Gamle Hellesund

Gamle Hellesund
Outport
Country Norway
Region Kristiansand Region
County Aust-Agder
District Sørlandet
Municipality Lillesand
Time zone CET (UTC+01:00)
 • Summer (DST) CEST (UTC+02:00)

Gamle Hellesund is an outport in Høvåg in the municipality of Lillesand, Norway. It is located about halfway between Ulvøysund in southwest and Ågerøya in the Northeast. The outport is located on the island of Helløya.

Both Sverres saga and Baglersagaene (Snorre Sturlason) mentions the port of Helgasund respectively in 1197 and 1207, but it is not known whether it concerns Gamle Hellesund or Ny-Hellesund in Søgne.

Dutch books for maritime pilots and nautical charts from the 16th century mentions Olde Hil Sont and Gammel Hil Sont, indicating that the outport was known for foreign sailors already then.

Gamle Hellesund had its point of highest tension in the 19th century, in the so-called era of sailing ships, it was a lot of maritime traffic along the coast, and ships from many countries visited the outports. Southern Norway then had a very active period, with diverse shipyards and shipping companies. Because of all the activity, Gamle Hellesund had a pilot station and a customs station.

Nowadays Gamle Hellesund stays empty most of the year, except some intense summer months.

References

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Thursday, June 25, 2015. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.