Mimmis Blogging on the Go: Sailing in 15.6 knots

This past Saturday I was out sailing Hobie Cat in the Stockholm archipelago with my friend Anders, his girl-friend Carina and our mutual salsa friend Johan. It was a wonderful day with beautiful weather to start with, then cloudy and finally a little rainy. But who cares when you’re getting soaking wet anyhow while having so much fun?! It was a very windy day, great for sailing a catamaran. We were all happy since we enjoy speed. We clocked 15.6 knots at one point which is quite fast!

I don’t have much experience of sailing but with people like Johan and Anders, who clearly know what they’re doing and telling me what to do, it all worked out rather well. Besides, I didn’t have to do much but to hang in a harness out over the water on the sides of the Hobie Cat, used as balancing weight on the side of the sail from where the wind came. Wet, windy and fantastic fun! I think I had a smile on my face the whole day.

We were out about 6 hours, starting by Lidingö, sailing to Stora Värtan but turning around when we found that there was hardly any wind, and then sailed east-bound on Askrikefjärden (the Askrike Bay) in the direction of Waxholm. We anchored by an island close to Hasseludden to have picnic lunch. We rather carelessly tied the Hobie Cat by a public landing stage and used another pole by a private landing stage to keep the catamaran from pulling its moors in the wind. This however cut off the access to the private landing docks and we got a scolding from an impatient, arrogant and rather rude woman with a German accent (from then on named “the Achtung Bitch” by us) who came to the island with her motorboat only a few minutes after our landing and immediately complained about our unauthorized use of the pole on their private landing stage, which she found totally unacceptable. She had no sympathy for the fact that we at that very moment were diving after Anders’s digital camera which he had accidentally dropped in the 2-2.5 meter deep water while tying the moors. I was with Anders the last time he lost an, at the time brand new, digital camera during off-pist heliskiing in Kittelfjäll last year… That particular camera was never to be found, but luckily this one was. Johan is a travel guide on adventure trips and a seasoned diver, so he found the camera on the bottom of the sea after only three dives. Anders drew a loud sigh of relief (luckily it was also a water-proof camera down to 6 meters, so all his images and video clips were saved).

You’ll find a selection of my photos as well as some taken by Anders below.
View the rest of my photos on Flickr>>
View Anders’s photos on Flickr>>