Trip's End

The sail home was straightforward. We went non stop from Reykjavik to Clifden. A few days of tail winds, straight towards Clifden - for this Teddy must zigzag downwind. Then towards the end a couple days headwinds.

 I decided to skip St Kilda. It was late August, and in the fall the dominant winds in these latitudes are W & SW. St Kilda lies NNE of Clifden. Stopping there was to take the risk of waiting out days or weeks of headwinds.

It was a real luxury to have 5 of us for the watches. With one person on deck at night the other four could sleep, and everyone was sharp in the morning. You don't get this when there are 3 crew.




I started flipping through photos of the trip. All of the following are from Greenland. At random, a few memorable moments.



                                                        Hue photo



                                     Blizzards of little auk whirling past. Hue photo




                                                   Lesser auk.  Josh photo




                                       Muskox & glacier.   Josh photo





                                    Muskox ma & baby at the beach.   Josh photo




   This berg has 4 arches supporting a central nave. A huge berg, it looks small against the 2000 metre mountains behind it. Oer Fjord, north side of Milne Land, Scoresbysund.    Josh photo







                  Foot of a glacier. Near Stewart Island, on the coast south of Scoresbysund.  Josh photo






                   Male eider, for supper.  For three people, two meals, plus a stew with the bones.   
                                                                          Josh photo






Cozy nook. Anchor astern, line to shore. Pic does not show the towering berg grounded just astern of us. Violent surging waves hitting Teddy during the night did not come from it but from a distant ice fall. We moved out promptly and anchored off a nearby beach.
                                                             Josh photo








Narwhal skull. The exposed sockets for the tusks are at lower center. This is from an Inuit campsite, which is always littered with the bones of various animals.   Josh photo






              Seal skull. The premolars and molars are carnassial - carnivorous. Foxes also have these.  
                                                                              Josh pic





                                                            Shy seal.  Josh photo





                                                    Bear track.  Hue photo





                                           Arctic poppy.   Hue photo






A fjord recently cleared of ice      Hue photo





Teddy, lower right. A three master, Linden of Denmark, fresh from Svalbard, center left.  Head of Storesfjord, Liverpool Land













Rum on the rocks. Ancient glacier ice, picked up out of the sea & broken up with a hammer. Often we ended the day thus.  Josh photo





                        Bear Archipelago, off Milne Land, Scpresbysund.   Josh photo





                                                    Receding glacier. Josh photo




                                                Monolith.   Josh photo







                                                                      Hue pic






                                                       Looks like Teddy belongs.    Hue pic



This was a fantastic trip. Everyone was great. When there was a problem we laughed

My thanks to all who sailed with me this year:

Gavin Johnson and Paul Murphy 
Hue Tran and Josh Scarrow 
Andy and Rory Harris, Eddy Stocker and James Golden 

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