The wind finally died sometime during the night. At 05:15, when we got up, there wasn't a breath and we resigned ourselves to motoring the 50 – odd miles to Ystad. Still, it was far better than hammering along in a F7 wind to a harbour entrance that was deemed 'dangerous’ in anything of a blow.

The engine was on and we were off then, by 06:00, heading out to sea a little initially, to avoid the wooden stakes of fish traps that festoon this coast and then turning northwards, keeping the white cliffs of Mön in sight for quite some time . We quickly settled into our normal routine of hourly turn and turn about and it would have been a singularly pleasant way to pass the day, given the bright blue skies and sunshine, if the air had been at least 10° warmer – it really was quite chilly.



The crossing over to Sweden is no great challenge, there are no natural hazards and whilst there are quite a number of ships about, we had no shipping lane to cross and the nearest ship’s course and ours was about a mile, so no stress involved there. Of course, the AIS system (Automatic Identification System) which all commercial ships over a certain tonnage have to have is a wonderful development, our own AIS system automatically calculates our track and any other ship in ‘sight ‘ of the system (16 miles or so) and gives you the closest point you will reach and when. It’s so useful, especially in these relatively crowded shipping waters .

Sometime during the journey a little zephyr of wind appeared, encouraging me to unfurl the main to give us a little extra drive and later, the genoa was put to the same use. Finally, the wind strengthened sufficiently to enable us to proceed in silence, every sailor’s wish! The engine, by the way, was now running a few degrees cooler, still not cool enough in my opinion (the gauge stabilized at 88°C). I will have the heat exchanger removed during the winter and either replaced or at least, cleaned out. That should do the trick.

By 15:00 we were a mile off Ystad marina and were able to find a berth alongside a pontoon quite close to the harbour office and toilets. Given some of the mega-walks we have had to undertake in some harbours just to use the loo, it’s always a big plus when you can park quite closely! Another huge plus was that we discovered that the washing machine and dryer were free – or at least the machine seeking payment was out of order, so we were able to wash everything, even if some items didn’t need washing just yet (a bit like Elizabeth 1^st, who allegedly bragged that she bathed once a year, irrespective of whether she needed to or not)!

The internet – it is such a boon when you can access it and such a pain when you can’t, especially when you’re under the impression that it is available in a given location. Ystad is one such location and given that we had no access in Klintholm, I was keen to get online, to catch up on any developments re the house sale and to call people on Skype, either onto their home phone which is chargeable but cheap or better still, to their computers which is free. The savings made using Skype are quite considerable, several hundred pounds over the whole summer. Anyway, to get to the point – there wasn’t any internet here in Ystad. Having finished stamping my foot, I left Julie with the washing and set off into town to find a shop that would sell me a ‘dongle’ to enable me to access the internet. Actually, our friends Nick & Frankie Bown (at least they will be called that in a week’s time, premature congratulations to them!) gave me their Swedish dongle a couple of years ago but I was advised by the store that it was as cheap to buy a new one rather than upgrade the one we had, which is what I did. 418 SEK (about £38) bought me a month’s internet access and the dongle, not bad, this means that we can connect for a month for about £20, which is fine.

Whilst I was in town, I called into a watchmaker’s to see if they could advise me on my ailing watch. The new battery didn’t help overmuch it still stops occasionally. The friendly young female watchmaker had a look but sadly, couldn’t find anything untoward with it but ironically, since then, 21 hours later, it is still going so maybe, she has fixed it.

Back to the boat and a relaxed evening spent on board, apart from 20 minutes or so that I was invited onto a neighbour’s 46’ Bavaria for a chat. The owner was on his way to Crete, to join his wife who had just started a job down there and his crew-mate was English, a CA member in fact. They were both hugely enthusiastic about the Swedish archipelago and its’ loveliness, which is good to hear.