I was awake early, eager to get going. The mist or sea fret, soon put paid to that idea – visibility was about 200 metres and everything was dripping wet, so feeling very disgruntled, I went back to bed. Later, with neither the fret or my mood changing, we went for coffee with Tina in Weilandt’s chandlery ( the Weilandt’s are a bit of a dynasty hereabouts, they run the boat overwintering business where we keep our boat in a heated shed and they also own 2 chandleries and quite a lot of arable farm land). Tina is our English speaking contact and our conduit to the Weilandt brothers, who run the business. Tina is a major asset to their business, she is friendly, competent and charming. Anyway, whilst we were having a coffee and I was slowly getting used to the idea that we might be here for another day, a lady came in and asked who owned MM17 GZO – ie our car. It transpired that her husband was unwell and wanted his car, having just put it away for the summer in one of the boat sheds and our car was the next one in, blocking him. It was very lucky that we were around, as moving our car meant putting it all back together again and reconnecting the battery, not a trivial task and one that would have given some difficulty if we were at sea! This way, we swapped cars around so they can block us in instead, on the theory that they will be back before us.

We were back on board at 11:00 and I was convinced that the fret was lifting and that we should go. Julie was reminding me of my promise that this year we were in no hurry and as a consequence, setting sail in poor visibility was unnecessary and pointless. It doesn’t take that much imagination to picture the next 30 minutes, nor Julie’s expression and mood as we cast off into the gloom – less gloom but still not brilliant. In order to calm matters, I promised that if we were not able to see the Fehmarn bridge as we approached it, then once past it we would call it a day and go into the anchorage in Orth, just past the aforementioned bridge. Much to my relief, the promised sun burned away the sea mist and as we sailed at 7 knots under the bridge, we acknowledged (through gritted teeth in Julie’s case) that we had made the right decision and we set off for Baginkop on Langeland, Denmark and 30 miles roughly from the bridge.

For a first day out you couldn’t have hoped for better conditions – flat sea, 15-20 knots from the east enabling us to reach (sails half way in/half way out) comfortably at 7 knots. It would have been even better if we had another 7 -10 degrees of temperature, but given that it was a bit chilly we were perfectly comfortable in our oilskins. It’s a bit early in the season for old man skin!!  Within an hour of exiting the bridge, we came across the leaders of a pretty large racing fleet as they passed us. Now we were on starboard tack and they were on port  ( we had right of way as the wind was blowing from right to left for us) so in theory, we didn’t need to alter course. However they were racing and I know from experience that it is infuriating to have to sail at less than optimum to avoid another boat so we steered ourselves  clear of all of the 50 or so boats as they passed us. Quite a sight!

We arrived at Bagenkop at around 17:00, to find a pretty full marina with weekenders from Germany. However we found a nice slot, wide enough for CW ( to refresh everyone’s memory, in Denmark they have 2 upright poles you have to get between before tying the bows to the shore, you lasso these poles as you go past so eventually, the boat is secured from all 4 corners. This is fine, provided that you know that the boat will fit between the poles – first problem. Second problem is that all Baltic boats are provided with bits on the side (called rubbing strips) that if they hit the poles (happens all the time), they take the impact and the hull is undamaged. Sadly CW and her ilk was not designed for such confined conditions, she is a blue water boat and has no strips, so her hull is very exposed to scratching if things go wrong. Happily, this time they didn’t and we were able to enjoy our first evening in Denmark in the cockpit in warm sunshine, sheltered from the breeze by the nearby holiday apartments.