By Fi

When we last left you, we had just moored up in the convenient Wasahamnen marina in Stockholm, which funnily enough had the rollercoasters of Gröna Lund right next door, complete with 10am-10pm screams every day of the week. To be fair, hearing thousands of people having so much fun simply added to the atmosphere of the place, and made me desperate to ride on the rollercoasters. BUT – first stop was the ABBA museum! Big city life!

The museum is a short walk (past the rollercoasters) from the marina and we decided to not waste a minute, and went straight down there after docking the boat and giving Bernie a bit of a sniff around.

Yes obligatory selfie!
These were exceptional wax statues of the band.
My favourite Frida and Agnetha costumes.
There was a large area with a number of their original costumes behind glass being preserved.
And some cool replicas.
These puppets were used in an advertisement. They are Jim Henson’s designs.

One of the biggest reasons we are in Stockholm is because we are picking up our first visitor from Australia who is flying in to Stockholm to spend some time with us. Tara is Adrian’s daughter and Adrian met her at the airport for her first sailing holiday!

The best way to get over jet lag is to keep moving while there is day light. Or in this case, because its day light till midnight, just keep moving until you stop. We wandered around to keep Tara moving and saw this cool old tram.
Nordica museum close to the marina was a spectacular building.
I’m certain that Bernie thinks he looks similar to this

Our plan from Stockholm is to sail to the Åland islands, which is an autonomous part of Finland, so we needed to do a little provisioning, get Bernie vaccinated, and make a sail plan. We also had friends in another Garcia Exploration 45 that we wanted to meet up with too. So unfortunately, not a lot of jet lag recovery time for Tara or much big city exploring for us yet, as we were on the move again. I didn’t get to do the rollercoasters this time but we plan to be back in Stockholm in a few weeks.

Goodbye for now pretty Stockholm!
Until next time you crazy rollercoasters with all your screaming fans.

We left Stockholm on a sunny afternoon and navigated through the archipelago mostly successfully. We only had to navigate through about a dozen fast moving ferries, plus the gigantic passenger liners that frequent the area, and only got beeped once by a chain ferry who popped out at the last minute (those things are pretty scary), but otherwise an uneventful passage to a beautiful anchorage where our friends on Anemis were waiting for us!

As we crept around the corner we saw Anemis who already had their drone out to record the rare spotting of two Garcia Exploration 45s in an anchorage.
Pretty boats!

The next day, we wanted to get to Finland, so we left in reasonable time, said goodbye to our new friends, and began the journey north east.

Next up we have come adventures in the beautiful Åland Islands

Don’t worry Stockholm! We’ll be back for more fun.