Sailing away from Stockholm Sweden.
Sweden consists of many islands and is surrounded by a lot
of water –lakes and ocean. Sweden is said to have over 27,000 islands and that
a 1/3 of it is forest, another 1/3 is land that is either cultivated or lived
on and the remaining 1/3 is water.
I was not aware that departing from Stockholm would be so
impressive until we were informed that it would take 5 hours for the Eurodam to
navigate its way down the channel out into the open Baltic Sea and that it
would be manoeuvring its way through and passing many small islands. We started
taking some photos and I hope you are interested in seeing some of the islands,
forests and houses that we passed so close to.
Departure time is crucial and in this port we had two people
literally running to board the ship as the last securing lines were being
released. (They were clapped as they boarded.) We very quickly realised why as
we became part of a procession of 4 large cruise liners exiting the port only about
one minute apart and they then following each other the full distance of the
channel. When you look closely the channel is very well marked –red on the
starboard side and green on the port side. The ship has to be manoeuvred
between the two.
One of the little sauna houses.
Most families in Sweden, if they have an apartment in the
city will also have a summer home somewhere close to the water. The Swedish
people love the water and one in 5 have their own yacht or small boat. Swedish
people also love their saunas and every family has at least one sauna – most also
have one (a separate building) outside as well as one inside. The outside sauna
looks like a separate little house and is usually close to the water so they
can plunge into the cold water after spending sometime in the heat of the sauna.
It sounds like a real ritual that they
do often for their health.
One family owned this island and they had everything on it including a tennis court.
One of the small communities.
One of the islands we passed that was heavily forested.
Most of the houses and saunas we passed were painted the
traditional brown/red colour with white surrounds around the windows. Some
appear to be in very isolated areas and others are nestled together to form
small communities. Most of the homes we saw were deserted– there were no light
on and we saw very few people. The islands are all exposed rock –very well
treed but with no beach areas and every island has a marker or its own little
light beacon. Where the houses were there are small landing jetties and in many
cases this is the only way their residents can be access the outside world.
The procession of cruise ships leaving Stockholm.
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