Hamburg to Haltlos

After a week of luxury aboard Nara, quite a different week of sailing was in prospect. One lesson applicable regardless of the size of the boat, though, was that we would get much more sailing done if we could manage to be a little better-rested at the start. Skipper accordingly wangled a couple of days’ holiday, and politely suggested that the Mate might like to make herself scarce so some serious kipping could be got on with. Obedient as ever, I left him in peace for a day (my exile was curtailed mid-afternoon so I could rustle up a spot of supper, naturally).

Having resolved to make better use of the week than we did last year on Rügen, we wanted to arrive as early in the day as possible and get through the “starting gate”, the Strelasund swing bridge, which is only open for 20 minutes, three times a day. We therefore decided to spend the Skipper’s second rest day on the road, with the relatively modest target of Hamburg. This would leave a 2 or 3 hour drive to Altefähr the next morning. Philipp the Folkboat Man was extremely cooperative, and proposed to do the handover at 10.30 – presumably because the Haltlos wasn’t going out the preceeding week.

We assembled our mountain of stuff and loaded the car slowly and carefully. The Mate has a history of being over-impatient to get on the road. The Skipper starts to feel harassed, and the inevitable consequence is that something important is left behind. (Last year it was the buckets. I think I may have learned my lesson.) Philipp also volunteered the information that the stretch of Autobahn between Bremen and Hamburg which had so tormented us last year was still dug up (I’m sure it will be lovely when it’s finished) so we took a slightly circuitous route and arrived late afternoon.

I didn’t remember Hamburg being a particularly attractive town, but we found a wonderful, and wholly unexpected, holiday atmosphere around the Inner Alster Lake in the city centre, just a couple of minutes’ walk from our hotel. The waterfront was lined with bars and brasseries, and most surprisingly of all, beer was being given a good run for its money by prosecco in the popularity stakes. It was not necessary to ask the Mate twice. The Hamburgers were out in force to bask in the warm evening sunshine. It was fun, and we felt that the holiday was well and truly underway.

Very early the next morning, we drove out of a Hamburg shrouded in cool mist. There were just a few people out and about in search of bread or news (or possibly beer. It would seem there is no such thing as a yardarm in Germany), and it promised to be a lovely day. So much for promises. As we drove east along the Baltic coast, the skies darkened and it began to rain. The further we went, the heavier it got. We stopped for provisions in the little Hanseatic port of Stralsund, just across the sound from Altefähr. At this point, the rain seemed to have eased and we had hopes for a decent day – it was still only 10am, after all.

Stralsund, seen from Altefähr

The optimism was short-lived. By the time we had crossed Angie’s Bridge (ceremonially opened by the Chancellor a few years ago) to Rügen the rain had become a deluge. We parked by the little harbour, grabbed a first instalment of kit, and went in search of Haltlos. Despite the weather, it felt really good to be back.

Altefähr is a tranquil and unassuming village, largely turned over to retirement cottages and holiday homes for Berliners. There’s a sprinkling of restaurants and cafés, a little fleet of fishing boats best described as motorised punts, and a sort of youth hostel and sailing school for teenagers. A tourist boat, looking as if it belongs on a lake rather than at sea, does tours of the sound and doubles as a ferry. Several times a day it docks at Altefähr and the little boats have to squeeze round it to get in to the harbour.

Haltlos was bobbing in her little Nordic mooring box, bringing a frisson of trepidation to the Mate, as memories of our exploits with this cruel and unusual berthing arrangement came flooding back. Philipp the Folkboat Man was already there, busy preparing the boat next door. We carted our stuff to the boat, by which time we were completely sodden. The Mate’s new pale grey chinos had become completely transparent. (Everyone pretended not to notice. Must be getting old.) Poor Phillip had left his foulie jacket behind, and his T-shirt was now so wet there was no point in putting on more clothes. He shivered uncontrollably as we went through the inventory. It was only July, after all. Haltlos is in a class above Das Drama in terms of comfort: there is a heater! Philipp had already put it on, in a futile attempt to dry out the cabin, but everything we brought in just made it wetter. I changed into shorts. The Skipper does not share my view that getting legs and arms wet is infinitely preferable to getting clothes wet. All you need is a towel and the problem is solved. This is undoubtedly a reflection of the Mate’s exclusively warm weather sailing experience – a couple of night-time Channel crossings and foulies would surely go up in my estimation.

Worst of all, Philipp’s sacrifice was in vain: it became clear there was no way we were going to get through the bridge at 12.30. As I said before, the Skipper hates to be rushed, and I’ve learned it’s wiser not to argue. (In this particular respect, you understand, not as a general principle.)

We set off through the monsoon in search of lunch. We found ourselves the only customers in a cavernous restaurant overlooking the sound. The waitress took the trouble to explain to us that today was the highlight of the Altefähr summer, the Sundschwimmen race. Every year at the beginning of July about 2000 people aged from 14 to 80+ swim the 2.3km from Altefähr to Stralsund, the fastest completing the crossing in a little over 20 minutes. We watched from the terrace as the swimmers waded out from the little beach, some jostling for position while others seemed content to wait until the rush was over. It seemed like a reasonably sensible way to spend such a miserable afternoon.

On our return to the harbour, we bumped into Stefan the Hafenmeister, still wearing the most unbelievably dazzling white baseball cap, emblazoned with his title and the town logo. I wondered yet again whether he has a job lot of these hats, or is he just an überlaundrymeister? He remembered us from last year, which was pleasing. We asked if he’d seen a weather forecast. “Tomorrow the sun will shine,” he asserted confidently, “but there will be no wind.”

Haltlos could mean different things. You could translate it as “without constraint”, which isn’t far removed in English from “adrift”, so we won’t go with that translation. It could also mean “reckless”. If she is that, she’s going to have to mend her ways with THIS Skipper. Either way, her teak decks and freshly-varnished wooden cockpit lockers and mast made her look rather smarter than dear old Das Drama.

The Folkboat next door had been chartered by a young couple with a very small baby. We watched discreetly as they stowed crate after crate of stuff through the forepeak hatch, and speculated as to whether they were brave or just plain crazy to take an infant out for a week on a very small boat. What I know about babies could be written on the back of a postage stamp using a 2” paintbrush, but I couldn’t help feeling the lack of hot water could be a bit of a drawback.

In the relative sanity of Haltlos, we got everything organized and looked at the clock. Two hours to wait until that confounded bridge was due to open, only 20 minutes motoring away. Tum-tee-tum. I hate waiting around, and my mind started rehearsing the trickiness of the passage through the Bridge, as well as those dratted mooring posts. The Skipper, a sensitive soul, grasped that I was getting edgy, so we decided to set sail and have a little pootle about the sound.

Our departure from the accursed box was, if I say so myself, pretty professional. I let out the bow lines while the Skipper hauled us back with the stern lines. When we were clear of the posts, we chugged out steadily with the little outboard, feeling ominously smug.

Right then, sails up, lets dispel the Mate’s apprehension and get the week on the road! Er, just one little thing: the luff of the sail is supposed to go up that little groove in the mast, if you remember? Oops. “It’s a mainsail, not a bloody spinnaker,” grumbled the Skipper. Of course, having started I had to keep going, because a Folkboat doesn’t have anything as bourgeois as lazyjacks, so my ineptitude was clearly displayed to the whole of Altefähr. Thanks to the Skipper’s proficiency at keeping the boat into wind (for once) I managed to get the sail down without giving it a jolly good wash, and the second attempt was rather closer to the textbook description. I’m not sure sailing a nearly-new, hugely expensive, 34-foot cruiser was the best preparation for the Folkboat. What else was I erroneously going to take for granted? Stay tuned.

The Bridge.

The bridge opened several minutes late. Angie would have been aghast. I think they were waiting for a train to cross, but surely that couldn’t have been delayed? Motoring through was, of course, no problem. You tend to forget that most sailors understand that a little sailing boat with an outboard has severely limited acceleration, and so they are very considerate. Local sailors are also almost exclusively German, and therefore even better than the British at forming an orderly queue.

The rain had stopped, and we sailed in light winds to Neuhof, a pretty little marina with (bliss) finger pontoons, fondly remembered from last year. There was plenty of space. The Baltic resorts are largely dependent on visitors from the Berlin and Hamburg areas, who do not make their plans far in advance, but rather turn up for the weekend when the weather forecast is good. It wasn’t, so they had stayed at home. Our plan for the week was to sail around the Greifswalderbodden bay, between the mainland and Rügen, so we hoped for enough breeze to get to the end of the Strelasund channel next day.