Full Rigger Sørlandet

Wiki EN Wiki NO: SS Sørlandet

I were fortunate enough to be invited for a trip on the tallship SS Sørlandet in Kristiansand. This is part of the Javazone Speakers Journeyzone, an excellent opportunity for those who wish an unusual adventure.

This is a very old tall ship, though in 1927 built with education in mind when most ships had steam engines. 

She was sunk during the war, probably by Norwegians. The ship had been refitted with a small engine when it was restored in the 1950's.

There was crew from Norway, Canada, USA and Denmark. Some very attractive, strong, Danish girls were pulling the ropes and climbing the rig as any man could do?

Trip out was nice, then we we're training for climbing the rig and just waiting for some wind.

Finally we had rigged the sails and she is a beauty with her sails out.

Apparently the crown princess is from Kristiansand, I wonder if the names of the life boats had anything to do with that.

Everybody had to do their turns on the various work tasks, included lookout watch, security checks, cleaning and steering. She had the original steering which was older than the ship, probably from the 1800's. Many of the parts were old when they built the ship.

Bringing Labradors to China

So it happened that I made a trip to China to help transporting two Labradors. My wife's long friend Gu had Annie (and me) contact Annuals Kennel in Sweden since he had been referred there by his friend Wang in Wuxi. Lena at Annuals had two adult Labradors that she was thinking of parting with and Gu very much wanted those.

Zacke (Mallorns Versace)

Jake (Annuals Piece of Cake)

First Lena's son Peter wanted to bring them to China and later we found it better that I joined him and came along since the customs process is simpler with one traveller for each dog.

Dogs left sweden on thursday morning. Friday morning at customs in Shanghai we shortly had the dogs out of the cages and gave them some water before we said goodbye and they were passed on to the seven days quaranteen.

Here's the dogs at Shanghai airport with James, a pet-relocation helping hand that Gu got to meet us there and help us with customs.


We had a few nice days in the Shanghai area together with Peter.

Thereafter we split up and went to Yancheng together with Gu. Annie had her schedule filled with appointments, dinners and friends, but we made time to meet two of Gu's three female Labradors and play with them. The third Lab was at dog-handler being prepared for competition.

The river area is where Gu mostly trains his dogs, there's good healthy sand to run in and water to swim in. 

The black was the younger and stronger and the yellow was the older and smarter. Yellow always got to the ball first.

The dogs were strong and very energetic, kept it going forever although after two hours we had to leave.

We left Shanghai the day before Gu picked up the dogs from the quaranteen. Gu took them right to Hangzhou where he has dog-trainers that will work with the dogs for a few days. 

The dogs seems to have had no problems with the travel. They look happy and Gu is very happy with them.

Now Gu is off to Dalian to prepare for what is to be his kennel. Dalian is a very beautiful area at the sea where the dogs will have a good life.

I am back at work....

Barcelona Pick Pockets

Returning from a New Years Eve concert in Barcelona, walking in the side streets towards the La Rambla tourist street with my wife and daughter, I got pick pocketed. I was somebody pretending to give away leaflets and showed some business card. He was first acting really annoying and starting to play and touch. My natural reaction is to immediately check my back pocket and yes my wallet was gone. I lept to my feet and ran after him, ready to ram him into the alley walls. He understood the situation and threw the wallet on the ground and ran. I could have run after him but I quickly checked that my cards were there, and yes all there. He probably would have removed the cash out but no luck for him, I had no cash. For a place like this full of tourists I don't think he would fight back with knife or so and the guy was smaller and weaker than me. I imagine I could have hurt him pretty badly ramming him into the walls. Safer for him to throw the wallet on the ground since most people would be happy at that point. If one out of ten would continue after him and say one of five is quick enough to figure it out and go after him, that would mean every 50th time he would be in severe trouble. I think the pick pockets most often operate in pairs, but maybe it was just way too safe and easy on this holiday.

Continuing someone else was playing the same pick pocket game. The card he showed us was exactly the same as the other guy showed us as the other guy so this was probably his regular partner in crime. I was not in the mood for a fight and did not want to cause any stir so I told him to get lost and put my hand over my back pocket to signal I recognized his game.

Barcelona is the number one pick-pocket city in Europe. A word of advice is to not use a wallet in your back pocket, which can be seen as an invitation to a pick pocket.