Chapter 1

On historical grounds

Everything started up on a sandy cliff. It was like we were thrown into the first page of an Oscar Wilde story. In one of his fabulous gardens. The lush green trees, beautiful as if vårguden dipped the leaves in a paint can with a green magic. The sea, with a mighty mystery, which threw its waves against the soft sand beach. For an old gardener like me, it was as if I tjuvåkt elevator up to heaven.

But there was still a sense - in contrast to the harmony that nature gave us - who sneaked up from behind, who scribbled us on the shoulder and gave us the shivers down your spine.

There, below, on the sandy beach, low larval feet still. Ohama Beach breasted up more than half a mil, and saw, with its steep cliffs behind them, like a large and hefty arms, ready to receive argsinthet sea and the waves than what went with it. These were the allies, they fought the inclement weather, the sea sickness and nasty waves that made it impossible for the tanks to roll in the country.

Chapter 1

Young boys ran, dyngblöta and terrified, into an open sandy landscape where it was raining lead. In the corner of my eye, they could see their comrades die in the mud and over there, somewhere beyond all the chaos, they could catch a glimpse of the Germans' shooters to be protected up on the sandy and verdant cliff engines.

Now I sat and Janne up there and ate seafood. That eerie feeling had beaten us in the face already on the way here. Along the coast of Normandy, they had begun to spring up: small memory boards that told how many soldiers who had landed right there, which regiment they were from and how many of those who died.

It was not far from the signs. 4000 dead. 800 dead. 3000 dead. 400 killed. But it was not until we arrived at the Ohama Beach as it began to seem unreal real, somehow.

We sat in the green grass, drunk on life and the white wine. We had before our departure visited the most delicate of fish markets and bought us a whole bag of shrimp, and the mixture of pleasure that seafood gave us and the sentimental mood as the story broke over us got us talking about life. What else would we talk about, in a place where so many people lost it?

Chapter 1

"Dad's old helmsman, Kurt Björklund, he helped to set foot here," said Janne to me. "It is difficult to absorb. He was a volunteer in the British army and one of the first who made it ashore alive. But what so many died. The first landed, they knew they would die ... "" And most of them were just boys. Many had not even reached the age of 20, "I said. "Here we sit, 50 years old men. It makes you wonder. "

"Yes, that Kurt Björklund sailed round the world then, four times. That's what you should do. "We agreed that we worked too much and ate too little shrimp in verdant coastlines. It was I who asked the question, but I myself was as surprised as Janne. I suspect it was one of the old soldier ghosts that crept down the palate to me, loaded k-slope and suddenly as I just spat it out of me. "Shall we sail around the world, Janne?"

Janne rapidly rejected the idea. "Damn it, we come to Elsinore, then puking I," he said. "I can not throw up all over the world, forget it. And I do not know if it is wine or if you eat too many shrimp, but you have forgotten a little, just a small detail: none of us have ever sailed. I do not even think about it, not life. "

Chapter 1

But think, was just what Janne did. After we emptied räksäcken top of the sand cliff we rode inland, Saint-Lô. Behind a church, more like a Swiss cheese with all of their shell holes, we took it in to a hotel where it was possible to rent rooms for hours - it's all over France, as all Frenchmen, and Frenchmen have a mistress or lover-boy. If it was in a weak moment in a foggy hangover or not, I do not know - I was sitting anyway and had a dry croissants in the breakfast room when Janne came down.

"Except for the terrible seasickness, it was a pretty good idea, even," he said. "My dad has always nagged at me, maybe it's time to show him now? There must have been some seasick wretches among those who landed in Normandy, some Calle? "" There were probably, you're probably right in. "" Yes, and that did not stop them. What the hell, we go home and learn to sail. "Fantastic," I said. "First we need to just get a boat."

Chapter 2

Life Steps

It's not really true that everything began atop a sandy cliff. Okay, that's where I came up with the proposal. And it was there, down in France, like me and Janne shook hands at sailing around the world together. We had always been quick decisions, him and me. We walked a lot of sense, both. The idea to sail around the world had swept over us in a frightful speed. Like a sudden storm. And we threw ourselves into it, as usual. But the feeling of doing something else in life, it had lain, and caving in me throughout the spring.

The seeds I planted on a highway in Skåne. Actually it all started four weeks before that räkfrossan in Normandy. I had my last day as CEO of Peab's electricity department. One and a half month vacation waited before I could start my new job. I had the chance, for the first time in years, to look up an old feeling. I remembered it so well. That one week together with my old military bike, the one with balloon tires. I had packed Fjällräven tent, a pair of underwear and a bottle of whiskey and stepped down to Österlen; by Tomelilla,

Chapter 2

Hellevik and up to Blekinge. I remembered everything so well, the sound of the gray tires rubbing against the gravel road, acidic and smiles from people I rushed past, funny little boxes and the blue sky which stretched out over me like the world's largest ocean. I remembered it so well, because it was just me there. I and nature. And I remembered it so well because it was the only time I really, somehow, pushed me out of my normal life. Earlier, I paused from my hectic work with quiet weekends in the garden, or with travel with family or friends. But a lone man on a bicycle, it was a health journey for the soul, in a completely different way. I needed a guy again. If I am anything, I'm no gardener. I needed a trip to the spring.

And this time it would be a real one. A week in Österlen are great, but I needed a lot more of that drug. I had sketched out the route on a large map of Europe. Neat lines of the pencil ranged from Elsinore to Esbjerg. There I would take the ferry to the spring, to England. I could smell the scent of blooming tulips and the taste of nytappad beer.

Chapter 2

I had amused myself by putting out small spots on the route between Harwich and Southampton, one dot per pub. The trip would proceed along the west coast of France. Past Nantes and Normandy, down to Bordeaux. In Lisbon. Around the Portuguese west coast city, I had drawn an inky ring. There was something special about Lisbon. I had never been there, but it was as if there was something exotic, just the name itself.

It seemed like the perfect harbor town, with its narrow, winding streets, sjöbusar and fish restaurants. Lisbon was the journey's end, I would have a month and a half on me and I had only two rules: avoid the German Autobahn terrible and like all other highways. And staying in a hotel with a bathtub in the room. I would fill halfway to a hundred and then it may be out of camping.

I had nice evenings at home in my office. I sat there and dreamed of the beautiful Atlantic winds. Wondered what wine I would buy in France. And so I went and poked at my bike, a red Canon Dale, who was leaning against a cart full of bananas.

Chapter 2

It was a real race with 27 points, which I received as a parting gift when I quit as CEO of Peab's electricity department. The cart of bananas, I had been finely wrapped with red bow around. Such a nice bike was forced to rastas. It was worth a real adventure. And since I had six weeks off before I started my new job I had for the first time in 30 years a really good chance to let go of my life completely.

The idea was that I was cycling itself. However, I revealed my travel plans on my 50th birthday party, when the sun goes down and drink table was cleared away. A drunken murmur spread through the room.

"You turn in Denmark," bellowed one. And then they laughed gin and tonic-blunt guests. But my best friend Janne came up and patted me on the shoulder. "You know what awaits you?" He asked. "April weather, snowstorms, rain and hell. And what boils in the ass later. "" You know, in Lisbon, it is our, "I replied. "Yes, that's who sings Evert Taube, the girls are in Lisbon." "Well, there's something exotic with the city," said Calle.

Chapter 2

Janne saw that there was something in her eyes at me. He had already realized that his old friend was serious - but in that moment began Janne yourself twisting and turning the idea into his own head.

"Yes, you may be right. It's probably not such a crazy idea. It might even have been damned funny. You and I have always had a hell of fun together ... "So Janne stood at attention. "I hereby register my participation, I hang out with." Brilliant brother, "I said as I took my future travel colleague in his hand

***

Chapter 2

I met Janne, for the first time, in say the least, strange circumstances, in the former East Germany. The year was 1975, and around every corner, from every cobblestone, haunted World War II. Equally horrifying was the new age; with the Communists, the Berlin Wall and the Stasi. At the top of the TV building on Alexanderplatz was possible to see how the bombs had fallen. The straight lines were the Russian concrete houses in the wake of the allied troops. The view was a telling image of the Russians' struggle to transform a ravaged town to the perfect communist state. Life down there, inside the walls, were somewhat surreal. Especially for our foreign workers, who made us from many of the rules in force at the East Germans.

Review

Said about the book:

"A snorting, blunt, a little coarse maritime history of two el-pro from Skane who one day decides to break their daily lives. Do something else. Kiss the sea, sail around the world. It really is incredibly fun when rescuers in distress comes to a new location, take a basement cold beer, a angöringssup and then begin to fix the error. A långseglarbok that does not save any punches. "The world once, Göteborgs-Posten. John Brovik.

"The book is not only a rich travelogue. It also deals with tough decisions - to break up with their daily lives to do something different, to overcome their fears and sacrifices, to be willing to sell his house to buy a boat. The language is captivating and journalistic liquid. No experience required. Sail with Albatross by Carl-Erik Andersson and Janne Larsson is a reading experience, a real page-turner that raises thoughts and dreams, a book that long linger in the memory. "
Reader: Heli Karalambev
Library Service Booklet: 12101202