Whalekillers

North Cape was our first long expedition. This year we sailed from Bergen on the west coast of Norway and up to the North Cape. Since it went a bit faster than originally planned, we just as well continued to Murmansk in Russia - although we were not allowed to enter Russian waters and had to take the bus from Kirkenes to Murmansk.

On this expedition we invented the team name and we demonstrated FOR whalekilling, espescially when passing the North Cape and at quay in Kirkenes. It started out as a privat joke - as everybody is demonstrating against whalekilling we thought; Hey - why not do the opposite and demonstrate for whalekilling instead. Also, as we were in Norway we got full support. At the floating docks in Tromsø, we painted "we kill whales for fun" in red on two blank sheets. Unfortunately the sheets were very thin so we painted the same on the quay in Tromsø. It took us some 4 hours to wash it off - the only thing that took the paint was boiling water:)

As we passed the North Cape we attached the banner to the rig, and we gained half a knot! In Honningsvaag we explained to cruise tourists why Norway still kill whales and were photographed by American high-school teacher who said she should talk about us to her class :) Some others also asked us if we used to kill whales with a tiny Hawaii-sling that we had abord.... We might as well kill whales with a fork!

Later on the trip we met several whales and found them very fascinating. Let's just make it clear that whalekillers don't kill whales - they are actually quite sympathic animals. Our name derived more from a private joke, and also as protest against Greenpeace which has in the latter years become well too obsessed with money and are doing campaigns for the sole publicity with sparse scientific validation of their objectives. Whales should be proctected, but they are also a valuable resource and there are no reason why not harvest the gifts of nature because they are "cute".

It's ok to kill pigs (that are actually quite smart) because they are ugly, but nok whales because they are cute? Also let's demonstrate the absurdity with a more concrete example. Say a young beautiful girl dies in a car-crash. Everybody says "what a pity - she was so beautiful". Should this then be interpreted as - "if she had been a bit uglier it wouldn't have been so tragic?".

Although the trip Northward was quite easy, the trip back home proved a bit harder. Our brand new enging stopped working, and we were already a bit late on schedule. Also, our initil crew of 5 had shrunk to only two with only the captain and navigator Ove abord. We decided to head out for sea with no engine and only a tourist map of Norway bought for 5euro to navigate outside the coast. We left Tromsø - sailed passed Lofoten and drew a straight linge to the Westernmost point of Norway - Stadt. With no engine and the autopilot also broken we had to steer manually 24h/24h, which proved to be rather strenous after a couple of days. We gradually learned to balance the boat using only the sail, and make it steer itself - and this was of great help. Our average speed was so good that we hoped to manage to get back to Bergen in less than 5 days - just in time to participate to Askøy rundt, the largest reagatta organized in western Norway. But the weather gods wanted it different...

Close to Stadt the wind disappeared completely, and we stopped 1,5 km outside an Oil Rig ( we still don't know which one since we only had a tourist map.) They called us up on the radio, but we didn't know since we had very little electricity left and had to save it for an emergency situation (and taking a sun bath in calm sea couldn't exactly classify as an urgence). Suddenly two zodiacs came out from the platform to see if we were ok, and ask if we needed anything. We deduced that they were bored on the platform, since they were approximately 15 to come out to the boat, and seemed to find it very amusing to have the opportunity to leave the rig. After they finished their work shift, they came out once more and offered us a brand new 75amps battery - probably worth some 150-200 euros! All in all - it we've had a very social social day - 80 km outside the coast:)

Then the wind came..... Much too much wind.... And from the south. With only the try-sail, we tried to beat against the wind - logging steady 5-6 knot. Surprisingly..... euhhh... or perhaps not, we didn't manage to make much way towards the wind. 4hours on one leg and 4 hours on the other - 40 nm in total but only 2 in the right direction. The boat took some heavy beating, so we concluded that the wisest thing would be to get into sheltered waters. The last 12 hours of the storm had been the Captain's shift, but the night was coming and Ove had no experience navigating after the lights in inland waters. It ended up with the Captain having to take a double shift after enduring 12 h of 7m waves, rain, beating and and steady wind of 45-50knots. The night was a very interesting experience especially after the flashlight fell over board and the only light left to look at the map was a 300w headligt - we might as well say that afterwards the nigth vision was less then zero for at least 15 min. At the end of the night the distinction between dream and reality slowly disappeared. Not only were there a lot more lights than there should be on the map, but also there was a fluorescent seagull which started to settle on the bow.... This was very irritating and the Captain tried to scare it away several times with not much success. Luckily the sunrise came and Ove could once again take over the rudder. The rest of the trip took us 2 days and went without any major incidences.

Below is a map of some of the places we stopped.

		NORTH CAPE 2003
		North Cape was our first long expedition. This year we sailed from Bergen on the west coast of Norway and up to the North Cape. Since it went a bit faster than originally planned, we just as well continued to Murmansk in Russia - although we were not allowed to enter Russian waters and had to take the bus from Kirkenes to Murmansk. On this expedition we invented the team name and we demonstrated FOR whalekilling, espescially when passing the North Cape and at quay in Kirkenes. It started out as a privat joke - as everybody is demonstrating against whalekilling we thought; Hey - why not do the opposite and demonstrate for whalekilling instead. Also, as we were in Norway we got full support. At the floating docks in Tromsø, we painted "we kill whales for fun" in red on two blank sheets. Unfortunately the sheets were very thin so we painted the same on the quay in Tromsø. It took us some 4 hours to wash it off - the only thing that took the paint was boiling water:) As we passed the North Cape we attached the banner to the rig, and we gained half a knot! In Honningsvaag we explained to cruise tourists why Norway still kill whales and were photographed by American high-school teacher who said she should talk about us to her class :) Some others also asked us if we used to kill whales with a tiny Hawaii-sling that we had abord.... We might as well kill whales with a fork! Later on the trip we met several whales and found them very fascinating. Let's just make it clear that whalekillers don't kill whales - they are actually quite sympathic animals. Our name derived more from a private joke, and also as protest against Greenpeace which has in the latter years become well too obsessed with money and are doing campaigns for the sole publicity with sparse scientific validation of their objectives. Whales should be proctected, but they are also a valuable resource and there are no reason why not harvest the gifts of nature because they are "cute". It's ok to kill pigs (that are actually quite smart) because they are ugly, but nok whales because they are cute? Also let's demonstrate the absurdity with a more concrete example. Say a young beautiful girl dies in a car-crash. Everybody says "what a pity - she was so beautiful". Should this then be interpreted as - "if she had been a bit uglier it wouldn't have been so tragic?". Although the trip Northward was quite easy, the trip back home proved a bit harder. Our brand new enging stopped working, and we were already a bit late on schedule. Also, our initil crew of 5 had shrunk to only two with only the captain and navigator Ove abord. We decided to head out for sea with no engine and only a tourist map of Norway bought for 5euro to navigate outside the coast. We left Tromsø - sailed passed Lofoten and drew a straight linge to the Westernmost point of Norway - Stadt. With no engine and the autopilot also broken we had to steer manually 24h/24h, which proved to be rather strenous after a couple of days. We gradually learned to balance the boat using only the sail, and make it steer itself - and this was of great help. Our average speed was so good that we hoped to manage to get back to Bergen in less than 5 days - just in time to participate to Askøy rundt, the largest reagatta organized in western Norway. But the weather gods wanted it different... Close to Stadt the wind disappeared completely, and we stopped 1,5 km outside an Oil Rig ( we still don't know which one since we only had a tourist map.) They called us up on the radio, but we didn't know since we had very little electricity left and had to save it for an emergency situation (and taking a sun bath in calm sea couldn't exactly classify as an urgence). Suddenly two zodiacs came out from the platform to see if we were ok, and ask if we needed anything. We deduced that they were bored on the platform, since they were approximately 15 to come out to the boat, and seemed to find it very amusing to have the opportunity to leave the rig. After they finished their work shift, they came out once more and offered us a brand new 75amps battery - probably worth some 150-200 euros! All in all - it we've had a very social social day - 80 km outside the coast:) Then the wind came..... Much too much wind.... And from the south. With only the try-sail, we tried to beat against the wind - logging steady 5-6 knot. Surprisingly..... euhhh... or perhaps not, we didn't manage to make much way towards the wind. 4hours on one leg and 4 hours on the other - 40 nm in total but only 2 in the right direction. The boat took some heavy beating, so we concluded that the wisest thing would be to get into sheltered waters. The last 12 hours of the storm had been the Captain's shift, but the night was coming and Ove had no experience navigating after the lights in inland waters. It ended up with the Captain having to take a double shift after enduring 12 h of 7m waves, rain, beating and and steady wind of 45-50knots. The night was a very interesting experience especially after the flashlight fell over board and the only light left to look at the map was a 300w headligt - we might as well say that afterwards the nigth vision was less then zero for at least 15 min. At the end of the night the distinction between dream and reality slowly disappeared. Not only were there a lot more lights than there should be on the map, but also there was a fluorescent seagull which started to settle on the bow.... This was very irritating and the Captain tried to scare it away several times with not much success. Luckily the sunrise came and Ove could once again take over the rudder. The rest of the trip took us 2 days and went without any major incidences. Below is a map of some of the places we stopped.