From Portimão to Sønderborg

Step 1 - From Portimão to A Coruña.

Bringing Vela home to Denmark from Portugal.

We bought Vela the 1st of June 2021 in Portimão, Portugal from a retired british couple. We had limited time to sail Vela to Denmark, since Christian had a job in Greenland which he was already a little late for. Signe on the other hand was still working when we got the boat, so she had to wait three weeks until she could jump on a plane and be reunited with Christian and our new home. Therefore Christian’s mom Gitte went along to Portugal and helped sail Vela from the south coast of Portugal to the Northern Coast of Spain in A Coruña.

The first week went with preparing the boat, getting to know all the systems and getting the engine serviced - just to name a few things. After about a week we were finally ready to head out on the first sail.

We sailed from Portimão in Portugal to A Coruña in Spain in about 1,5 weeks, stopping every night at anchor or in a harbour. Thank you so much Gitte for helping with this leg of the voyage <3

On this first part of the voyage we did a lot of motoring due to the stationary highs in June that generate winds from the north. Along the coast of Portugal the local fishermen put out A LOT of fishing buoys! These buoys are very small, hard to spot and everywhere! Luckily we didn’t encounter any of the buoys but we had a lot of near misses

Speaking of encounters - many sailors have during the pat years encountered many attacks from orcas in the same area. Luckily we didn’t encounter any orcas, even though the fear of doing so was present. Instead we met a lot of dolphins on our way.

A Coruña.

The evening Silas, Klaus and Signe arrived to A Coruña before crossing The Bay of Biscay.

Step 2 - A Coruña to Brest

In preparation for the dreaded passage across the Bay of Biscay there were lots of boat projects to tend to. Among some of these were re-sealing the hatches and making them waterproof again. Besides projects it was time to say goodbye to my mom Gitte, who would be flying back to Denmark. And also picking up Signe, her dad Klaus and my brother Silas. Klaus would be joining us during the crossing from Spain to France, while Silas would be joining us for the whole trip to Soenderborg, Denmark.

After spending about a week in A Coruña we filled the boat with diesel and headed off for the Bay of Biscay. The weather forecast was pretty good, weak northerly winds and minor waves. In this time of year (June) the typical weather is northerly winds, so this was a pretty good forecast to sail on. But as it typically goes, forecasts are only forecasts and you can often experience completely different weather, which we of course also did.

The first 18 hours we headed into gusty northerly winds with big waves directly against us. Many of the new crew members had to adjust to the ship and its movements, resulting in seasickness for the first part of the passage. When the wind finally settled down we were almost becalmed and spent the next few days motorsailing and just enjoying life and celebrating the purchase of our very seaworthy ship with some bubbles.

As we got close to France a light breeze picked up and we were able to hoist the sails, kill the engine and really enjoy the sound of silence. Later that same evening we arrived in Brest, France.

Step 3 - Brest to Sønderborg

After successfully crossing the Bay of Biscay we spent the next few days enjoying the french cuisine in Brest.

From Brest the challenging English Channel awaited! In the channel you really have to pay close attention to the traffic and the tides. Therefore a little planning went into it, so we were able to pass the most difficult navigational areas with the tides in our favor. Since we were running out of time we decided to continue on with longer passages at the time. We ended up making stops in Roscoff, Cherbourg, Zeebrugge before arriving in Brunsbüttel, Germany - marking the end of the English Channel and The North Sea. We had very favorable downwind conditions during this part of the trip and had the opportunity to try out our asymmetrical gennaker, which had barely ever been used.

Upon arriving in Brunsbüttel we were greeted by Signe’s mom Charlotte and her boyfriend Jimmy who would be joining us through the Kielercanal. The usage of the 100 km (54nm) long man-made Kielercanal is a very big shortcut to the Baltic Sea and during the pandemic it was even free of charge - extra bonus! We made a stop for the night halfway in Rendsburg, which was the first time we were visited by customs on the whole trip! We had no issues at all with customs - we were just surprised that of all the places we had stopped, Rendsburg would be the place they would visit.

The next day we did the last few miles of the canal and from there a short sail before we arrived in Sønderborg, Denmark, marking the end of our 1000+nm voyage bringing Vela to her new home port.

We hope you have enjoyed reading these steps about bringing our new dreamboat home.