Words from a poor man

Hello all,

Well an exciting morning and I have bought a house in Stavanger. The suburd is called Våland and I will be living just around the corner from Emma and Joel, which will be great for the occasional dinner. Finding it a little hard to work today feeling a combination between sick and excited. Here is a grand tour of the house.

This is the lounge room, door opens to the deck in the bottom right corner

Viewing from the yard back up to the house, I am the first floor and the cellar

Here is the mamoth kitchen that you could cook up a storm for a whole cricket team (or more appropriatly a Ice Hockey Team)

The Bedroom which is pretty small but the living spaces are huge.

The entrance hall, the left is the lounge and the right is the kitchen

The entrance again looking towards the bedroom and bathroom

The Bath room which is very new.

Another shot of the kitchen

From the lounge looking onto the living and kitchen space, The door leads onto the deck.

The living space, looking from the kitchen.

The living space again and the kitchen to the right.

And to enjoy the sun when it is out is the deck

And looking back up towards the house from the yard.

I also have the cellar which is approximately the size of the house again below for bikes etc. Move in on the 1st of febuary so looking forward to then for the house warming.

Cheers
Ryan

Australia!

As some of ou may or may not be aware I had a quick surprise visit down under over the last 2 weeks. Sorry to those of you in OZ that I did not get a chance to catch up with but it was a very quick visit. I will opst some photos early next week of the trip which included Perth, Karratha and Geraldton for the Wind Warrior tour 2007. Now I am back home in Stavanger and tonight will be atending the company christmas party.

Cheers
Ryan

Still Offshore

Hello Hello, Still bouncing around offshore in the North sea. Have had some pretty bad weather lately so the whole crew has been struggling to sleep a little. We transitted into port yesterday as the weather was not that good and one of the girls on the Marine crew's father was sick so we went to port to let her off the boat. The transit to port took about 18 hrs as we had VERY bad weather, at the start we had 55 knots of wind and it was gusting to 65 Kts, thats pretty windy and the boat was only going about 3 knots. Needless to say we had some good waves aswell so no one got any sleep during that time. We stayed in a fjord last night so that atleast one shift (day shift) could get some sleep, luckily that was my shift so I am now fully recharged.

We have just left for transit again out to field and the Nav screen in front of me reads 11hrs to go and we are currently moving along at 8.5 Kts. I dont think the night shift will be getting much sleep again as it is still pretty rough outside and this boat moves around ALOT.

Have just completed the standard morning routine of a coffee with a couple of freshly made croissants’ (who really knows how to spell that word anyway) and a quick read of the morning paper. It looks like when we get back to field that we will have the chance to get some work done for quite a long period, unless the weather forcast changes. Unfortunately it is getting late in the year and we are loosing alot of time to weather.

Anyway thats it for now, still have a couple of weeks left out here I would say until the project is complete.

Until then Ha det bra.

Ryan

Kristiansund

Hello all, well we have had a couple of days waiting on weather in Kristiansund. Have been keeping ourselves amused with a bit of poker of an evening, and some coffee and croissants during the day. Here are a few photos of the "horrible" weather we have been experiencing in a fjord near Kristiansund.






















This is a photo from earlier in the campaign of sunset out on the North sea.






























Full moon on a fjord near Kristiansund



































Snow capped mountians in the distance.






























Full moon again on a perfectly still evening










































An amazing Sunset



























Could not stop taking photos of this sunset.

Thats it for now, hopefully get back out to sea within the next day or so.

Cheers
Ryan

Well Nothing new to report just thought I would post a photo of Aasgard B Platform at night. Still waiting on weather here and looks like we will get some good waves on Friday (up to 12m).

Offshore

Hello all,

Well I am back out bobbing around on the North Sea at the moment. The vessel got a bit of work done over the last couple of days, we installed a spool and tied it in to a manifold, it then was tied into the flowline at the other side by another company Technip and is now ready to transport oil to a platform near by so al,l you people out there can drive your cars etc. Though I am not sure if it all the way to OZ.

We now have some more work to do at another template, we have to change out a subsea manifold (43 tonnes) and a few other things like cutting and retrieving some pipe from the sea bed. At the moment we are waiting on weather and cannot do any work, it could be like this for a few days. So it is a nice easy shift tonight, just eating food and drinking beer (alcohol free of course).

I have also included a plot of the weather forecast over the next few days. At this stage I will be on board till the 3rd of October (although this will definitely change) and will come back on board again for the final week of operation in Mid to late October, but that all depends on when the project is finished.




Alcohol free beer on board the vessel. (actually does not taste too bad but will revert to the real deal when back on land)



Aasgard B Platform in the North Sea



An Ugly Technip Vessel doing the other end of the spool tie in.

The weather forecast for the next few days.

West Coast of Norway

We are currently steaming up the West Coast of Norway to Kristiansund where I will depart the Skandi Bergen. Here are some photos of the sunrise on the Norwegian west coast on a perfectly calm day in the North Sea.

Ha det bra.

Ryan

Offshore

Hello all,

Well there will be no updates in the comming weeks as tommorrow I am going to head offshore. I will be getting onboard a new vessel called Skandi Bergen tommorrow night. We will be alongsiode getting the boat ready for departure for about 4 days then out to the North Sea. I will be out there for 2 weeks then return to land for 2 weeks then go out for a final three weeks or until the project is complete. Hopefully all goes smoothly and should do if we have all done our job properly over the last months. I will post some photos next time of some big offshore stuff (probably very boring photos to most of you) I will leave you with a couple of pictures, one of the new vesssel (the blue one) and some of the vessel I was offshore on last time. Speak to you all later.

Darren Hanlon

Well hello everyone, A real quick blog update today. Had a good weekend, went to a Darren Hanlon concert and for those of you who dont know him he is a really good Australian singer songwriter. The last time I went and saw him in Tassie Joel and I got him to sign a beer coaster to say he would come to Stavanger Norway and Joel and Ryan would be on the door list. Anyway he was quite suprised to hear G'day Darren called out to him when he entered and more suprised to see the coaster. Anyway to cut a long story short he took up the offer to get a lift back to stavanger with us (Joel, Emma and I) and stayed at joels house that night before leaving to Estonia the next morning. I suggest you check out his music if you have not already at http://www.darrenhanlon.com/ Here is a photo below of us all on the couch at Joel and Em's with the coaster.





Anyway, work is getting really busy now so must be off to do some, Sorry to those of you I have not been in contact with for a while.

Ha det Bra.
Ryan

Volley Ball

Stavanger was blessed with good weather for the finals of the beach volleyball championships. A large stadium was constructed in town and sand dumped in to form the court. A large barge was also in the harbour dumped with sand for all the earlier matches. See pictures below

Joel with his large zoom Fully extended during the womens matches.

Cheer leaders to keep the crowds cheering

Warm enough in stavanger to take your shirts off, there were a few sunburnt people after the match.

The USA won, China second and USA third

Lots of boats on the vågen with people drinking beers and enjoying the day.

Em and I on the Vågen, heaps of people around, a great atmosphere

This should give you an idea of how long the days are over here, clock reads 22:45.

Thats all for now,

Cheers

Weekend in Haugesund

Hello all,


I was lucky enough this last weekend to spend it in a cabin by a Fjord just north of Stanger near a plce called Haugesund. There was also a celebration for midsummer as the longest day of the year here in the Northern Hemisphere was during the weekend just gone. We celebrated with a bon fire on the beach as the photos below will show. The weeeknd also included Skiing (water), lots of drinking, swimming and even got to sit in a Hot tub and drink some beers.



A View of the cabin from the fjord and The boys sailing their modified "surf boat" as they like to call it.



The High tech skis used to carve up the waters of the Fjord.



Carving up on the Fjord. I had a huge smile on my face after this ski as I have not done it in a while it and it was great fun. My body is still aching a little today though.



Night one and here is Marius having a drink on the boat, a few of us standing around the fire.



A perfectly still evening on the Fjord.



Christian the host and Jørn cooking up a bit of a feast for the midsummer celebrations



The feast and the starting of the bonfire.



The bonfie being continually fuelled through the night.



The crowd watching on.


Well thats about all I have for now.

Ha det bra.

Ryan.