Wednesday, 24 July
Today we saw the forecast and are staying put. There are strong winds of around 25 knots from the West which is also the direction we want to sail in.
We had a stroll down the beach and local nature area and I saw a lovely red backed shrike.
We also found out what the huge white funnel thing is on the ferries: it’s a circular sail that can reduce diesel usage by up to 20% if there is a side wind – as there mostly is on this route.
Then we went for supplies in town to be ready for Kevin joining us later today.
The wind really got up and there are a lot of white horses.
Gedser is on the southernmost point of Denmark on the bottom of the island of Falster. This may be our last Danish stop as due to the wind direction we may head a bit more South towards Germany tomorrow.
We then had a very scary moment. David had been up on deck watching a boat trying to moor next to us, but the strong wind was pushing them off and David watched it go out of the harbour as if it had decided to go into the commercial harbour next door, as advised in strong Westerlies.
Then, as we were back down below we heard and felt a very big bang as our boat was hit. I felt sick. David rushed up to find the same boat with its bow now attached to ours with our anchor hooking them onto us – they had driven right into us.
David, thinking very quickly, stepped onto their bow to push it down so that we could uncouple. If the boat had hit us just one foot over there would have been a big hole in the side of La Bamba and our trip would have been over.
The stupid man with one useless crew was trying to moor a 50ft Spirit into an impossible position in very strong offshore winds.
Quickly other boats’ crew saw what was going on and ran to help. Soon 3 very strong men, including David and then the boat’s skipper, were hauling the boat onto the dock with me on our bow with a fender. It was incredibly hard to get her in and took about 20 minutes.
As David explained to this skipper: don’t try to moor unless you can do so safely – there was a fuel dock further down where the wind was calmer he could have tried, or the commercial harbour. Also call for help as you approach if you need it and then other sailors can and will help.
Fortunately La Bamba is very strong and has only has a few scrapes, but it could have been a very different story. We were very lucky!
So our Odyssey continues!
This evening we are having a much needed drink with Monique and Marc and Kevin who has arrived today to join us. There is an excellent restaurant here, which is amazing as we are in the middle of nowhere, and we will eat there again tonight with our friends.
