Unioninkatu at night
Originally uploaded by Greygriffin.

Just playing with my cameraphone.

Laivakoira (ship’s dog)
Originally uploaded by Greygriffin.

Kittiwake has a mascot, a dog we picked up in the Turku archipelago. The badge on the lifejacket says ‘Pida saaristo siistina’ (keep the archipelago clean), which is a charity organisation that does good work there.

We should give the dog a name. I thought, ‘Horatio’ (after Admiral Nelson) – any better ideas?

Kittiwake at Malkasaari
Originally uploaded by Greygriffin.

We sailed yesterday to Malkasaari, a small island in eastern Helsinki. It only took about 3 hours, which was good as we didn’t set off until after 4pm. On the way we called Kati & Janne, and as they were already out in the ‘Buster’ speed-boat they came to the island too and joined us in a barbecue.

Now we’re off again, and planning to stop at Suomenlinna for lunch. Today the sea is smooth and the wind light, but we’re still gliding along at about two knots, plenty to get us there and wonderfully peaceful.

Wedding anniversary lunch
Originally uploaded by Greygriffin.

We’re meeting friends for a picnic this evening, so we decided to celebrate our fifth wedding anniversary by having lunch together at Hakaniemi market square. It was warm and sunny, with a string & flute quartet playing traditional music nearby – what a shame we both had to return to work afterwards!

Eve & Kittiwake at Kaunissaari
Originally uploaded by Greygriffin.

On the way home from Onas we stopped at Kaunissaari (‘Beautiful Island’). It was nice enough, with a good, big harbour and a café, but otherwise unremarkable.

Kittiwake at Onas
Originally uploaded by Greygriffin.

We sailed yesterday to our yacht club’s island harbour at Onas, near Porvoo. They have a really nice place there, with a couple of jetties, a kitchen/barbecue outbuilding, a big sauna and a couple of compost toilets. There are even a couple of Optimist dinghies and a Snipe dinghy you can sail, though it would take a couple of hours to step the Snipe’s mast etc. so we didn’t have time. The whole place has a feeling of being cared for – very nice to see.

I promised to post some videos I took of Kittiwake sailing – here they are. They’re quite big so may take a long time to download (don’t try unless you have broadband) and will only play on very recent versions of media players like Quicktime or RealPlayer.

They give you a very good feeling of how fast Kittiwake is (she’s doing about five knots in the videos) and in particular how fast she feels, since Kittiwake has quite low sides (‘freeboard’) and so you’re very close to the water rushing past.

One thing I’d like you to notice is how there are no railings on the narrow bow, where you have to kneel to take down the jib. Now imagine doing that as the boat is tossing through stormy waves, when the bow is wet and slippery and steeply sloping, actually digging into the biggest waves. No wonder Eve makes me do that :-).

Homeward bound
Originally uploaded by Greygriffin.

We’ve left Lähteelä and are running down the east coast of Porkkala, bound for Helsinki and home. It’s been a great holiday, with lots of adventure and new experiences. It’s strange to think that it’s been two and a half weeks, although the first days do seem a long time ago.

The Turku archipelago was very beautiful, but as Eve commented the islands and coastline around Helsinki are just as good and a lot more convenient to visit.

So, would we do it again? Certainly, though a bigger and roomier boat would make it even better. We’d hope to spend more nights in ‘natural harbours’ and fewer in ports. And we’d be even more careful about being caught out by heavy winds…

Lähteelä
Originally uploaded by Greygriffin.

We’re at Lähteelä, run by Helsinki’s park service although it’s in Porkkala, west of Helsinki. It’s a very sheltered harbour amidst beautiful Finnish coastal countryside, and unlike Elisaari from which we departed this morning, there aren’t many mosquitoes.

Our day’s sailing began gently enough as we ran down Barosund, and as we passed Vörmö we were going very well, over six knots (and Kittiwake’s ‘hull speed’, her theoretical top speed, is a little over 6 knots). Then as we started to reach across Porkkalan Selkä, the wind just kept increasing. Soon the GPS unit was reporting seven knots, and as we came to Porkkala peninsula it reported 8.4 knots. The boat was sailing right at the limit of controllability, and we had to head into wind and remove the jib (me crawling out on the unprotected foredeck, toes hooked over the weather rail for safety as Kittiwake tossed in the five foot waves). Luckily we got through the narrow channel safely and there was Lähteelä ahead.

Byxholmen
Originally uploaded by Greygriffin.

We stopped for a break at a small island called Byxholmen, which has an ‘excursion harbour’ (i.e. mooring rings in the rocks on the sheltered side), as well as a sauna and BBQ areas. It was a beautiful island, and we saw a couple of fine snakes (too quick to photograph). In the boat moored next to us was one of the old sailors we met at Gullkrona, so we got some more spinnaker advice.