Oh deer.....

During our short trip to Grinda today, we noticed a yacht suddenly turning around. "Confused!", I said. "No", Lyn responded "they are looking at that deer swimming across the channel" (which was a few hundred metres wide and 24m deep).
What next?

Location:Värmdö Grinda,Värmdö,Sweden

A trumpet concerto in Paradiset

For a second night, we are at anchor in 'Paradiset ', a bay between a few islands that together are called Finnhamn, as here the ships on their way to Finland would shelter from adverse winds.

Paradiset is quite an appropriate name, it really is very nice and therefore also very popular. Last night, on a Saturday evening in peak season, we counted almost 80 boats in the bay. Forty of those tied to the wooden staging that has been built on the rocks, now even with power points, really like a 'Gästhamn '. And the remainder tied with their bows to a rock and a stern anchor out, or just swinging behind the main anchor like us.

This morning we took the dinghy ashore and went for a walk along one of the nature trails. Suddenly we came to the water and guess what we saw:





That's Onbekommerd at anchor, without us on board!

This evening, we are being treated to a trumpet concerto: one of the boats on shore sports a trumpet player who is entertaining us.





And on another rock, a family is having their evening meal:





It's a nice day in "Paradiset"!

Location:Österåker,Sweden

A harbour on the ferry route

This morning we woke up before 5AM to do a final check of the weather forecast. All was as expected, so we were out of our mooring just after 5, basically at first light. We still needed the navigation lights on!








The trip over the Sea of Åland was uneventful, we had a few ferries and some other shipping to cope with, but with the AIS it's so much easier to judge and anticipate what the big ships are going to do.

After 4 hours we entered the Swedish archipelago and put the clocks back by an hour.

We are now in the harbour of Furosund, which right on the fairway of the ferry lines from Stockholm to any destination north.
The fairway here is very narrow and the ferries (which are basically cruise liners) go very slow. But you have to be very careful: they won't give way at all as there are rocks on both sides. We waited for this one to come through a particularly narrow gap:





And now in the harbour, this is what we see:








We really enjoyed our short time on the Åland Islands, in a later post I'll tell a bit more about why we like it so much.

Location:Norrtalie,Sweden

Back in Mariehamn

Just a quick update, without pictures.

From Sottunga we returned to Kastelholm yesterday and then to Mariehamn today.
Although we would like love to spend at least another week here on the Åland Islands, we need to get back to Sweden for reasons I won't dwell on at the moment. Add to this the fact that the weather is rather unsettled, and we will take the next weather gap to do the 32 miles back. Not a big distance and not difficult either, but as it is open sea we are always extra cautious.
That gap might be tomorrow, we'll get up early to do our checks. Otherwise it looks like Tuesday, which is not a problem either. Mariehamn is a nice and friendly small town. The marina is lively, packed full this week and next as it is now the peak of the season.

Location:Havsgatan,Mariehamn,Åland Islands

The least populous EU municipality

Today took us to Sottunga, just 9 miles from Seglinge. We had considered to go a bit further, but the wind picked up and the 13 miles to the next place were a bit unprotected. Sottunga, by the way, is the least populous municipality in the EU with 101 inhabitants (in 2014).

In these small harbours, you need to be early to get a spot so we were not sorry to have tied up around noon, just as a few visitors from the previous night were leaving.
Next to us are three boats of the same Finnish family (90% of the boats we see are Finnish now, there is the odd Swede, a rare German and we are the only Dutch we ever see). Two of the family, couples with small children arrived first, the grandparents came a bit later and (literally) squeezed in between so that the grandchildren could step on board from both sides. How nice to be able to do this as a family! We see lots of small kids on boats here, very independent, always wearing life jackets and usually busy with a fishing net, that seems to be a universal pastime!

There is an interesting 17th century church here, with a typical separate bell tower.
And we borrowed bicycles to check out the shop, which was as limited as the one in Seglinge. One better comes well provisioned to these islands. The smoked herring one can buy at the harbour is delicious though!

Here are some pictures:







Little fisher girl.







Sottunga church





And Sottunga bell tower





The church is still actively used.





Smoked herring

Location:Finland

The small Åland harbours

We are now in Seglinge, a small harbour which is full with 19 boats. When we arrived, it seemed quite full with only about 8, but the advantage with stern buoy moorings is that you can fill the place up nicely. With two boats on a stern buoy and the fenders (almost) touching, you can use all available space nicely.

What we are finding is that the people running the harbours are amazingly friendly and helpful. The young lady harbourmaster here helps new arrivals tie on, takes your mooring fees, informs you that there will be smoked fish for sale at 6pm and assists her 4 year old son in selling you potatoes (he only needs assistance because he does not speak English yet). Coffee is for sale at a little stall and later also cake. And all of this on an island with 34 permanent inhabitants!

Here are two pictures:







View from Onbekommerd.

Location:Åland Islands

The Russian influence

Åland is part of Finland (although it is semi autonomous and is Swedish speaking). Finland is a relatively young nation, it only exists as an independent state since 1918. Until 1809 it was part of Sweden, at that stage it was taken over by Russia. At the October revolution in 1917, the Finns cleverly proclaimed independence which was confirmed in 1918.
There are still quite a few remnants of the Russian influence, one being the marking of the fairways between the islands. This is mainly done using the 'cardinal system', where obstructions are marked with black and yellow marks, the 'order' of the black and yellow indicating where the obstruction is:





This is a South cardinal, the black underneath the yellow tells us that the mark is to the south of the obstruction.

The cardinal system is still extensively used worldwide, but generally only to indicate separate obstructions, not the course of the fairway. This is nowadays usually done with the lateral system, using red and green buoys. In the Åland Islands the lateral system is only used on the newer fairways, the Russians used (and apparently still use) the cardinal system almost exclusively.

A more visible remnant of the Russian times are the Bomarsund ruins. As Åland was the westernmost outpost of the Russian empire, they wanted to build a fort here to defend against naval attacks and to protect their Baltic fleet. They started building it in 1850, it was to be an enormous fort with 8 large towers. But long before it was finished, in 1854, it was destroyed by a joint British - French force.











From the ruins of the tower, one has a great view of the Åland skärgård:





At the foot of the tower, in the bay called Notviken where the Russian fleet was to have been anchored, there now is a guest jetty on the rocks where we are now tied up on a stern buoy.

Location:Sund,Åland Islands