Thursday 2 – Monday 6 August
Once again we had a fantastic sail across to the Åland Islands, enjoying a colourful reach under mainsail and gennaker in a steady F3 Southerly breeze. In the Southwest of this archipelago we found a pleasant bay on the North side of Södra Labbholm, in front of an unfinished house. As we’d noticed elsewhere, the dock is completed first, then the sauna (although this was not evident here) and finally the living accommodation. At least with the pontoon sturdy and stable, the builders could arrive by motorboat for the day’s work.
Skipper was called upon to change the gas canister, which fortunately ran out only after supper had been cooked.
With a plan to anchor off Mariehamn that evening, in order to combine a free night with a social occasion, the tender was hauled from the sail locker so Mate could inflate it to give it a test run. Inevitably, a new puncture had materialised since its last airing around a year ago in Scotland, and Skipper’s best efforts at repair were not going to produce magically instant results. So in the afternoon we pottered back to Mariehamn East harbour, for a return supper invite from our lovely friends on Saltimbanque: fabulous proper Breton crêpes, even if they were washed down by local ‘cider’. It was great to catch up on our mutual wanderings, and swap tips for forthcoming anchorages.
Having made the most of our walk-ashore berth to catch up with laundry, we left the harbour once again on Saturday evening, to retreat to the anchorage that we’d used before, just down the channel. Sunday was mostly quiet, apart from the mother of all thunderstorms, that loomed menacingly towards us from the Western sky, and caught us square in its eye, with torrential rain and forked lightning forming a ring around us. This time, we were quick to disconnect all electronics, and stow the portable ones in our very own Faraday cage – otherwise known as the oven. Everything on a boat should have more than one use. We were glad to escape any further loss of instrumentation.
On Monday we headed back into Mariehamn, now half empty after the end of the Finnish holiday season, and were able to tuck inside the line of stern buoys to tie up alongside the outer pontoon – much more our style.
On the way into the harbour, we felt like we were looking into a mirror – just setting their anchor in the bay was a sister Allures 45: hull X24, just two before l’Escale, now with her second owners and renamed Duo of Hamburg. Another contender for the Alu Club, and a delight to meet and exchange experiences over a brief drink in our cockpit, followed by an equally brief ride on their ready-prepared tender to play ‘spot the differences’. She also has a red interior with American cherry woodwork, and a slightly darker red external livery.
After all this excitement, we watered the boat and stocked up the fridge, cleaned and baked until late.