During the season 2021, Dolphin Dance II logged 1200 nautical miles during 72 sailing days. Engine logged 70 h, and thus, 77 % of the nautical miles were powered by green energy. We spent 68 nights on board. The season lasted seven months as the first trip was on the 17th of April and last sailing trip was on the 21th of November.   Almost ready for the new season (14th of April).The first sail of the season also the first test sail with the new selftacking jib (17th of April).Our summer cruise begun on the 21st of May as I had just started my four weeks paternity leave and Minna had some ..read more

Sailing season 2021 ended on late November (20/11-21/11)  with one-night trip to Nauvo together with my father. The last sailing trip of the year offered plenty of wind and pure joy of sailingThere was not much traffic at the sea on November. We were the only sailing boat at Nauvo guest harbour. Air temperature climbed barely above zero degrees on Sunday afteernoon.Dolphin Dance was lifted out on 26th of November. The post The last sail of the season 2021 appeared first on S/Y Dolphin Dance ..read more

Sailing season continued through the October as we made a trip to nearby archipelago during the Autumn break week and another weekend sailing trip on the last weekend of October. After the rain… This October day offered variable weather, autumn colours, not much wind and great sauna in the evening. Misty morning. Air was moist and deck was still frosty after a cold night. You never know at this time of the year how long the season continues so got to enjoy every moment The post October sailing appeared first on S/Y Dolphin Dance ..read more

We cast-off on Saturday 4th of September for a weekend trip and gusty northerly wind (up to 28 kts) pushed us to a beautiful natural harbour called Västra Tvigölpan (south of Korppoo). In the Archipelago one is away from artificial light and this gives great conditions for star gazing and photography. Saturday night’s anchorage beneath the starry sky.Darkening autumn nights offer possibility for star gazing and photography The post Autumn nights in the Archipelago appeared first on S/Y Dolphin Dance ..read more

Kråkskär, located in the southern part of the Archipelago National Park ( 59°58,40′ N, 22°02,65′ E) was a new anchorage to us, but instantly became our favourite. The surroundings are very beautiful and the sandy beach on the bottom of the small bay is great. The northwesterly wind was gusting +20 knots when we arrived there. The island gives fairly good shelter from the swell from that direction, but the tip of the island is low-flying, so the protection from the wind is not that good. There are some mooring loops attached to the rocks, but we decided to use our bow anchor instead and use the ..read more

July 2021 was record warm and temperature climbed close to 30 C° in many days. At times it felt almost too warm inside the boat, especially as the water was also over 25 C°. The night (12/7) when anchored at Sandön was probably one of the finest of this season: The night was totally calm and clear and the colour palette of the evening sky was magical. Sandön island, located at the Archipelago Sea National Park (N 60° 2.30’, E 22° 20’), is quite exotic among Baltic Sea islands with its sandy beaches. The eastern tip of the ‘Sandy island’ continues very far as a low sandbank. Sandön island, Arc ..read more

Major upgrades and refits for this season were mostly related to new electronics and improving the functioning of the electrical systems in general. As often is the case in boat investments, one thing leads to another and the whole project turns out to be larger than originally anticipated. First of all, our domestic battery bank needed to be renewed as the batteries had lost much of their original capacity. We decided to replace the old domestic lead batteries with Lithium batteries. They were very expensive, but outperform traditional batteries in capacity, efficiency and length of the batte ..read more

Eastern Gulf of Finland was this season’s main destination. We had not previously sailed east of Helsinki so this area was completely new to us. This area offered some beautiful sheltered archipelagos (for example Pellinge archipelago) for anchoring in natural harbours as well as more open stretches along the coast with some beautiful outer islands located next to the open Gulf of Finland. Here are some photos from Eastern Gulf of Finland. Pellinge Archipelago (Porvoo) offered some nice natural harbours for anchoring.Tied to a rock at Norra Sandö (Porvoo). With our draft (1,8 m), we were two m ..read more

Commercial collaboration, discount on the mattresses. For the season 2021, we wanted to improve the sleeping conditions. This is partly due to our youngest crew member, who of course can sometimes affect his parents’ sleep, but also because carrying him around makes especially his mother’s back sore. We have had an adjustable Tempur bed at home now a bit longer than 1,5 years – we bought it before the pregnancy so that Minna’s back would manage the pregnancy as well as possible. We have been very happy with it, so it was obvious that we would like to have Tempur mattresses also onboard S/Y Dol ..read more

Our summer cruise begun on the 21st of May as I had just started my four weeks paternity leave and Minna had some summer holiday weeks left from last year. Partly due to the Covid, we decided to stay in the Finnish waters also this year and take a course towards east and Gulf of Finland this time. Gulf of Finland is an area that we visited with a sailing boat only once before (in 2015), and then Helsinki was the easternmost point before heading to Tallinn. The first part of the summer cruise took us to Helsinki. Here are some photos from this first part. /Antti First stop Dalskär natural harbo ..read more