Sarah Pedersen 10th August 2023
We had a quiet day of motoring to Mariasundet after the busy days at Barentsburg. We were tailing Yuma and Sarabande and the sun was shining and we were rolling along on gentle swells.
We had considered going further south, but the anchorages were quite exposed and below at Hornsund it promised quite a bit of wind, so we ended up sailing into Mariasundet.
The sun is lower at the sky now and when it went behind a sky it almost felt like a sunset. God we do miss sunsets after a few months without.
All our 6 weather forecast said the wind would be 5-6 knots, so we were looking forward to a relaxing night. Well we should have learned by know that you should never trust the weather forecasts in Svalbard and multiply the wind by 4 or 5. Not long after going to bed we were waken once again by the wind having picked up and was blowing a sustained 30+ knots we were up many times during the night checking the boat and the anchor alarm, it’s quite cosy below in these conditions but there are always strange noises that get your imagination on overdrive, but most of the time it’s just a wave hitting the boat or some rigging tapping in the wind.
This morning it occasionally drops to 25 knots but for the most its still blowing 30-40 Knots so we are just staying put here, the waves, whilst a bit bumpy are at least head on and the Ultra Anchor is well set at the bottom with 80M of Chain out.
Sarah decided its was a good day to show Steve just how much she loves to sing all the Musicals, in English and Danish..
Will we ever get back to trees and sunsets?
