Having sailed around the world, we pondered where next. We wanted somewhere that would offer us places to visit that would be as exciting as some of our more exotic landfalls, we wanted a three to four month cruise, and we wanted some interesting and challenging sailing. Starting from the UK, the Baltic scored well on all our requirements. Our ultimate goal, Russia at the far eastern end of the Baltic, fulfilled our desire to visit somewhere exciting, a transit of the Gota Canal would be challenging as would need to get back from Russia to the UK--some 2000 miles to windward.

The high latitudes would mean long sailing days, such a change from the 12 hours of darkness in the tropics, and we hoped that the Baltic high would establish to give us good weather.

And what a great cruise it has proved to be. We are currently sitting in the IJSELMEER in Holland waiting for a weather window to return to the UK. So far we have been able to time our passages to avoid long beats to windward and have either had easterly winds or gentle head winds. Thanks again to Buoyweather, whose astonishing accuracy never ceases to amaze us and to whom we are extremely grateful.

However, nothing is perfect, and when we needed to make a decision whether to stop overnight in Cuxhaven or push on to Den Helder, the buoyweather system went down. The previous day's forecast had suggested a short 24 hour weather window that would enable us to cover the 200 miles along the Fresian coast, where there are no suitable harbours to break the journey. But when we emerged from the Kiel canal, the local forecast was for NW 6, gusting 7. It was a generalized forecast for the whole of the sea area (German Bight) and our now 2-day-old buoyweather forecast suggested rather different conditions. However, with shifting sand banks to leeward and a sea state reflecting the gale that had been blowing for several days, we were not keen to set off if the local forecast was correct.

Fortunately we also have a weatherfax, so we downloaded pictures from as many sources as we could and set about forming a back-to-basics weather forecast of our own. We decided that things had moved on since the local forecast had been produced and that conditions would not be the same across the whole sea area. Along our route we thought the winds would abate, then veer to the southeast, giving us perfect conditions for the trip along the Fresians to Den Helder.

Thankfully we were right. The maps, barometer, looking at the sky and the experience gained over many years paid off, and we had a wonderful beam reach through the night, arriving next day before the wind veered again, closing the window for another week or more.

So now we are once again watching the forecast, waiting for the right weather to set off across the North Sea and back to the UK, and reflecting on three great months sailing in the Baltic. Over the next few weeks we'll describe some of the highlights, along with some observations about yacht design for cruising the area.