Mastless in a warm shed

Two days ago Sirena IV finally had her mast taken off at the Weilandt yard in Burgstaaken in northern Germany, and she was lifted out of the water. 

The night before we had had a terrible evening - Nic managed to turn his foot black and blue slipping on wet wood and we were caught in vicious downpours as we tried without success to moor up close to the crane ready for next morning.  The harbour master harangued us in German saying it was forbidden so we were forced to raft up next to a friendly boat. It blew a hoolie that night. 

So we were on edge the next day and Nic was still sore in the foot when we got ready for the mast lifting. All the awful ends of wires at the bottom of the mast had been labelled (god knows how it will be when we have to reconnect them) and we had tidied all the ropes around the mast and tied them to it. 

Here starts the series of photos - from when Detlef and Alexander started to ease the mast upwards. (It was attached halfway up its length to the crane) Nic was in the cabin ready to stop things if the mast got stuck - Lesley was taking photos outside...and amazed to see how much mast kept appearing through the cabin roof. 

At last it was all out and our poor boat looked very odd without it. Then it was her turn to be lifted out- a much more familiar and easy process.

For much of Thursday and Friday she was out in the yard and in pouring rain as we had various craftsmen on board giving us estimates for work to be done, and as we put her to bed. 

Yesterday we followed as she was taken by a tractor into a 'warm shed' where the minimum temperature will be 5 degrees C through the cold snowy winter. It is very quiet and peaceful and calm in there with only the sound of the rain on the roof. She is inches from the boat behind her and soon will be hemmed in completely until May when we return.

It was with a pang we turned away and shut the shed door. But she is safe and in good hands. We totted up the statistics for this year's journey to the Baltic - 902 nautical miles....that's 1038 land miles.

Who knows how far we will sail next year?  Will it be Sweden, Norway or east to Poland and beyond? We hope you'll join us for next year's adventures in our blog.