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During the day, the weather became ever better =)

The entire port of Halmstad was packed with over 50 small sailing boats and 15(!!!) tall ships. I never saw so many ships at one place, many of them open to the public.

17th Century Frigate Replica "Shtandart", from Russia

"Europa", from the Netherlands

She has studding sails on her yards!

She was the first ship I ever saw for real having that feature IN USE.

(There were some more in Halmstad, as I discovered soon after that, and they were all Dutch:

the brig "Morgenster", the two-masted schooner "Wylde Swan", and the largest of them, the "Stad Amsterdam").

I made 195 pictures from many details of this ship alone.
And I asked them how they really use the stunsails:
they confirmed my assumption, they set stunsails in very light winds only.
They also said that they have the belaying plan available online =)

That made my day!

"Alexander von Humboldt I", from Germany

Her green sails make her unique among all sailing ships in the world.

I am about to build a model of her (from the Revell kit still avaliable).
So I made many detail pictures here, too, as a preparation.
If any modelbuilder has interest, feel free to mail me: j_gelbrich@gmx.net

BTW: her successor, the "Alexander von Humboldt II", is being built right now, because the I is getting old ...

"Thalassa", from The Netherlands, coming in under full sails!

Her fore and mizzen masts are rigged traditional, but
her main mast has no yards and no gaffs, only staysails - a unique kind of rigging.

"Stad Amsterdam", from The Netherlands

Sadly, she was NOT open for the public, else I would have made some more 100 pictures of her decks and fittings.

She looks very alike the Cutty Sark, indeed! Very beautiful!

Her rigging is almost a 1:1 copy of the famous Cutty Sark, INCLUDING the stunsails, rigged out from heavy booms from the yard arms.
Note that the the stunsail booms are attached under the lower yards, and the topstunsail booms above the upper topsail yard,
so the Top Stunsail spans over two square sails, like the famous clippers did 150 years ago.

My only successful glimpse upon her decks was from the forecastle of the Gloria, morred just behind the Stad Amsterdam.

Thus, I know at least that she has a looong pinrail at the sides of the mizzen mast, and a fiferail around the same mast, AND a spider band, allowing for many lines to be belayed.

Now I need to ask them about how they arranged that scheme ...

"Gloria", from Colombia

This is the first time I ever saw her with my own eyes. The went to Sweden from South America in 5 months.
She is a rare guest in Europe.

Her legendary giant ensign is well the largest in the world, as large as the spanker sail itself.

Never did I see lines being coiled up so neatly!

The entire ship is in extremely good shape and utterly clean.

I know of no other ship that has such elaborated decorations on every brass belaying pin, and every single of them poolished perfectly.
And the crew is very friendly and smiles everytime =)
Every visitor is saluted! The typical Latino dance music onboard could well be heard in the entire harbour ...

"Dar Młodziezy", from Poland, and "Mir", from Russia

Both sister ships (and there are yet two more in that class) were mooring behind each other in Halmstad.

The square yards of the Dar Młodziezy have no halyards, they are all swinging in fixed racks.
Each of the 3 full rigged masts has three platforms. The backstays are seperated from the shrounds, for stabiliy.

This new rigging design was made by the Polish maritime engineer Zygmunt Chorén,
who shaped the modern rigging of 17(!) newly built sailing ships.

It was not the first time I was onboard a Mir class ship, in fact I had visited the Mir twice, long ago.
Now I wanted to solve my riddles finally, about the belaying scheme of these ships.

So I asked some of the people selling souvenirs ...

... and a friendly cadet went with me under deck, where he showed me the original diagrams they use in Polish and English:

And finally, I now made my own bilingual belaying plan in Polish and English, of the Mir Class ships (although some small differences may be).

Yet another mission "Belaying Pins" accomplished =)

Two Norwegian Fullriggers

For some reason, I never found the Norwegian tall ships being open for the public on events like this;
they were reserved for VIP visits only. So I made a few pictures from the quai only.

Yet, it is great to see that still all their 3 classic fullriggers are sailing.
In Halmstad, the Sørlandet and the Christian Radich appeared.

Sørlandet

Christian Radich

I would have given something to be let onboard ... pity.

STS "Sedov", from Russia

BUT; I had the luck to enter the SEDOV, the largest classic windjammer in the world.

Since the "Sedov" had been a "1:1 model" in 2007, starring in a German TV movie as the "Pamir", she seems to have kept her black-white scheme since then. It was the classic color scheme of all German P-Liners, which also she was until 1945. The Russians (or: the Soviets that time) refitted her after WW2 but painted her hull all-white. And there are some old Russian crew members
who miss the shiny white scheme they were used to for so long...

Then I entered their souvenir shop onboard. And I found a small manual with all the information for the trainees,
about the rigging, in Russian, English, and German. Bingo!
And a giant picture book about the Sedov.

And finally, I now made my own bilingual belaying plan of the Sedov, in Russian and English.

Yet another mission "Belaying Pins" accomplished, the third in one single day =)

By the end of the day, I had made over 1000 pictures. This is the Best-Of selection for You.