Good morale but mixed weather

Now, the first trip of the season is finished. It was a ski trip to the Glacier Fjords with a group of Icelandic skiers and snowboarders. The weather forecast was pretty nasty but it turned out ok and we were able to ski all days but the crew did not get much sleep on the third night.

We began the journey by sailing to Hesteyri in the evening. The morning after was totally calm with clouded sky. We skied the mountains above Hesteyri and the snow was good. In the end we cruised down to the bottom of the fjord where we met AURORA and captain Siggi and anchored for the night. The evening was bright and the steady wind looked promising for some kite skiing. Few of the guys gave it a try in the bottom of the fjord and had some fun harnessing the wind for few hours before it got too dark.

The next day we skied over the mountains in Hesteyrarfjordur and made few runs in Veidileysufjordur. Part of the group (the most enthusiastic guys) did the first ski descent down Mt. Lonhorn and praised the angle of the mountain and its spectacular location. It´s very steep at the top and then a pretty wide ridge all the way to sea level. We moved AURORA to a safer anchorage because the forecast predicted that the wind would pick up during the night. It came true and around midnight it was blowing 40 knots steadily with gusts up to 57 knots. We decided to turn on the engine and stay on anchor watch until the morning. It was a long night for the crew but the guests slept like babies.

The morning was bright and very nice with blue skies and a little breeze. The snow was hard and progress was good in the morning. The sun managed to warm up the slopes a bit but it was already gone when we skied down to Lonafjordur. Still a very long and good run all the way to the bottom.

Onboard AURORA Runar (that´s me) baked pancakes to celebrate his 35th birthday and few beers ran down smoothly with the delicious dinner Siggi made. It started to snow during the calm night and the next morning was grey and the guys were anxious to try some sailing. We had to get back to Isafjordur before the last flight and hoisted the sails. The sun appeard around noon and we got very good sailing all the way to Isafjordur.