Since we are being urged to think that we are in a “war” with Covid-19, I thought that I’d file the occasional dispatch from the front, from our very comfortable fox hole, distressingly much more comfortable than many dealing with Covid in other parts of the world.
This post is particularly timely since, had the world remained as it was on Jan 1, 2020 we would today be arriving in Istanbul en route to Iran for the beginning of a trip that both V and I were very much looking forward to. We had often thought about traveling to and in Iran for a number of years but something always came up and we continued to put it off. Finally last summer we decided that given our age and the storm clouds on the horizon over Washington and Tehran, we felt that we should do it sooner rather than later. V’s researches turned up a clever, sophisticated, young Iranian woman who was a food blogger and who ran a cooking school in Tehran and we asked her if she would help us plan an itinerary and be our person on the ground locally. Since we don’t travel with tour groups, who usually take care of all the details, experience has taught us how important it is to have a local advocate on the spot if there are problems, to make sure we know the things to be aware of and to help mediate with local travel agents. V arranged a fee with her and set it up so that she was working directly for us and not for the local travel agents and hotels. We then spent a number of very interesting WhatsApp video meetings with her over the fall as we hammered out the itinerary and finalized the details of our trip. Sadly it has all come to nought and I’m not sure that in the current state of the world now, and for the foreseeable future that this is a trip that we will ever be able to take. This is reminiscent of a trip that we were planning to take to Syria only to have our plans overtaken by the Days of Spring uprising in 2011 so this is not the first time this has happened. However our travel problems are of no consequence in the context of the devastation suffered by the Syrian people and the continuing turmoil in Iran.
A very quiet Queen Street
I have been corresponding in recent days with a very good friend in Australia, a friend since the early 1970’s. I’ll just restate a couple of points that I wrote in my last email to him, I hope he won’t mind.
Point 1. Covid should be an instructive lesson for climate change deniers who seem to believe that any problems that might arise from their beliefs will manifest slowly and give coming generations lots of time to fix them. Systemic failures when they arise, as we are witnessing, replicate exponentially and will be fast, sharp and brutal, not gradual and manageable.
Point 2. The one thing that has had really very worried me since the beginning of the covid turmoil, as economies started shutting down and being force-fed with government debt, is the likelihood, already beginning to be seen, that governments faced with mountainous debt, will start printing money and rapidly expanding the money supply. Very high or stag (i)nflation is as worrying as Covid and its effects will last much longer and will ultimately cause even more pain and suffering. All fingers and toes crossed that this does not happen.
On a more cheerful note, as I was driving along River Street yesterday, my car being only one of three to be seen on a normally very busy street, I saw a young woman carrying a shopping bag on which was printed, “Sex, Drugs and Pinot Noir”. I thought it a recipe to help make the passing of the ample amounts of self-isolation time that we now have in abundance much more enjoyable and I determined to make this my motto. Now to tell V!
Both V and I continue to receive many emails and messages from readers wondering if Blue Clipper has been lost with all hands since my post abruptly stopped in the middle of the voyage. In fact, as the trip wound on, I felt that I had written so much about my various sailing voyages in the last 8 or 9 months that readers must surely be sated with salt water and sails. I therefore decided to stop writing and just enjoy the passage with son J.
However not wanting to leave the journal in limbo, I thought that I’d wrap up the voyage with some final observations.
How did it compare with the other trips? In a word, easier, by far, but with its own set of difficulties. Because we were sailing, for the most part, within sight of the coast, only once being more than 40nm from land, we anchored or moored every night but one. This of course meant that there was only one night with an overnight sail and overnight watches, for the rest of the time we maintained our watches during the day and evening while we under sail but could get a full night’s sleep as we were tied up overnight. This did come with a downside however, the sails needed to be raised, lowered and trimmed every day. On my previous passages we were in blue water so sails were rarely raised and lowered. Except when the winds became too much for the sails we were carrying and we needed to reef the sails, we were for the most part trimming and adjusting sails, not raising and lowering them. On this passage however, our first hour every day was consumed with getting sails up, coiling lines and leaving our mooring and at the end of every day, lowering and flaking the sails, coiling lines and making fast for the night…does get wearysome.
Since we had no cook on board, each watch had responsibility for one meal a day which we rotated through breakfast, lunch and dinner. J and I were on the same watch so J and I along with another watch member regularly took our turn at the stove and the galley. Ordinarily I’m the family cook and I prepare dinner on a daily basis as well as any other meals that go beyond lefotovers for lunch. Given my experience I thought that when it came to our turn to prepare dinner, it would be a fairly easy way of getting out of the more rigourous end of day tasks, i.e. lowering the sails and mooring the ship. Unfortunately, very much not the case, we were assigned the dishes to prepare based on a meal plan that had been designed before we left port and we were given the quantity of ingredients that was allocated for each of the dishes on the menu. I get it, if you’re creative you can deliver interesting results from whatever you have to work with, but that theory was tested daily, and found wanting. Our menu choices revolved heavily around a starchy base, pasta or rice or couscous and was finished by a stew or curry of vegetables. Vegetables were root vegs for the most part supplemented frequently with chick peas and occasionally enlivened by chicken. Not much in the way of fresh herbs and the spices were bought in bulk and were dusty and tired, hard to be creatively inspired. Virtually everyone was young and hungry, bulk and filling seemed to be the primary requisites, and flavour and interest were second or third order requirements. Add to this a rolling ship, a hot, steamy enclosed space, dull knives and 15 meals to prepare, rising to the creative challenge was often superseded by surviving the experience.
Our last port of call was Stavanger, Norway where we were to disembark. During our second last day we sailed to within about 5nm of Stavanger and anchored in the shelter of an island for the night. We had our dinner and settled in for an early night before our final day’s sail the following day. About 2330 there was a hell of a racket, the sound of the winldass raising the anchor, very noisy and it does make the whole boat vibrate, and then the sound of our engine moving the boat for about 15 minutes, followed by the sound of the windlass dropping the anchor, once again followed by the sound of the engine moving the boat to set the anchor. This process repeated itself twice more before finally stopping at about 0230, but during this time the boat banged, clanged and shook as she tried to find good holding ground for the anchor. The wind had picked up during the evening and as we had anchored on a rocky bottom, the pressure on the anchor grew with the wind, so that it failed to hold. Needless to say, during the two hours we spent trying to find a good spot for the anchor, sleep was impossible.
Stavanger is an important Norwegian port as it the country’s 3rd largest city and is often referred to be as the Oil Capital of Norway. It is located on Norway’s south-east coast and is ideally located for shipping access to the North Sea oilfields. The city counts its founding to the year 1125 but has grown rapidly since the discovery of North Sea oil, which makes for a very interesting architectural mix, very old, preserved heritage wooden buildings mixed with very modern steel and glass office structures. As we lifted our anchor and raised our sails we could see it in the distance, our final destination which we would be returning to at the end of our day’s sail.
However, we did save the best day for our last day. Up bright and early, our watch was on for breakfast KP, a beautiful sunny day with an easy breeze but the mixed emotions of our final day was in everyone’s thoughts. Sailing inland from Stavanger, we entered Lysefjord, a stunning fjord with steep cliffs and mountainsides rising sheer from the water on either hand. The sail down the fjord in the bright sunshine was magnificent and about noon we lowered sails and hove to as anchoring is impossible, the water in this part of the fjord over 400 metres deep. We had stopped Blue Clipper just past one of the most inspiring spots on the fjord, Preikestolen better known as Pulpit Rock. Described by Lonely Planet as the world’s most breathtaking viewing platform, Preikestolen rises 603 metres above the fjord but the scale is almost impossible to grasp from water level. I tried to photograph someone standing on the edge of the rock from the ship’s deck but it’s almost impossible to see the person in the image, only a couple of pixels big.
Just past Pulpit Rock is Hengjanefossen Falls, a glorious set of cascades racing down the side of a sheer mountainside and, misty and ethereal, they tumble into the fjord. The sunlight glowed through the lacy water while we had a very pleasant lunch, the whole crew relaxed and absorbing the heat and the light. As everyone grew hotter in the early afternoon a feeling grew that it would be very refreshing to dive into the fjord and cool off. The water in the fjord was deepest midnight blue and I felt icy just looking at it, but impetuosity of youth, it was not long before about 12 or 14 crew lined up and were diving into the 15˚C water. The diving and swimming went on for about 20 minutes and then chilled and happy they climbed aboard and we prepared to return to Stavanger.
Pulpit Rock, thanks to Paul Edmonson
On our dock by about 1800, we lowered sails and coiled lines for the last time. J and I then headed into town where we had a couple of the most expensive rounds I can remember, ordinary little dockside bar but Norwegian prices, 1 beer and 1 glass of house red wine, Cdn $50 per round. Compared notes and remembrances and agreed that it was a very worthwhile exercise but one that if repeated, would be better done on our own boat.
This is my third voyage in the last year, and I have spent two months out of the last eleven on the water. Even in my worst moments I have enjoyed every moment but in thinking about it, a couple of themes have emerged. So summing up?
Highlights:
I enjoyed blue water sailing significantly more than coastal cruising. It can certainly be more uncomfortable and the terror factor can be orders of magnitude greater but I really enjoyed the intensity and the challenge of deep sea sailing;
I enjoyed the camaraderie of a group all working their way through the same risky issues and challenges;
I really enjoyed the engagement with my environment and my surroundings. Weather moves way beyond worrying if I need a raincoat or shorts. Weather awareness is always top of mind and the impact of weather changes is immediately felt, it literally controls the ship’s progress and safety. The sea’s moods, colours, motions also change constantly, and while occasionally frightening, they all are intensely beautiful and the sea like the weather becomes a primary focus of your attention.
I loved the whole idea of blue water sailing, crossing an ocean and seeing at first hand all the things that have captivated me all my life but that I’ve only ever experienced through reading about them. Mostly though I loved the learning experience and the skills that I was exposed to and had the opportunity to begin to learn.
Not so Highlights:
Not so many, but the ones that I did experience led me to the place I’m in right now. The most significant of these was the perpetual feeling that I was only ever eating hors d’oeuvres but never a main course. We were continually learning new things but never had enough time to really absorb, integrate and master them and I felt that I was merely floating over the surface of the experience.
As I said above I enjoyed the camaraderie and the team spirit involved in moving a large vessel through wind and weather but I could not, even at the most trivial level, say that I had learned to manage a boat and be confident that I could deal with seagoing situations that arose. That of course was never expected to be the outcome of these voyages, these were meant to be realistic exposures to the situations and the processes but there was never a promise that in a couple of months I would be transformed into an old salt. What it has made me realize is that I have outgrown the model. My only logical next step therefore is to stop sipping and to start drinking with both hands.
I wrote the above a while ago but before I posted this blog post I decided to explore where my logic led me. I have just learned that as of today, I’m the proud but slightly terrified owner of an older CS 33 sail boat. Fear, excitement and trepidation all whizzing about but I think that at the age of 75 it’s time to buy my first boat and to stop sipping!
An interesting couple of days’ journeys since my last post. On Thursday we left our anchorage right after breakfast, raised sails and headed for Gothenburg, an old university town and the second largest city in Sweden. Winds were not helpful, Force 2, so not really moving the boat with any speed, so on with the engine expecting our motor-sail to cover the 70-odd nautical miles by late evening. As the day drew in with our boat speed hovering between 4 and 5 knots it was clear that it would be very late evening or early morning before we arrived, so picked a very nice anchorage about 3 hour’s sail from Gothenburg and tied up for the night.
A beautiful evening with a gorgeous sunset, and good weather forecasted to continue for the next couple of days. Had dinner, watched the sunset and an early bedtime, no watches as we were at anchor.
Friday morning was beautiful, limpid blue sky and water and light winds. We are anchored in the midst of a little archipelago, many of the islands of which have brightly painted summer cottages erected, the overall effect being very like Georgian Bay. Planned to raise sails after breakfast and point for Gothenburg but the water was warm and calm and a number of crew decided to go for a swim around the ship. Put the ladder over the side and 7 or 8 of the crew dived in, water quite warm, about 21C. Then an easy sail into Gothenburg, arriving at about noon and tied up for the next couple of days.
We were very pleased to discover that the weekend was the occasion for Gothenburg’s annual Culture Days Festival. So after tidying the ship, J and I, along with a couple of voyage crew, had a cheeseburger and fries at a restaurant next to our mooring, we had all been dreaming of this for the last week, and caught a water taxi into Gothenburg city centre. The city is very neat and clean, lots of historic buildings, the very large university and many parks and green spaces. J and I walked for a couple of hours, listening to concerts, jazz groups and choral groups that were performing at a variety of venues. I then found a shady bench in a very large park next to the Festival site, got out my ereader for a relaxing couple of hours while J continued to explore. He returned to pick me up in the park at about 6pm having covered more than 12k during his explorations and we set out to find a restaurant for dinner, having linked up with another member of the crew who joined us for dinner. Found an extremely good French/Swedish fusion restaurant and had a fabulous dinner, chanterelles on toast as a starter and a rare filet of beef in a demi-glace sauce with very fresh local vegetables and a very good bottle of Croze-Hermitage. Caught a 10:30 ferry back to our boat and left J and the other young crew member to explore the night life, getting past my bedtime!
Blue Clipper was designed and built in Sweden and the naval architect who built her lives in Gothenburg so the next morning, Saturday, the crew of Blue Clipper took the designer and his family for a sail, first time that he had sailed the boat since it was built. J and I chose to have a last morning in Gothenburg so we walked for a couple of hours, enjoyed a very good lunch, bought some freshly roasted coffee and other supplies to make our coming week on the boat a little more interesting and then headed back to the boat at 1:30 for our passage to Norway.
Hauling on the inner jib sheet
Weather has changed very quickly since last evening, heavily overcast and winds and seas rising, so we’re going to make a run for the Swedish coast and the town of Arendal which has a very protected harbour and a good shelter for the weather that’s approaching. We had a choice to wait until this morning, Sunday, and make a day sail out of the 95nm passage or make a run overnight and put watches in place throughout the night. The winds which have been quite light up to now are expected to rise to Force 6 or 7 over the next couple of days with the seas and waves growing with the rising wind. Grace, our captain, was quite concerned that if we left the passage until the following day, it would be extremely uncomfortable in the seas that we are likely to meet. An overnight sail, even though it meant keeping a midnight and 4am watch, would be much more comfortable, so that was the decision that we all agreed to. Equally as importantly, the southern coast of Norway is listed on the nautical charts as Dangerous Waves since the water is very shallow and with onshore winds, eg winds from the South or SW, the waves can build very quickly to a considerable height. Onshore winds also make this coast a pretty grim lee shore which means that you need to put lots of sea miles between your boat and the shore. For all these reasons we decided to make an overnight run for Arendal.
Gothenburg dry dock welcomes you to the city
We were on the 9pm to midnight watch, the easiest from a sleep perspective. The winds and seas had been increasing during the afternoon and we were maintaining a steady 7.5 to 8.5 knots but our watch is the unlucky watch; while we are on the helm the winds are almost guaranteed to abate and, true to form, this occurred again. Over the course of our watch the seas rose and we were rolling and banging our way along but the wind dropped significantly and when the midnight watch took over from us we were only moving at about 5 knots. However after I fell into bed I could feel the boat’s motion change, and during the night, a very uncomfortable one with the boat rolling and pitching, we sailed into heavier seas and rising winds.
After about 3am the ship became very noisy, we were heeled well over and seas were washing up over the starboard side. This continued for the rest of the night and when I came on deck at about 6:30am, we were blasting along at about 10 knots, having occasionally sailed at 12 knots and the seas were coming over the bow. However the entrance to the harbour was a short way ahead and by 7:30 we were in the harbour, all sails down, anchor dropped and crew dropping with tiredness.
J getting ready to go out on the bowsprit
Scrambled eggs for breakfast, strong coffee and a restful day ahead.
Following our train journey on Sunday, tiresome to read about I’m sure, and tiring to experience, it was with real pleasure that we found our boat moored in the midst of a flotilla of tall ships on the Aarhus docks. The whole area was filled with masses of people, vendor’s tents and tall ships at their moorings. The harbour in Aarhus was the final destination of the annual tall ships race which begins and ends in different venues each year. This year’s race began off Bergen, Norway and after 8 day’s hard sailing, finished off in Aarhus, the fleet then mooring in Aarhus where a Tall Ships Festival was underway. We joined at the tail end, many of the ships having already left by Sunday afternoon but Blue Clipper and a number of others were still at their moorings.
It was a pleasure to be back aboard and even more so to recognize a number of the faces of crew members with whom I had sailed from Bermuda and who were still with the boat. Lots of chatting and catching up and then since all the crew were now aboard, we were the last following our interesting journey from Copenhagen, we had our first crew meeting to begin our passage planning. The sentiment was very much in favour of putting to sea rather than spending an overnight in Aarhus and exploring the city. Our afternoon was then taken up with safety drills, and all the information and practice necessary to raise sails, and work the ship. Then, there being virtually no wind, after an early dinner we motored our way out of the harbour and off to an anchorage for the night, about a 3 hour motor sail away from Aarhus.
Jack, our first mate, swimming with the seals!
The ship’s makeup for this voyage is very different as compared to our Atlantic crossing; there are 7 of us voyage crew and 9 permanent crew, similar to the previous voyage but the difference is the lack of the 10 sail trainees who were part of the crew who crossed the Atlantic. Since this is not a training voyage, there are only 16 of us and not 26 which will make a difference on watch. Voyage crew on the Atlantic run were able to be more flexible in opting out of watches if they chose to do so in order to to catch up on sleep or just not feeling sufficiently well to take their watch, there were lots of trainees to cover requirements. Now however there are fewer hands to raise and lower sails and help with the running of the ship so voyage crew will need to be more present on their watches. Additionally, on the Atlantic we had a chef and a saloon steward to cook and help serve and clean up, on this voyage we have no cook and no helper so each watch will be taking their turns preparing the meals, doing dishes and cleaning up.
Monday was our first full day at sea, pleasant but not very exciting. Again, lacking wind, we raised the sails to get everyone in practice, lowered them again and motor sailed to a Danish island called Samso where we spent another night at anchor. All the rest of the voyage crew went ashore and spent the afternoon cycling or walking and exploring Samso, I chose to stay aboard and write the blog; having just reread it I should have gone ashore with the rest of them.
Alice, our figurehead, putting sail covers on the outer jib
Yesterday, Tuesday, we had a 72nm sail to our present anchorage. Up sails and underway by 9am with enough wind to move the boat along at about 5-6 knots; a downwind run so the jibs were useless but we gull-winged the sails to catch as much wind as we could, but still a pretty sedate passage. However the wind and seas did pick up later in the afternoon just as our watch started to prep dinner in the galley, one of my least favourite dishes, pasta with vegetables, bacon and pesto, hold your nose and swallow. The swells made dinner prep more interesting than I could have wished, between the smell of the pesto and the ship rolling I was happy to back on deck after dinner with the wind in my face.
Shortly after dinner, the wind died completely so back on with the engine, resulting in a very late arrival at our anchorage, about midnight. The virtue of these overnight anchorages is no midnight or 4am graveyard watches so as late as we were getting in, straight to bed for a quiet, motion-free night of sleep.
J arrived on Saturday morning and we spent a couple of hours walking before a very early dinner, 6pm, as he hadn’t slept on Friday night, sitting up on an overnight flight. I, on the other hand, the previous evening had found a wonderful Italian wine bar and restaurant, an easy 15 minute walk from my hotel. Had their tasting menu, which featured as the Primi, a wonderful roasted tomato risotto and grilled cod for a Secondi accompanied by a couple of glasses of very pleasant Barbara d’Alba. The restaurant, interestingly named d’Alba, was charming, the service prompt and helpful and the food very good.
My cod at d’Alba. Never remember to shoot the picture before trying the dish!
As a contrast J and I had our early dinner at an Argentinian steak restaurant and that tells you all you need to know, still, a rare steak, always welcome. Early night needed in preparation for our trek to Blue Clipper on Sunday as she is berthed in Aarhus, about 200k from Copenhagen. Without doing much research I had pre-booked an early train from Copenhagen and we met at the station at 8:30am ready for our run to Aarhus. As the day unfolded we came to realize that the choice of a train rather than a bus was not a wise decision and as we learned on arrival at the boat, we were the only ones who had chosen that mode, everyone else having arrived unscathed by bus.
Won’t bore with all the details but if you are ever in Denmark and traveling by train, be prepared. Admittedly, many of our problems were self-inflicted, not the least of which was the fact that between us we had 2 large duffel bags filled with sea clothes etc, mine weighing in at 24k, as well as backpacks, camera and equipment bags, the list goes on. I had counted on there being trolleys to get from the taxi to our track, but no trolleys and no porters, am I a fugitive from the 19th century? Compounding this was the fact that our destination did not appear on the train schedule boards, so no track and time information, there was not a ticket office, all automated ticket machines and not a train information kiosk, in short not a living soul to turn to for help. I finally managed to waylay someone wearing a train badge who was obviously going off duty and not keen to be kept from his breakfast, who however gave us two critical pieces of information, the first was the track number and departure time of a train that would begin our journey and the second explained why there was no train on the scheduling board going to Aarhus, since as we learned, there was no train going to Aarhus. A large portion of the track between Aarhus and Copenhagen is under repair and we were going to have to take a train to an intermediary town about an hour away, leave the train, hike about 1/2k to a bus that would then take us about an hour closer to Aarhus, to another intermediate town where we would board another train which after an hour’s journey would deposit us in Aarhus. The second piece of his information was correct, the journey unfortunately was as described, the first sadly was not, as we discovered when we dragged our bags and selves to the platform where we were told that the train was waiting to leave, only to discover that there was no train. A passing train worker took pity on us and guided us to the proper platform, up and down stairs again, while calling his co-worker, who had steered us to the wrong track, as well as his ancestors and family every colourful and vile name that he could call up and did it in english so that we could all share in the experience.
Thus began an eventful and exhausting day, each transfer from train to bus to train all seeming timed to give a window of 5 or 10 minutes between stages before the next one departed, requiring the two of us slung with bags and sacks, like Ironmen participants, jointly carrying our two duffel bags piled on each other, each of us desperately clutching a handle and knowing that to stop running would be the end of all of our hopes, mark us out as failures in life and possibly lead to the fall of western civilization. A little over-dramatic maybe but while in the moment, those appear to be the only options, success or abject and everlasting failure, completely disregarding the fact that there would certainly be another train or bus and that the boat would not leave without us.
The coup de grace was delivered when we were running the 500 or 600 metres between between the train and the bus when my phone rang and since stopping was not an option, it rang itself out and no sooner had the call ended then it rang again and yet again. Arrived at and safely on the bus, I checked my phone and could see that the calls had come from somewhere in Texas so I put it down to a spam caller and was thoroughly grateful that we had not surrendered to iPhone’s siren call. However, J on checking his phone saw that he too had received calls and from the same phone number and since the coincidence was too unlikely without a reason he determined to call the number to see what it was about. I thought it a good idea but would have been unable to make the call myself since I was trying to get my hear rate below 200 bpm and with no breath to speak. During the call he kept looking at me and explaining to the caller that he was with me, I was ok, I really was there and there was no emergency. You should know that the satellite tracker that I take with me on these trips and that shows my position on the blog site is equipped with an SOS button that requires a recessed slide to be pushed from one setting to another and then an appropriately name button held down for a set period of time, followed by a response on the tracker to indicate that the SOS is genuine and requesting help. These trackers are designed to be taken on mountain climbing expeditions, back country hiking, etc and are taken very seriously by the Assistance group who backs them up. I can only assume that in throwing our bags around, running up and down stairs with them and bouncing them around that the tracker must have been knocked about enough to do all the required things to trigger the SOS. What then became a problem for the Assistance people was that they could not reach me on my cell nor could they reach my emergency call list and I was not responding to the communications link on the tracker requesting confirmation that there was an emergency. Once we had it all straightened out they were gracious and charming but there certainly was the potential to have begun the trip with a never to be forgotten moment as Coast Guard choppers descended on our bus.
We did arrive in Aarhus and we did find Blue Clipper but that required another and very unexpected trial, but enough for today.
The last time I wrote I was in the Azores having sailed from Bermuda, and now here I am in Copenhagen, continuing what has clearly become a very bad habit. But before I begin….it has been a wonderful summer, at least for some of us. It began in late May with the start of the Cricket World Cup, a quadrennial event, this year hosted in the UK.
The World Cup was a fabulous tournament, 10 international teams, England, Australia, NZ, South Africa, West Indies, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Afghanistan, which meant a match every day, starting at 5:30am local time from the beginning on May 28 until the Final on July 14. The cricket format was One Day cricket, a 50 Over game and this year’s tournament was reckoned the best ever held. The Final between NZ and England ended in a tie, the first time ever, requiring a Super Over, also ending in a tie, England ultimately being awarded the title based on a superior record of Boundry runs. If this all sounds a little arcane for non-cricket fans, I understand, I’m not a sports writer, but it did focus attention every day for 7 weeks.
Immediately following the World Cup was the Tour de France, my most anticipated sporting event of the year and this year was one of the best in recent memory. Again, for non-followers, the Tour is a team sport, not individual riders racing, although the teams are set up to maximize the opportunities for individual team members to out-race opponents. It is the quintessential sporting example of coopetition at work, riders co-operating with competing riders to take turns at the front allowing opponents to slipstream behind them before changing places and then attacking to leave the others behind and be first at the finish. It is supremely strategic as tactical decisions are constantly made and changed as the dynamics of the race change. This year 22 teams of 8 riders each took part, which meant 176 riders started the first stage and on the final stage into Paris 155 riders survived to finish. It is, undoubtedly, the single hardest, most demanding and intense, organized international sporting event. Over the course of the Tour the riders covered 3600K, on occasion in the Alps and in the Pyrenees, climbing grades of 13 or 14 degrees to heights rising to over 2800 metres. They race every day for 3 weeks with 2 rest days over that period, covering between 125 and 300 kilometres a day and reaching speeds of 90+kph on the mountain descents, utterly unimaginable!
Copenhagen skyline
The Tour finished last Sunday which left me just enough time to pack my bags and catch my plane on Wednesday for here, Copenhagen, to await Blue Clipper. Why? …a reasonable question.
After our return from the Azores son James, 37 years old, who works in Corporate Finance, buying and selling companies, joined us for dinner and in the course of chatting about the trans-Atlantic sail, said that he’d love to join me on one of these adventures. The thought being father of the deed, I checked the next morning and found that Blue Clipper was planning a 2 week Scandinavian sail from Aarhus in Denmark to Stavanger on the Norway coast, via Sweden. Since J’s very tight time window fitted precisely with Clipper’s plans, it felt fated and so I committed to the trip and am here in Copenhagen awaiting J’s arrival tomorrow. In the meantime I plan to spend a couple of days exploring Copenhagen which I have not visited since the business trips I made here before my retirement.
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Sed semper, lacus et porta mattis, nibh massa tristique dolor, nec aliquam ligula neque vel ante. Aliquam gravida tempus gravida. Vivamus ipsum mi, volutpat a massa a, rutrum tincidunt lectus. Proin vulputate diam sagittis odio varius, id viverra turpis rutrum.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. In rhoncus, orci at efficitur elementum, magna nisi dapibus ante, in facilisis magna sapien pulvinar ligula.
Proin diam ipsum, vulputate sed laoreet condimentum, venenatis non quam. Aliquam ornare massa et sem sagittis, eget egestas dui porttitor.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. In rhoncus, orci at efficitur elementum, magna nisi dapibus ante, in facilisis magna sapien pulvinar ligula. Vestibulum at fermentum magna. Mauris sapien erat, tristique et hendrerit eget, condimentum auctor odio. Integer interdum venenatis sapien sit amet volutpat. Suspendisse vestibulum neque cursus augue commodo, non imperdiet dolor pulvinar.
Sed semper, lacus et porta mattis, nibh massa tristique dolor, nec aliquam ligula neque vel ante. Aliquam gravida tempus gravida. Vivamus ipsum mi, volutpat a massa a, rutrum tincidunt lectus. Proin vulputate diam sagittis odio varius, id viverra turpis rutrum.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. In rhoncus, orci at efficitur elementum, magna nisi dapibus ante, in facilisis magna sapien pulvinar ligula.
Proin diam ipsum, vulputate sed laoreet condimentum, venenatis non quam. Aliquam ornare massa et sem sagittis, eget egestas dui porttitor.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. In rhoncus, orci at efficitur elementum, magna nisi dapibus ante, in facilisis magna sapien pulvinar ligula. Vestibulum at fermentum magna. Mauris sapien erat, tristique et hendrerit eget, condimentum auctor odio. Integer interdum venenatis sapien sit amet volutpat. Suspendisse vestibulum neque cursus augue commodo, non imperdiet dolor pulvinar.
Sed semper, lacus et porta mattis, nibh massa tristique dolor, nec aliquam ligula neque vel ante. Aliquam gravida tempus gravida. Vivamus ipsum mi, volutpat a massa a, rutrum tincidunt lectus. Proin vulputate diam sagittis odio varius, id viverra turpis rutrum.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. In rhoncus, orci at efficitur elementum, magna nisi dapibus ante, in facilisis magna sapien pulvinar ligula.
Proin diam ipsum, vulputate sed laoreet condimentum, venenatis non quam. Aliquam ornare massa et sem sagittis, eget egestas dui porttitor.
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