Since 2014 we are landlocked again in Berlin. My wife became full time teacher and I started a company specializing in energy consulting (and we build our own ultra portable energy meters). Of course we’re still travelling a lot. Initially with an old camper van, until one time when we visited friends in Gullholmen, Sweden – the sailing fever hit us again. So sometime in 2018 we exchanged the VW van for a small Compromis 720.

And then … we got two new family members – first Moana (2018) and then Kilian (2021). So now we have a wonderful family with four kids (and two cats). The boat of course was a little to small so since 2020 we have a Carter 30, Bj. 1979 which we share with another family who are very good friends and neighbours.

Or to put it short: Yes. We still are LosLocos. :-)

Well, at least it isn’t only us. So far I have yet to discover sailors that keep blogging once they’re back on land. There are several reasons for this. First – there isn’t much to write about. It’s just something completely different to brag about sailing adventures and post the most gorgeous pics of idyllic islands. – To write about daily life in Berlin, work, school and all the stressful moments of this everyday life just isn’t as interesting. Second: there just isn’t time for this. Our lives are busy and demanding and to invest an hour a day to keep friends and ‘followers’ up to date just doesn’t work out. And third: the switch to the so called ‘normal’ life wasn’t exactly as easy as planned (psychologically that is). I felt quite depressed and wasn’t able to write at all. But it seems that’s changing now…

But fortunately there still are sailing magazines and one of those – the austrian YachtRevue was kind enough to ask for a few pages about how it was to come back after three years at sea. It wasn’t easy for me to write about this and had it been any earlier I’d probably have declined altogether. But the developments of these last weeks were promising and got me in a better and more optimistic mood and thus I complied and here ist the outcome.

I couldn’t put the full article online as that wouldn’t be fair for the publisher but maybe when the next issue is out, I’m able to update this post with the full PDF…

I’ll start from the beginning: Last weekend it finally happened that two cruising families who know each other since ages via Email, Skype and Facebook get to meet each other in meatspace. I’m talking about the crew of the SY Ironlady or nowadays SY Marlin. Even before we began our own journey, I’ve been a keen reader of their blog and the first book they wrote about their own journey with kids: ‘Meer als ein Traum‘ was the trigger for us to go sailing. So finally we met in Flensburg to get to know each other and go on a little sailing trip with their amazing new yacht. The weekend was exhausting but totally beautiful and just as expected the kids immediately connected to each other and off they went blabbering in three different languages, running around with the dog, chasing sheep or producing chaos on bord. The big ones enjoyed the (chilly) breeze on their faces, the sea, the moving of the yacht – in one word: sailing. It was gorgeous. And hopefullly not the only meeting.

Back in Berlin, I immediately prepare to leave again. This time the journey is a little longer. Destination: Brisbane, Australia. Our ship the Suvarov has been in Redcliffe for several months but the plan to sell her with the help of a broker didn’t really work out. That’s why I chose to fly around the globe to tidy her up and take it in our own hands. I’ve just got two weeks but it should be possible to find a new owner – or at least a cheaper place to leave the boat.

After 1.5 days of air travel, Brisbane welcomes me with tropical-moist, warm air just after midnight. I take a cab to Redcliffe where our marina is located. Luckily everything worked out as planned and I find the deposited security token and our ship’s keys – I get onboard without having to climb fences or getting wet. Heh. On bord no surprises (good !!): everything is in it’s place, no bad stench, no little animals. Without searching, I find the lights in the dark. I sit down while my surroundings together with the ship’s smell remind me of past adventures and places. The soft hissing of the wind generator takes me away to lonely anchorages in the south seas… a torrent of emotions start to break down on me. Despite the exhausting journey I can’t sleep and start to search for a drink. Finally I find an old hip flask with some Whiskey in it. I grab it and sit down at the bow where I immediately catch sight of the constellation Scorpion….

Eventually my eyes get tired and I fall asleep having crazy dreams. I wake up as a tropical shower pours down on deck and I run through the ship to close windows and hatches. When viewed in daylight I can see a few little specks of rust here and there but nothing essential. Actually a lot less than I imagined. One fender lost it’s air but otherwise I cannot find any defects. In the afternoon I walk through the little town to get some groceries and have a look at the nearby beach. Back on board I start the engine which comes to life on the first turn – just as if we’d been getting into harbour yesterday. I’m amazed how well the Suvarov has taken the six months without maintenance. Hopefully a potential buyer will also notice. Tomorrow – hopefully halfway recovered from the jetlag, I’ll start working…

The question we heard the most often during these last months is: ‘And ? Have you settled in ?’ This question is asked without much thoght and unsuspecting that the answer might be a long and complicated one. Just as for the typical ‘How are you ?’: people expect a simple ‘Good/well/whatever.’ and definately not a lecture on the positive and negative sides of different lifestyles. So right now I could just write ‘Good.’ And all of you would be satisfied, wouldn’t you ?

Or do you really want to know how we are and what’s been going on these last months ? I guessed so…

The initial arrival was quite nice. Hugging old friends, knowing the surroundings and the neighborhood, meeting family and friends of our kids… All very lovely. But we also knew from other sailors’ returns that the actual arrival hits you after a few weeks and it’s not a nice one. It was just the same with us. It’s not that suddenly you realise that the journey and the free and wild life is over. It’s more subtle. The changes get you slowly.

One thing I miss the most are the intense, deep conversations we had with our sailing friends. It seems that the people on land are just too busy or too fearful to really dig in deeper. So the conversations stay on the surface and the essential parts of life mostly are kept out of focus. This is a thing that really makes me sad and it is something that one starts to accept after a while – although it really hurts.

Our kids took it the best, I would say. They really integrated themselves rather easy and fast and Viola had no problems at all to find heaps of friends and find herself to be one of the top students in her class. For Bruno it wasn’t that easy as he was rather slow when it came to reading and writing. He had done school on board in spanish and german but his new school was all english so this was a big step. But after a few months he also had settled in and is now gaining on the midfield in his class. His teachers are optimistic and tell us that by the end of the year he would be above average. Well at least that is no reason for concern anymore. Before arriving in Berlin we were quite nervous about school but it all seems to develop very well. The kids have lots of friends and frequent sleepovers and playdates and both are quite happy.

And how are the grownups ? Well we didn’t have it that easy so far. During the first weeks we had a lot to organize (appartment, insurance, school, taxes, furniture, jobs, etc.) but that was all settled quite fast. More difficult for me was the fact that during our absence the development in politics, economics and society are still in the wrong direction and even picking up speed. So rather than getting more independet from the axis of evil (the five eyes) we embrace them with TTIP and CETA and at home ‘our’ institutions ECB, European Comission and IMF do everything to make the situation worse, to play everything into the hands of a few rich people while the big part of the population in Spain, Portugal and Greece is driven into poverty and unemployment. The news regarding the global surveillance through the NSA are not publicly discussed and the rather shy comission of enquiry that the german parliament put into work was dissolved during the first hearing when a double agent was discovered on the team. Business has to continue. Business as usual with full speed towards the abyss. These developments make me rather nervous (a huge understatement) and I’m quite sceptic when I look into the future. But here comes one of the most important learnings of our journey into the picture: Even when the future looks rather grim, we still know that a different life is possible. And we HAVE lived that life for some years. That gives hope. As does the awakening of Podemos in Spain or Tsipras in Greece. Maybe all is not lost yet.

Well now I’ve disgressed completely into the political arena. But well. Politics is important and the developements right now will have a huge impact on all our future. So. What have Gui and me done during these last months ? Gui was busy with her clothes label Coquito and travelled to Argentina in January to create the new collection. On the side she works three to four days a week in a little french restaurant here in Berlin. I started to work with my old company again. Back at the computer instead of painting the deck or working on the engine. It’s not exactly better work but it pays better and that is quite important for us right now. But still it’s not what I would want to do forever. That’s why I’m currently trying to establish a new company together with a friend. We’re still quite at the beginning but it will have to do with conserving and monitoring energy, focussing on small businesses now but going towards private households in the end. This is really fun and involves a bunch of skills that I really like to work with. Mostly electronics, electricity, programming embedded and web and also installing the equipment on site which gets me away from the computer at least one day a week. But the best is that doing this work, we’ll improve the human impact on our planet just a little and that’s great.

That all means that we both ususally work six days a week while our kids are in a full-time school. We meet only shortly in the evening then everybody is really tired. During the weekends we usually work one day each so there is no time to do anything together as a family. We were prepared that re-entering the ‘normal’ life wouldn’t be easy but we really didn’t expect it to be that hard. But still: spring is in it’s starting blocks and slowly one thing fits to the next and the outlook get’s better and better.

Many friends also asked me whether I would be writing a book of our journey ? Yes. I want to. Definately ! It’s just – right now I have no time to do that. And with two jobs and a lot of chaos around us it’s quite difficult to organize my thoughts and put them on paper (or rather on hard disk). But I have tons of content, a lot of good ideas and slowly the story is developing in my head – despite all the crazyness around me. So don’t give up yet and bear with me. It’ll be worth it. Promised !

But the best thing right now is that in two weeks we’ll be sailing ! YES !! It’s not gonna be the tropics but a little trip in Flensburg with friends will really be good for us. And actually – speaking of the tropics: I will be back soon. In three weeks I’ll have to fly to Australia visit the Suvarov. We’ll have to move her to a cheaper marina and also there might be two potential new owners having a look or a testsail. So please keep your fingers crossed that we’ll sell the Suvarov. That would definately cheer me up !

So here we are. Back in Berlin, the city we left with the Rancho Relaxo of the Seas just a little over three years ago. We relocated six (!) times during these last weeks, moving from appartment to appartment and back and forth in between Austria and Germany. And to intensify that experience, Gui flew to Colombia to have her very first Fashion Show with Coquito, then visited Paris to have a look at the children’s clothes fair ‘Playtime‘ where hopefully Coquito will be present next year.

In the meantime I was working overtime to get back into ‘the machine’, getting registered as a citizen, getting insurance, enlisting and visiting the school of our children, organizing the transport of our few belongings that we left with my parents in Austria, meeting friends, finding a job, getting essential furniture and finding out why our stuff from the boat still didn’t arrive in Germany and and…. Believe me: the life in the south seas was a lot more relaxing.

But compared to my last visit of Berlin where I was quite shocked by the ‘western civilisation’ – coming just from French Polynesia, this time it’s different. It probably is mostly owed to the fact that we all were very looking forward to being in Europe again, having access, money, a smart phone, running water, a fridge and shops that are around the corner instead of a one hour dinghy ride away. Despite all the stress, we all enjoy ourselves, are quite relaxed and happy with the city life.

Still, when I hear the wind shake the leaves I immediately search the sky for signs of bad weather, we don’t really know what to do with all the space in our appartment and all my clothes still fit into a cabinet too small to even qualify as a bedside locker. We enjoy seeing so many old friends and connecting with new people. The kids started school last week and although it’s a little tough for Bruno starting school in 3rd grade and in english, he does very well. Viola’s classes will officially start on monday and she cannot wait to finally go to a ‘real’ school. Heh.

So on monday we’ll all leave home early in the morning… dropping the kids off at school and then I’ll be starting work in the office again. Funnily enough I also got a VERY interesting offer to deliver a yacht from Turkey to France. But I had to decline since all the other stuff going on didn’t make it seem clever to leave my family with all the chaos. But – hey – maybe again in spring ? Offers welcome !

All is gone. Everything we uploaded in these last three years: thousands of photos and many videos…. all gone. That’s something not everyone could do. And definately not as fast as me. To efficiently delete these amounts of data you need a proper internet connection and the right tools ! Heh.

But as I’m not really new in this arena I don’t get a stroke but keep quite calm and start searching through the backups of our blog. But not ! Funny enought it’s exactly that ONE folder that somehow is not included in the nightly backup routine. Heh. So the only option that is left: To restore everything manually. Up until mid 2012 this is an easy task as I did a complete backup of the whole site when we were in Moorea. The rest I have to extract from a PDF export I once did in Brisbane. And the final posts I restore manually.

Two days later our site and all our pictures are online again. And now I’m finally starting on a long overdue update. There was quite some things happening during these last weeks, believe me !

Of course some of you will try to encourage us to stay and I really appreciate it but be assured: It was not an easy decision. And somehow we wished we could continue. But the time is not the right one. We’ve been sailing three years, crossed two oceans, lost one yacht, had many adventures, met wonderful people and were able to see and live in the amazing beauty of the South Pacific. It’s a good time to stop.

We also searched for ways to continue our travel or fast routes to sail back to Europe but nobody on board really wants to cross the Indian ocean and even less the Atlantic from south to north with very few and short landfalls in between. We all miss our family and friends a lot and – it has to be mentioned: Since our shipwreck we always have been very short on money which sometimes complicated things.

Soon we’ll try to go back in our previous lives but not quite yet: We still have some weeks left and want to visit Tikopia in the Solomon Islands and climb the volcanoes of Vanuatu. Later we probably will end up in Australia which seems to be the best place to sell a boat in the Pacific.

And just as we made up our mind, the South sea throws this unbelievable gorgeous island called Yanuca in our way. Together with the family from the SY Time Lord we’re the only souls around. The kids wander off and disappear for hours looking for crabs on the beach and investigating a lost resort hidden by the palm trees. We snorkel in the crystal clear water, see turtles and sharks. Dolphins swim and jump in the bay and in the evening we have a wonderful camp fire on the beach. And to top it all off, we experience a rare ‘blood moon’ as we return to our boats.

But still, today in the afternoon we’ll pull the anchor out of the coral sand and sail through the night towards the western islands. We try to reach Malolo Leilei (what a name !) in the morning and probably stay there for a week to celebrate easter and Violas 6th birthday.

I don’t want to write about Europe right now. I’ve started getting my thoughts on paper but it’s so crazy, the life here has so little to do with the life we live in Polynesia, it’s really hard to even find things to compare. But I’m 100% happy to be with my family again and it feels good to see all friends after two years. Speaking of: there’s someone weaiting for me, I’ve gotta go.

The evenings I spent on the internet looking for spare parts and stuff we need, organizing the trip and trying to get in touch with friends. Oh I hope, somehow I could manage to see them all. So anyway, my schedule is Berlin for the first days, then to my family in Austria. The third week of May I should be back in Berlin from where I leave on the 21st towards our home in French Polynesia.

The party started right in the morning with the setting up of the slack line, some weird rope game, putting baloons in the trees and while the kids were preparing these things, the skip sneaked out and buried a treasure deep under a coconut palm.

The gang had a lot of fun, searching the park for the hidden hints towards the treasure while the grown ups tried their balance on the slack line. But there was one thing that stole away the attention from the celebration: The puppies !

Somebody left seven little puppies under a tree in the park and they all found food and love with the kids that cuddled and carried them. When we left on monday all but two of the little dogs already had found a new home.

Next day we had to leave towards Tahiti. As usual, there’s not much wind and we were running under engine. Back in Tahiti, we dismounted and sold the windgenerator, the VHF and the fridge. Finally things get moving…

Oh ! And I nearly forgot to mention: I’m gonna fly to Europe !!!! Yessss !!! The Ackerman Foundation sponsored the flight to get Gui’s label Coquito started. So I’ll be in Berlin and Austria the first three weeks of may, starting a business and getting parts for the Suvarov. And of course visiting all my friends and my family – oh, I’m so happy. It’s been two years. I really am excited about that trip. Yay !!

But even then I still did some preparations: The main anchor is buried deep in the sand and we have 55m of chain out. That gives us a scope of 10:1 and should be quite safe. I also put a second anchor on the bow, ready to throw overboard. And we have another one on the stern – just in case. I also removed the big sunroof and removed all the loose stuff on deck. There’s enough food and water on board to last a few weeks so I’d say we’re prepared for bad weather.

Other than that I’ve been focussing on changing flags. I’ve sent emails to the insurance and to get an official measurement-paper for the boat. That is needed to apply for the austrian flag. It’s all complicated and being on the other side of the world doesn’t make it any easier. But I guess, we have that done in a few weeks.

What else has happened. Ah, yeah, there was the thing with my bank card. It arrived with my christmas parcel a week ago. The thing is: for it to work, the card first has to be activated at an ATM of the Berliner Volksbank. Pitty that those are 20000km away. Well, the bank will send another card that doesn’t need that activation. In the meantime I’ll just try to sell some unneeded equipment for cash. Heh.

Today in the morning I successfully passed the exam ! YAY !!! Now I’m going for a beer. If you’re in Berlin, give me a call on my mobile or look for me in the EKA at Helmholtzplatz. I’ll be there from ~21h.

So if someone wants to meet up with me: Call me on my mobile, I’ll be free on monday afternoon ’til late night as I’ll stay until tuesday. – And it doesn’t matter how the exam turns out: I’ll have lots of beer. Hehehehe.

The day was wonderful with the most beautiful weather and a fast travel without much waiting at the locks. Another sight was of course the ‘Schiffshebewerk Niederfinow’ which lifts ships travelling from Berlin to the Baltic sea about 36 meters !

We arrived in Marina Oderberg at 19:50h and finished our first day with argentinian steak and a Septima Malbec 2009. Perfect !!

You probably thought so, but the last days we were quite busy. I had to fix a couple of last minute problems with the ship and Gui is still in the city working on her next Coquito collection. But tomorrow morning we’ll leave. Keep an eye on the little map to the right as I *just* fixed the position reporting system !

As I still don’t have any pictures from our party, I’ll post some work-pics: Viola and Bruno while filling our cereals into water bottles. That’s it for today. Tomorrow, we’ll start when the sun rises. ;-)

And as we were busy talking to all those nice people the whole evening, we did somehow forget to shoot pictures. So PLEEEEASE, if you have some nice pictures of last night. – Please send them to us.Thank you.

And thank you all for coming and for the wonderful evening – for sure it will be unforgettable for us.

And how will it continue ? Well. First of all, we’ll sail back to the Marina Lanke and I will do some additional repairs. The start towards the Baltic sea will probably be on thursday. Yay !!!

We’ll be travelling with the Rancho Relaxo to the city center and hope to arrive at the Radialsystem at around 14h on Saturday afternoon.
The PARTY will start around 15h in the YAAM !! But as there will be a concert in the evening, we’ll relocate around 19h to the RADIALSYSTEM where our ship is and we’ll stay there and drink lots of beers. I hope you’re all coming ! You can find a detailed map here !

I would post some pics of the moving but that’s boring and we’ve got more important things to do at the moment. – See the next posting…

Today we’re moving our remaining stuff. Which means a couple of boxes with kitchen stuff, books, clothes that go to Austria and all the leftovers will be subject to a little ‘garden sale’ that will start NOW.

I’ll move aboard on monday evening, the family will probably follow on wednesday – they can stay another few days with our neighbours. Pics will follow…

On popular demand: Yes, our party will be on the 28th of May ! If it’s the Yaam, we still don’t know – we don’t have time to manage our farewell right now – but there WILL be a party.

And of course a few pics from my last day in the office. – The bounty invasion on my desk and lots of beer in the backyard. That was followed by even more beer in the Prater Garten and finished off with a few SG&Ts in the Klub der Republik. Mmmmh. What a beautiful last day at work…

So we mostly end up in front of barricades and wire fences but – hey ! There is one place still going: The Yaam ! And this locations seems nearly too perfect: wonderful relaxed atmosphere, african Music, playground for the kids, cocktails and drinks for the grown-ups, sandy ‘beach’ – and it’s located at the waterfront ! We ask one of the people working here and he sees no problem with our plans. Just sent an email to the one managing all the events and now we’re waiting and hoping. But the date is still set: 28th of May 2011. Mark it red in your calendar !

The process was quite unspectacular despite bringing the crane to its limits – our ship is actually a little too heavy for that 10t crane but it got into the water without problems. Also we replaced the old rusty anchor chain with a new, whopping 70 meters of 10mm chain. That thing actually weights 170 kilos ! On one pic you can see the nice antifoulding job we did, together with the new sacrificial anodes and the shiny prop. (After brushing it for approx. 1 hour.)

A (quite boring) video of the craning will follow…

Also there was an aditional part of the workshop focussing on how to receive weather info while underway (Navtex, SSB+Pactor, Inmarsat, etc.) This part was done by Norbert Kruse whose HAM-course I have the privilege of participating. I’ll do another post on that subject soon…

A really nice article – unfortunately only in German. But here it is anyway:

And thanks to the fortunate wind, there doesn’t even seem to be any dirt from the fire on the ship. I guess, this time we’ve been really lucky !

Here are some pics, I found on the internets Pics are made by Andreas Meyer, (C) Berliner Tagesspiegel:

Pics deleted on Request of Mr. Meyer.

The Berliner Morgenpost also has a short Video of the fire:

Update: And a couple of more pictures, found on the webpage of the RBB. As one can see the ship in font of ours as well as the big crane at the waterside, I guess, the Rancho Relaxo is safe. Uff !

Well, we’re still doing preparations. I’m on the way of getting my Amateur Radio License and when I’m not reading sailing books, I try to improve the webpage or we’re doing journey planning. Speaking of. Here’s a temporary link to our planned route. Later on I’ll link the finished page somewhere on the top of our site here. Beware: all dates and coordinates are still subject to change and of course, everything more than one year ahead is pure speculation… And as I’ve said before: Maybe we don’t have the guts to sail through the Gulf of Biscay, we’re back in Berlin before the year ends… ;-)

Oh and btw: A happy new year to all readers !

So und nun noch ein paar weitere Bilder unserer Kanalfahrt am letzten Wochenende:

Eigentlich bin ich zu muede um noch viel zu schreiben, aber ich wollte das nur mal eben verkuenden.

Wir sind also von Stettin am Sonntag los und ueber Schwedt die Westoder hoch, dann den Oder-Havel Kanal nach Oderberg, wo wir im Schlick bei ca. 1.40m Wassertiefe ‘geparkt’ und uebernachtet haben. Wir haben im uebrigen ca. 1.70m Tiefgang, eher mehr. ;-) Am Montag weiter durch das sensationelle Schiffshebewerk in Niederfinow und ueber Eberswalde, Oranienbug nach Berlin, wo wir bei einem Seglerverein Unterschlupf gefunden haben und nun ein Winterlager suchen werden. Noch schnell ein paar Fotos. Spaeter schreibe ich mehr…

Die Kiste, die sich nun am vergangenen Freitag fuer immer verabschiedet hat war in etwa aus dem Jahr 2001 und hatte sich also schon abbezahlt.

Am Wochenende habe ich in einer Blitzaktion serverart.com, serverart.org, rancho-relaxo.de und einige Domains von Freunden nach Berlin kopiert und dort laeuft nun das alles auf einem lieben, kleinen MiniMac, der gerade ohne Aufgabe rumstand.

Sobald ich Zeit hab, werde ich den Server neu installieren und dann wieder in ein richtiges Rechenzentrum packen. Das wird aber wohl noch etwas dauern. Bis dahin laeuft unsere Website wohl etwas langsamer, da die Anbindung hier nur 10MBit ist. Tja. Aber immerhin haben alle Daten den Crash ueberlebt. Nicht auszudenken, wenn ploetzlich alle meine Emails (ja, ich hab fast alle noch, ab ca. 1998) weg gewesen waeren. Na und was erst die vielen Freunde gesagt haetten, die auf serverart.org ihr Emailkonto haben…. Schwein gehabt !

Original comic: http://www.xkcd.com/705/

Highlights:

* der Roller von Oma und Opa (und ueberhaupt, dass Oma und Opa so kurzfristig  auf Besuch kamen)
* ein alter Wunsch wird endlich erfuellt: das Playmobil Feuerwehrauto !
* die Schatzsuche !

In der Gallery gibt’s jede Menge Fotos zu sehen. Nur zu !

Ausserdem noch zu sehen: Bruno und Viola am Spielplatz in der Choriner, Konzertfotos von Trans Am in Berlin, Abreise nach Miami.

Und eine Weitere Fotosammlung – Anfang Winter 2009/2010: Umzug in die neue Wohnung, erste Planungen einer grooooooossen Reise, ein kleiner Auto-Crash und (viel) Schnee in Berlin.

Fahrradfahren lernen mit Bruno: Raufsitzen, Fuesse auf die Pedale. Treten ! So ? – Ja, genau. Schneller. Schubbs und losgelassen… Bruno faehrt.

Dauer der Prozedur: ~2 Minuten.

Hier auf dem Video faehrt Bruno seine zweiten 50m !

Anklicken fuer Video !