From Hamburg to Sweden !!

Hi everybody !
The time in Hamburg went swoooosh and thre weeks were gone. Lots of visits with friends and family made our time not boring. Denise learned again some more German and enjoied meeting many new playmates. The City habour placed perfect in the center of the town was cheaper than most Swedish,Danish,French or English boathabours, and from the cockpit you could watch all kind off interresting ships,boats vessels, the subway or people strolling over the pier.
Next stopover was Glückstad a smaller town down the river Elbe where we changed the folding propeller to a fixed one in order to get better propulsion specially in backward gear. Thanks to the "Yachtwerft Glückstadt" !
After a short stop in Borsfleth for another meeting with my father in his boat "Boe", we sailed into the Kiel-Kanal where we moored halvway for the night. The decision to start in light fog next morning, thinking it would lift soon, was not the best, we motored for two hours with very little visibility along the channelside, feeling very unpleasant. Anyway we arived in Kiel-Holtenau the day after . As to much wind, we had the time to stay in Charlottes old Unitown for about 3 days, getting visit from a cousin with children, exploring the town and having dinner in the good old "Bergklause".
After the wind had gone down a bit, we could sail on to Fynshavn on Denmarks island Als. Next morning we run under engine against very little wind into the "little belt" and had a nice daystopover on Bågö. After having had a nice walk and some time on the beach in Summertemperatures we went on to a small ankring place just before Middlefart.
Next morning we went on under engine (no wind) and enjoied lots off real common dolphins and some seals in the last part of the "little belt" + the first part of the kattegatt. Sunshine, water like a mirror and many dolphins jumping-- we hadent seen anything like this since the first part of our atlantic crossing ! Never had I seen real dolphins in the baltic anyhow.
That night we stopped in Hou/Hov having a BBQ. From there we sailed on to Grena, arriving late, leaving early again for Halmstad in Sweden. The sail over from Grena took 12 hours motorsailing for the 65sm hard on the wind, so we were really happy to get into Halmstad just before dark. Here Anna ,Charlottes Sister picked us up and we had a nice evening with her and Marcus at their home.
At the moment we are still here, waiting for the wind to go down so that we can sail on northward.
See ya all soon,
The Samponians

HAMBURG !

From Caen we sailed with mostly good winds via Honfleur,Fecamp and Dunkerque in France, Blankenberge in Belgium and Breskens + Vlieland in Holland to Cuxhaven in Germany were Peters parents came to visit / crew. From Cuxhaven Peters father sailed with Sampo via Borsfleth to Hamburg. Here we arrived last friday and since then we are busy meeting family and friends.
On the trip the first highlight was Honfleur, an incredibly nice old little town were most of the houses haven´t changed in 2-3 centuries. We just had to stay 2 days !
The next stop Fecamp had high cliffs around and a long wide beach of big round stones . As in the last 4 habours we came here right for market day... Denise enjoyed the many playgrounds on the beachfront promenade.
Dunkerque felt a bit like home with the big industrial park, otherwise it was just a nightstop for us.
In Blankenberge we stayed 2 days again and visited the nice old town of Bruegge with train for a day. Loads of history again. We enjoyed the Belgium beer and fries but it was quite expensive there.
The next stop was supposed to be Vlissingen but the habour was already full, so we stayed overnight in Breskens. Free showers !
After Breskens we had to sail outside the sheldearea, and cross Europort entrance, Europes busiest habourarea which I did not like too much, but everything went well so we went on sailing the next night to Vlieland.
Vlieland then is a fine place to stay again, many nice old boats, lots of children in the habour fishing crabs, and the superb nature of the lowland north sea islands. We enjoyed specially the walk on the beach and in the dunes in hot summerweather.
We´ll tell you later about Hamburg, the pearl of all habourcities.
Cheers

Some nice time in France

Ciao!

We spent a wonderful time in Cherbourg, St Vaast La-Hougue and Caen with our friends Alejandra, Patrik and Emilia. Denise was very happy of course that her best friend came to see her. We visited some playgrounds, old churches, the Cité de la mer with its aquarium and submarine, ate lots of ice cream, Chinese and French food, went for a swim, took a walk on the tidal flat and visited some oyster cultures, did some shopping etc. It was very nice anyway!

We also got a visit from Daniel, an old friend of Charlotte from the time she was studying at a lycée in France. He took the train from Paris to Caen just over the day to visit us on Sampo and we spent a nice day in Caen together. Denise was shy the first half hour and then she was holding his hand and wanted him to play with her.

Now, after a short visit at home in Stenungsund to get some more warm clothes, we are in Honfleur. This is a nice little town with lots of old buildings and nice architecture which were not destroyed during the wars. It is really a place that we can recommend to visit if you are in this area. And now when we have enough warm clothes and sleeping bags here on Sampo we got some nice and sunny summer weather again. It was actually quite hot the whole last week until tonight when it started to rain...

Take care and see you soon!
Charlotte, Peter and Denise

Bilder Acores

Hi everyboy again !
Well after 9 1/2 days we arrived here in this nice town of Cherbourg in France. The wind was all the time from the half until aft but much stronger and with worse waves as expected. It was often blowing 5-6 bf, sometimes 7 anf in gusts even more. Nice fast sailing but very exhausting !! You don´t always feel good in the stomach...
But Denise did - she always sleept through the nights without trouble, even in the worst waves, waking up in the morning, happy, and ready to play with her tired parents.
The last days we had 2h watches, and so we were really happy to arrive safely here. Tomorrow Emilia, Alexandra and Patrik from Stenungsund will arrive for a week on board and we all are really looking forward to this !
Best regards to all of you,
The Sampocrew

Wall painting in Horta!

Hi!

It was really fun to make this painting on the wall in Horta! It makes you feel like a great artist for a day or so! And it is nice to walk around and see all the other paintings.

We also made a painting in Angra do Heroísmo, but as it was raining afterwards the sailing boat disappeared and we had to make a new one and we hope this one will stay there a bit longer!

Today we will begin the crossing to France, the sun is shining and we don't expect too much wind!

Bye for now!

Charlotte, Peter and Denise

We leave the Azores

From Horta we motorsailed 10 hours to Velas on Sao George were we stayed for four days in the small marina. We enjoied the quite little town with its very friendly habourmaster Joe . In the evenings after sundown the birdcolonie in the hills above the habour disturbed the quiteness for a few hours every evening with screams and weired sounds. There was the big island festival which started the day after we arrived, but most happenings, concerts and so on started first in the evenings after 22.30 or later, so we did not get a lot out of it. We saw a "bullfight" but it was more a sad thing were youths made a fool out of a young bull/kalv which could not really get hold with its hooves on the road.
On we sailed to Angra de Herismo on Terceira which so far is our favorite here in the Azores. A very nice old town with lots to explore, nice bars and restaurants and again very friendly people. We stayed here as well four days, and had a rental car today with which we visited the interior whith it´s caves, lakes vulcanoes and hydrogenaflowers everywere.
Tomorrow we will probably start to sail in direction France were we will get Emilia, Alexandra and Patrik as visitors for a week. We all are really looking forward to this !
Now we hope for good not too much wind for this last long sail for this trip. It is about 1300sm to Cherbourg in France or if we have to see land earlyer it is about 900sm to La Coruna in Spain.
We calculate an average of 100sm per day.
Best regards,
The Sampocrew