Saturday Shtandart Sailing

[oneiriad]

This weekend was the Baltic Sail in Elsinore. It is a meeting of ships of all sorts - well, actually I suppose it is several such meetings, moving from port to port around the Baltic Sea (hence the name) every summer. Usually there are, among other things, a few ships offering brief trips on the Sound, and this year me and a friend had gotten tickets to sail on the russian ship the Shtandart.

The ship itself is replica of a ship built in 1703 by orders of tsar Peter the Great. The original ship lasted until 1728, but in 1999 people began working on the new Shtandart. It is 34,5 meters long, making it about the same size as the Lady Washington (which plays the part of the Dauntless in Potc).

Coming from the front while she was still at the docks, the first thing I saw was the figurehead - and then we went on board, to find a place to stand. Most of the crew are young people learning to sail, but of course the captain himself is a bit more experienced - and also, along with a couple of girls from the crew, he was dressed in a period uniform (although the overall impression was slightly spoiled by the sunglasses he wore).

And then it was off - the modern ship has, like most modern built ships, an engine which took it out of the harbour, but once we were out on the Sound the engine was turned off and the sails were set.

It was a bit hectic while this was done, because the crew had to get to ropes where passengers had positioned themselves, but eventually we were sailing - south because of the direction of the wind - and it was possible to go around and look at the ship.

This fellow was on the main deck - he was one of many lovely carved wooden items on board (though I must admit to ignorance as to his actual function).

And a tiny cannon - I´m not sure of the English word, but I believe this was the kind used for signalling, not fighting.

Once the sails were set and we were well on our way the captain announced that those who wanted to could get to climb up into the main mast. Now, I´m not afraid of height, and the ship was very stable (probably due to the fact that there was almost no wind) but the ordinary stairs on the ship was quite steep enough for me.

Still, they must have had a spectacular view!

While we were out small boats and even other ships constantly came to the side of the ship, waving and shouting hello. I kind of envy them - they had a chance to get the only picture that I could not from my position - a picture of the Shtandart with sails unfurled, gliding across the sea. Ahh, but I got one of another ship, the Baltic Beauty.

After a while everything got, well, very quiet and calm. The sea was calm and the sky was clear, the sun beat down. People grew quiet. Everybody who could found a place to sit (not an easy feat - we were about a hundred passengers and there was very little room (observation: 34,5 meters sounds impressive, but it is not that much when you are faced with it - movies are deceptive when it comes to the size of ships) and enjoy it. Have you ever been on a sailing ship - it is literally soundless! I always wondered how they always managed to sneak by each other in the dark - now I now...

Eventually the time came when we were to start back towards Elsinore - because of the wind direction the sails had to be reefed and the engine used once more.

On the way back to the harbour we passed by Kronborg from the seaside - and of course I got a picture of the castle (doing so is practically compulsory and I am only halfway kidding ;-)

Getting the ship back into the proper position at the dock was a bit of a challenge: a rubber dinghy had to repeatedly ram it to push it into the right place. Not the most elegant parallel parking I have ever seen.

And so I said my goodbyes to the Shtandart. I spent a bit of time looking at the rest of the ships which among others included the Eye of the Wind (which starred in Ridley Scott´s movie White Squall) and a small privately built submarine that had unfortunately decided to prove that it was fully functional, so I could not take a picture of it. There was also an art gallery and a exhibition of old cars. And then me and my friend finished off our trip with big fat delicious ice cream cones :-)

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[drbillbongo.livejournal.com]

Pretty ships!!! *swoon*