Göta Canal - East to West - Mem to Sjötorp

Freja helped us with line handling on the last lock going up.

After a two week interlude at stugan (the family summer cottage on the Baltic Sea in northern Sweden), the next leg of our adventure took us through the Göta Canal. We had (still have?) hopes of spending the winter in northern Norway but border restrictions due to Covid may make that impossible. Regardless, we had a trip booked through the Göta Canal on September 14 in order to quickly get us to the west coast of Sweden. The canal is an absolute marvel of civil engineering. The total distance is 190km (102 nautical miles, 118 statute miles), 87 of which were dug by hand by 58,000 Swedish soldiers between 1810 and 1832. Not too big of a deal if you're digging through dirt, but most of the surface is solid granite. Not to mention the long winters. There are 58 locks that rise the boats a total of 91.8 meters above sea level. You can read more about the canal here: Gota Kanal history. Fellow sailors and kid boat s/v Ran recently transited the canal. They have a great vlog up on YouTube. Ran Sailing on the Gota Canal

The canal is only used by pleasure boats now and is a dream vacation for many people. In the summer months the locks are open all day long and you can take as long as you want to transit the canal. There are small marinas all along the way, cafe, ice cream shops, mini-golf, bicycle rentals, and quaint villages to explore. It was easy to see how you could turn the canal into a multi-week vacation. We went in the off-season, however, so we were constricted to travel with a convoy of boats. We had a strict 5-day schedule we had to keep to with start and stop times every day, and if one boat needed to stop for fuel or water, all the boats had to stop. We had to stay together and go through the locks together. Kind of fun but also more like a delivery trip. We arranged with the canal office to stop at Vadstena for a couple days to explore the castle and then we joined another convoy a couple days later.

Portions of the canal took us through farmland, small villages, lakes, and forests. The scenery was stunning. The second half of the canal took us through many small lakes lined with thick forests. It was surreal to be on our ocean-going boat in the middle of Sweden, about 90 meters above sea level, and sharing the water with small rowboats and fishing boats. It was hard to imagine that a month ago we were sailing in the Baltic with 20+ knot winds.

Family joined us for the length of the canal. Hans's sister, Sofia, and her family started the trip with us. Patrik and Sofia are big sailors and their kids are almost the same age as our kids so it was an easy and fun start. The kids wore their life jackets without being told, no toilet paper went in the toilet, and there were minimal freak-outs when the boat heeled past 15 degrees. Freja's Swedish is improving exponentially every day, especially when she had the incentive to play with cousins. Matilda certainly needs more practice, but at least she is now open and willing to learn, as opposed to the last 7.5 years of her life!

Typical for sailing, the first two days of sailing to get us to the start of the canal had rain and strong winds coming from exactly where we needed to go. We sailed some, motored some, and generally kept in good spirits. We spent the first night at anchor off a small group of islands and after the cold front blew past, the sky was absolutely crystal clear and we had an amazing star show. Probably the brightest, clearest sky I've seen in years. Unfortunately it was blowing like snot and freezing so star gazing was less than appealing.

Fast, fun sailing just before we entered the canal.

Sailing is in their blood!

Cold. Windy. Rainy. Fall sailing in Sweden.

But no weather will keep Hans from zipping around with kids in a dinghy.

Apple picking on castle grounds. We didn't have a bag so we stuffed our pockets! Sofia and I made a gorgeous apple crumble.

Our kids have little experience with hills (hello Florida and Texas), so they were thrilled to learn from their cousins how to roll down hills.

We went through our first lock in Mem and were both over-confident in our locking abilities and woefully unprepared. Not a good combination. Hans and I have gone through quite a few locks and figured we knew what we were doing. The locks in the Göta Canal, however, are much steeper and narrower than any we have done before. After we scrambled around trying to keep the boat from bashing into the granite walls and the other sailboat we shared the lock with, we motored out of the lock and strategized for our next lock. (We also read the guidebook which had clear locking instructions.) We got better and better as we went through every lock, but it still required hands-on effort from four adults. (The kids were on their own!) Patrik left on the evening of that first day, so we only had three adults on the second day. By the end of the second day Hans and I handled the boat by ourselves for practice for the third day when Sofia wouldn't be there. Like everything with boating, a solid system is key.

Locking up in Berg. Some places had individual locks, others were flights of locks where you exited one lock directly into the next. This particular one had seven locks in a row.

Supervisors at the top of the lock.

There were a couple hand-operated locks and bridges on the canal.
The kids had a great time opening the lock.

Vadstena Castle. We took a break from the canal for a couple days to explore the castle and old town.

Hans's parents met us in Forsvik, about halfway along the canal. It was their first time on the boat and so fun for us to share with them what we have been working toward and talking about for years. They have a lot of sailing experience as well and also don't particularly need a lot of creature comforts so it was easy to have them on the boat. We reached the highest point of the canal with them and then started locking down. Locking down is a lot easier than going up because the forces in the lock are much more gentle. Still, we had to figure out a whole new system again. Roger watched the port side of the boat to ensure we didn't bump anyone in the lock, Karin managed the bow line, I managed the stern, and Hans...he helpervised. And drove us in and out of the locks. We had a good team!

Picturesque little villages all along the canal.

The canal just west of Forsvik. The second half of the canal got very narrow and forested.

Honestly, the canal wasn't a dream trip for me. The scenery was gorgeous and, other than some stressful moments in the locks, it was easy. But it also felt like a delivery trip and motoring for 8-10 hours a day isn't what the boat is designed for. I would have been much happier island-hopping and actually sailing. I can, however, see how the canal would be fun if we had more time and weren't on a set schedule. Then we could bbq in the evenings, visit museums, maybe rent bikes for a day, and sample treats from all the little bakeries we saw. The best part of the trip, by far, was sharing Positive Waves with family. It was a great way to spend time together on the boat without having to worry about weather, secure anchorages, and seasickness.

Locking up.

Locking down. It is VERY disconcerting to have the water suddenly rush out from underneath you! I prefer plenty of water under our hull!

The canal meandered through the farmland like an old country road. Each lock has house for the lock master, yellow with the name of the lock on the side. The lock masters no longer live in the houses, now they are private homes. Surprisingly, most of the lock masters are college kids earning some extra money. Not my typical idea of a lock master.

As for the kids, they loved the first lock but pretty much stayed down below for the rest of the trip. I think for them it was like a long car ride, except instead of 70mph, we were only traveling at 8mph. But it is indeed an expedient way to get across Sweden without having to sail all the way around--something we weren't particularly interested in doing since we had just sailed a long way to get to the east coast from France.

We're now posted up in Mariestad while Hans is at work. This is the first time we've stopped for more than a couple days since we left Treguier and we badly need the down time. The kids need more days where they can just wake up and play, and we need to just spend time living on the boat and making it feel more like our home. We're still in the middle of Sweden. When we're ready to head further west and get to the open waters, we'll have to transit the Trollhätte Canal. A more commercial canal that will take about two days.