Wednesday 6 June
Once again, Skipper washed and watered, while Mate set off on a bit of a wild goose chase, taking in a little more of modern Gdansk en route, but ending up disillusioned after finding herself in TKMaxx “never in the UK” and then a Polish supermarket not yet sampled – Biedronka has a cute ladybird logo, but otherwise: you have been warned.
We said our farewells to Desiré and Gdansk, and set off in time for the 1730 opening of the bascule bridge just downriver of the marina. Once again we dipped the ensign at Westerplatte and cleared out of the port. We set the mainsail and genoa once we had sea room between the two TSS channels that converge into Gdansk, but in a light wind variable between SE and SW, we furled the genoa and ran downwind under just the mainsail at around 3.5 knots, as the swell eased a little.
Mate stood the overnight watch, enjoying a beautiful sunset at around 2115, and keeping an eye on the occasional shipping. Around midnight some cloud from the still light Northern sky spread to obscure some of the stars, but it was never completely dark. She observed a cargo vessel change course to clear our path and pass ahead of us, and then gybed the mainsail and set the staysail for a port tack.
At 0115 she radioed a ship coming up from astern, to check they were aware of us ahead of them, and would clear us safely. A huge orange waning half moon rose from the Eastern horizon just before 0200 as we surfed Northwards.