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Santa Maria - Helsingfors - Mariehamn rally - racing



Leaving Helsinki with the fleet as a parade was most spectacular, but the spectacle was an internal one, as Helsinki was at sleep at 08am.  Then we managed to tangle up  the parade flags by trying to take them down under march, and parts of the flags were stuck which led to a great deal of laughter  when we sent Imke up the mast to get it down again safely as we arrived in Porkala where we had decided to stop over for the night. The first leg was a short one under motor since we has to fight the headwind.

Knowing that  the wind would change in the next days we speculated in sailing days straight to Mariehamn. On the second day we motored past Hangö, we were told that berthing there would be difficult as a motorboat race was taking place there. Therefore we motored past Hangö and were a bit surprised that there were so many boats anchoring along the passage, with lots of people just laying around. I went to the front and chilled for a bit playing around on the mobile phone, as I heard some thundering noise approaching, I managed to turn on the camera, turned around towards the roaring noise and took a shot. What a success.

It was the lead boat of the motorboat race we had heard of. What nobody had told us is that the race was taking place in the fairway we were taking heading to Nötviken, our next anchorage place.
Speedboats were howling toward us in rather high speeds for the coming quarter of an hour, the fairway was quite curvy and rather narrow which made our rally rather a bit more exiting, witnessing an other kind of rally, and not knowing whether those pilots knew how to take the curves. After this excitement, and a couple of more motoring hours, we anchored in Nötviken were two other ARC boats were anchoring. After yet another fantastic meal on board some of us had a swim to a "svaberg" where we enjoyed the sunset.

Next morning we cleared out early to finally sail all the way to Mariehamn in favorable winds. We loved every minute, north east of Kökar we even tacked a couple of times up against the wind, an exiting passage, as there were rocks on both sides, having mastered this we took course to the west and a little to the north, to pass another lovely route between two islands heading for Mariehamn. We were counting the miles left and having a rather joyful time sailing into the channel, as Imke, pleasantly sais, I can see cars, - and I can see a bridge?!
That bridge was clearly to low for us, all of a sudden the tension raised, I went to the mast to be ready to lower the main sail, the only sail used. Just the, the engine did not want to ignite, as we were heading in direction of shore. Now I was heading to the stern to prepare throwing the anker just there. The anchor was not freed yet, as I heard the engine starting. I re-assured the anchor, and finally we brought down the mainsail, and tucked out of the sound back to Kökar,  from where we opted for the southern route to Mariehamn. On the way our of the sound we had supper Currywurst with Kartoffelsalat. Thus we had the pleasure of sailing and motoring another night, split up in shifts where our team of nine showed handy. I was a bit astonished to hear that this bridge had been mentioned at the skippers meeting which I joined personally.
For some of us this was the end of the journey, 14 days of sunshine with some occasional showers, also lovely anchorings with baths and wind in the  beginning, and at the end again, including the extra time and penalty shootout ( sailing against bridge) which we managed with bravour.

Now lets enjoy Åland, while we can
Xxx

Erik



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