5/9/03 – Sugilite’s first outing.
Stefan took us out for a shake down cruise in the local bay outside of Ellös. All the radios and electronics seem hard to figure out. We “learned” how to furl and unfurl the sails, run the engine and other ships systems. “Learned” is in quotes, because although we had gone through the motions of operating each system, we still didn’t really know a damn thing about what we were doing. That, of course, would come with practice and experience and we were going to take it slow.
We again called the freight forwarder for our shipment – no word yet. They don’t know where it is or when it might come in.
5/11/03 – Steve and Jan’s first trip alone.
Today we tested out the autopilot to make sure it would follow a course. We noticed that when it approached a waypoint to within .5 nm[1] (about 3,000 ft) it wanted to turn to the next heading. Navigating along the Swedish west coast is a bit tricky as there are many rocks and channels only a couple of hundred feet across. The autopilot was set up for mid-ocean crossings where a half of mile is not so critical. We found that it’s best to delay the turns a bit until you get to the waypoint and we also cranked the tolerance down to .1 nm or about 600 ft.
We calibrated the meters and gauges as best we could. Vickie from HR Parts brought over our new dingy and outboard motor. We measured and marked the chain on the HR dock. That night we took Roland and Vickie Vance with us as we sailed to the picture postcard village of Gullholmen. Rolland directed us via the shortcut way that only the locals know, threading our way through the rocks and channels. We had our first experience with bows-to moorage – Roland caught the stern ball as we passed by and we got the bow to the dock without hitting it. This looks like it could be trouble. We had a fabulous dinner at the restaurant.
5/12/03 – Left Ellös for Fishebachshil.
Our first real trip which required navigation was to Fishebachshil, a small town north of Ellös about 50 miles. It is a beautiful trip among the islands which make of the archipelago along this part of the coast. Brian McCulloch called from Seattle while underway. He is scheduled to join us for part of the trip and we were planning on meeting him in Stockholm on the 20th. We are beginning to realize how unlikely it will be for us to make it all the way to Stockholm and we suggest that maybe Copenhagen would be a better choice. Brian keeps thinking of more things to bring with him. He seems to like the idea of Copenhagen as he has just met a woman over the internet that lives there and is anxious to meet her in person. So the change of rendezvous is made.
One of our many challenges was to establish some sort of reliable internet communications with our office. If we were planning on being away for over 2 months, then it would be critical that we had some sort of ability to contact our office, our suppliers and customers. We had acquired cell phones which worked internationally and in the States we had tested their ability to connect to the Internet. Everything seemed to work fine – ahhh, but once we were in Sweden, things were not quite so simple. We decided to get a local cell phone and a local access number. This seemed to work although it was quite expensive. It gave us access when we couldn’t get to an internet café.
Steve spent the day installing the remote control that we bought from HR Parts and the Nav-Tex. We bought gas for the outboard in Fishebachshil. During the trip to Fishebachshil we saw lots of eider ducks on the rocks, which was a first for both of us.