Posts In The “Destinations” Category
In early August, we returned to a very different Haugesund than the one we’d visited in late September of 2018. The previously tranquil town was absolutely packed with boats, many rafted several deep, and high-speed, muffler-free cigarette boats roamed the waterway. On this most recent visit, we were at the height of the boating season,…
After a day of heavy winds and rain following our visit to Skjoldafjorden, we had wonderfully calm conditions to explore Forresfjorden. During our tender tour, we finally got close enough for a good picture after several eagle sightings in Norway from a distance. Below are highlights from August 5th and 6th. Click any image for…
The Skjoldastraumen is a shallow waterway with swift currents, suitable only for small craft. To allow larger boats to reach the Skjoldafjorden beyond, a lock was built between 1904-1908. For many decades steam ships regularly passed through the locks, carrying people and goods between Skjoldafjorden and the larger centers of Stavanger and Haugesund. Today mostly…
Six of the islets in the Sjernaroyane group are interconnected with bridges, with a marked cycle path between them, Sjernaroyrunden, that makes for a wonderful day trip. From the anchorage at Kotavagen, we made a short nine-mile run to Sjernaroyane and anchored for a couple of nights near the community docks at Nodholmen. On our…
The hike up 1,230ft (375m) Randasen was among the easiest we did on our return trip to Norway. The tender ride to shore was only a few hundred yards, the trailhead was an easy half-hour walk away and the roundtrip hike from there was only three hours. But the view was as good as any…
After two days of wind, heavy rain and overcast skies in Erfjord, we were rewarded on our third morning with clear and calm weather for a tender tour of spectacular Josenfjorden. What the 17-mile (27km) fjord lacks in length it makes up for in dramatic scenery, with 2,300 ft (700m) cliffs full of waterfalls. After…
A small weather system was passing through, with gusts to 45 knots, as we were underway for Erjforden. We found a beautiful and peaceful anchorage at Hattavagen, and ended up spending three nights anchored in the sheltered basin. While there, we explored the area by tender, hiked up 510m Bandasen, and completed a few boat…
The village of Sand lies in a beautiful setting where the Saudafjorden and the Hylsfjorden meet to form the Sandsfjorden. From our anchorage at Nevoyvagen, we’d already explored to the head of Saudafjorden, including hiking up 3,054ft (931m) Hovlandsnuten from the town of Sauda at the head, and had made a brief pass by tender…
Saudafjorden extends 10.5 miles (17km) between the towns of Sand and Sauda through several-thousand-foot mountains with many waterfalls. At the head, the popular Saga Trail extends from Sauda to 3,054ft (931m) Hovlandsnuten. Stone steps newly laid by Nepalese Sherpas lead to the summit, with panoramic views to Saudafjorden and the surrounding mountains. After a 22-mile…
After exploring its two branches, Sandeidfjorden and Yrkjefjorden, we completed our five-day tour of cross-shaped Vindafjorden in a beautiful anchorage at Kvaloy. On a warm and sunny day, we toured to the head by tender, then spent a lazy evening enjoying the surroundings from the cockpit. Below are trip highlights from July 24th, 2020. Click…
Nedre Vats in Vatsjforden has a couple of great attractions for us: an excellent view hike up 1742ft (531m) Granuten and the AF Environmental Base decommissioning and recycling facility. The massive semi-submersible crane vessel Sleipnir that we passed en route to Stavanger had removed the 8,929-ton (8,100-metric ton) Jotun-B platform jacket from the North Sea…
Our “move the boat every day” plan faltered when we reached beautiful Ilsvag at the head of Sandeidfjorden. We ended up spending three days in this scenic, sheltered anchorage and made our second Norwegian hike of 2020, to the summit of 1830 ft (557 m) Oktarenuten. From there we could see down into our anchorage…
Himakana is known as “Little Trolltunga” due to its similarities with the famous Norwegian rock formation that juts out horizontally 3,600 ft (1,100 m) above sea level. The hike to Himakana is much more accessible at only about 2 hours roundtrip though, compared to 10-12 hours for Trolltunga. From our initial anchorage at Vestre Bokn,…
It’s an unusual day when you get up in the morning to start a short coastal cruise, and end up making a 2.5-day crossing of the North Sea to an entirely different country. Given the current world situation, Norway was number one on our list of desired destinations, with its excellent hiking and abundance of…
We very much enjoyed our month in Stornoway. It was wonderful to be fully fueled and provisioned again, with the bottom painted, the zincs replaced and the insurance survey complete, and we were looking forward to some relaxing cruising with our generator now back in full operating condition after replacing the cylinder head. Our first…
The Stornoway slipway is a big commercial railway that can lift boats up to 50m long and weighing up to 850 tons. The railway cradle uses three pairs of hydraulic support arms to hold boats in place, making for an efficient lift process. Once the vessel is in the correct position, the arms are simply…
The replacement parts for our failed generator arrived from the US into the UK two days after we reached Stornoway, but got stuck in the UPS system for another eight days. While we waited, we completed some other projects, including finishing off the wax job we’d started at the Isle of Gigha. We also arranged…
We spent our first few days in Stornoway busily reprovisioning the boat. After six trips to the grocery store, sometimes twice in one day, we still had a few more items to purchase. But our list was down to a half page from three. We also topped up our propane and engine oil supplies, and…