looking southwest from Nerlandsoya to the island of Skorpa. From the other side of the island, a trail leads up to the top of 1,414-ft (431m) Keipen. We’d love to take it if we had more time in the area.

Flavaer Islands Position: 62°20.40’N, 5°32.09’E View from Nerlandsoya to the Flavaer Islands where we anchored a couple of nights ago. The islands are really exposed, but make a wonderful anchorage in calm conditions.

Sore Vaulen Position: 62°20.40’N, 5°32.09’E The bridge across the channel Sore Vaulen, between Nerlandsoya and Bergosoya, with Kvalsund Harbour at left. We passed through the channel and under the bridge en route from the Flavaer Islands to our current anchorage in Leinevika.

Santa Position: 62°20.68’N, 5°36.15’E For his day job, Santa runs a front-end loader.

Holiday Tree Position: 62°20.53’N, 5°35.55’E The holiday tree in the hills above Kvalsund.

Happy Hour Position: 62°20.72’N, 5°40.67’E The lights of Leinoya reflecting into Leinevika during Happy Hour on a calm evening.

Click the travel log icon on the left to see these locations on a map, with the complete log of our cruise. On the map page, clicking on a camera or text icon will display a picture and/or log entry for that location, and clicking on the smaller icons along the route will display latitude, longitude and other navigation data for that location. And a live map of our current route and most recent log entries always is available at mvdirona.com/maps.