When we were in a harbour last week, we spoke with the captain of a Dutch boat who was moored next to us. He told us how much he loved sailing in Sweden and said that he and his wife came up north almost every year to savour the delights of the land of herrings. He asked if we were locals and we told him that we were in fact from the other side of the country, with our home harbour being in the Stockholm archipelago. At the mention of the word "archipelago" he shuddered and admitted to us that he had never ventured along Sweden's east coast at all. We were really surprised as he was a very experienced sailor and he had a big, modern yacht, bristling with every navigational aid known to man - radar, depth metre, gps, colour plotter, vhf etc. In addition, his boat had a swing keel, which meant he could go into quite shallow water. In short, we declared, it was an ideal boat for sailing in the easy coast archipelagoes.

At this he shook his head and said that he felt safe in the south and south-west of Sweden, where one could just set the course and go, but he was absolutely terrified of the rocks and shoals in the east coast. For those of us who live in that environment, we wonder what the fuss is about. Sure, you have to be on your toes, but the benefits of sailing in these waters is immense. You are always close to land, you pass interesting islands and landscapes at close range and it is easy to find an anchoring place for the night. I find sailing along a straight coastline to be as dull as dishwater - give me the islands anytime.

To give you an idea of what scares these sailors, here is a shot of the portion of seachart where we are moored at the moment. We are anchored in the bay on the north side of the V-shaped island called Tärnö (Tern Island).




The yellow areas are the land, with the water designated by white, light blue, medium blue or dark blue. The numbers you see represent the depth in metres. In a white area, your depth is over 10 metres. In the light blue areas, the depth is between 10 and 6 metres, in the medium blue area between 3 and 6 metres and in the dark blue area it is between 0 and 3 metres. In addition, there are small "+" signs which show some of the visible rocks, a "+" with dots in each quadrant showing underwater stones, a few black dots that are rocks (visible), some stick figures which are markers and even a route marked with a solid line along the chart. This route is usually the safest way through the area - and something that we rarely follow, preferring to island hop our way around. It sounds complicated, but after a time you learn to interpret the charts quite easily. I think it is the sight of so many dark blue areas, rocks and twists and turns that puts people off, but really it is not difficult if you are careful.

After leaving Karlshamn harbour, it was a short trip through the rocks to Tärnö. Naturally we took the most dangerous, shallow route but then we used our plotter to make absolutely sure of exactly where we were. It is connected to the GPS and so is quite accurate - I would hesitate to come this way otherwise and I have nothing but admiration for the sailors who used to weave in and out of these islands using blind faith. We were fortunate that the SXK buoy was free, so we tied up to it rather than to the public pier we could see on land. Here we could be in complete peace and use the zodiac to go to land in the morning to look around. If the rain eases...





Compared with the other islands in the Karlshamn archipelago, Tärnö had very few inhabitants, even though it was the biggest island. Most people lived here only during the fishing season, though there were pilots stationed out here and sometimes the place was used as an emergency harbour. Even today, there are only sixty or so summer homes on the island, with many of them hugging the beach in the northern part of the island.




As we looked across the bay, we could even see Karlshamn in the distance. I can see why this is a popular place to sail to on the weekend. You can tie up to a free pier, there are bbqs set up there and the island itself offers a lovely variety of walks. You can simply walk along the coastline up to the small settlement, take one of the routes through the pastures to the high cliffs on the other side of the island or even look at where some of the stone masons used to carry out their trade.

We were restricted by the weather, which is almost tropical at the moment. We have warm, humid mornings, with heavy dark clouds accompanied by pouring rain and thunder arriving in the early afternoon. This sometimes clears later and we have a fine evening, but sometimes it lingers - all very strange for Sweden.




Around at the main settlement we found a tiny cafe and shop - the only one in this archipelago. I was reminded of the little places we visited last summer in Stockholm and we both remarked that this was something we enjoyed doing - coming on land in the island communities and exploring. I have missed that so much this year and it feels fantastic to start doing this all over again. We would have liked to have our bikes on land as this was perfect land to ride around, but the inclement weather put a stop to it. Still, we enjoyed dangling our feet off the pier and enjoying a coffee while we watched the clouds pass by.




As you can see from the above picture, the roads are built very close to the front of the homes. Fortunately there are no cars on the island, just a few small mopeds, though there is a lot of pedestrian traffic which would pass by your window. There are regular tour boats that come here several times a day in the summer months, so I imagine that you could feel somewhat invaded at times.

In the morning we decided to move across to another island about two hours sail away from here. Lars-Göran was feeling tired, though he didn't tell me that bit of vital information. It would have probably been better to wait rather than take short cuts through these stones when his attention was not good. It wasn't long before we got a wake-up call by ploughing into a rock while doing 4 knots. It was a big bang and gave the rigging a good shake. Of course, it happened because he was busy reducing the foresail in the most narrow part of the route and we strayed too close to land. Typical Lars-Göran timing strikes again. Fortunately Fiona has a keel structure that allows her to bounce over stones - one of the reasons we chose her. The modern bulb keels would have been quite damaged if they hit the same stone.

Phew! A big breath of relief!

After sailing through some open water where quite large waves were rolling in because the wind had increased dramatically, we managed to find our way into a sheltered bay on the west side of the island of Tjärö (Catchfly Island, referring to the pretty flower which blooms here every spring).




This proved to be a long, narrow island, about two kilometres long and a few hundred metres wide. The landscape was really unusual in that it reminded me of a minature rift valley, with irregular lobe shaped beaches made of smooth rock slabs and small, deep inlets. It looked fascinating and I couldn't wait for the rain to stop so we could row to land and take a look around.




We had read that this nature reserve was a very popular day trip, with regular ferries arriving from nearby Ronneby every day during the summer months. I can see why they come here as this is a lovely example of a small island farming community as it would have looked over a century ago. In many ways, it reminded us of the islands of Håskö and Lisselön in the St Anna archipelago that we visited last year.




One thing we noticed immediately were the many, many stone walls. They were unusual in that whoever built them had even gone to the trouble of building them up slopes, along rocks and down dales. Usually we see a stone wall built up to the rock, then continued on the other side. This is the first time we have seen one built over such a steep slope.

I thought again of the first of the Moberg books I read (Swedish title: Utvandrarna, English title: The Emigrants), which documented life in this region. He spoke there about the poor quality of the land and how even the small patches of fertile ground that existed had to be cleared of stones before it could be cultivated. We gazed at the stone walls, which were built from rocks collected in the adjacent fields and thought about how hard life was for the people trying to wrest a living from this harsh land. But also how they utilised everything around them and wasted nothing.




We spent a whole afternoon walking around, looking at the slabs of stone around the shores, all worn smooth by the retreating ice during the last ice age. This was contrasted with the interior of the island that has been partially cleared and cultivated over generations. There were signs that areas had been set aside for growing meagre crops and other areas used for grazing livestock. We even came across a herd of hardy Highland cattle in a field. But what made this place very special was the sea - visible from all points.




The whole area is a nature reserve and the Swedish tourist authority run the island, preserving the buildings as an example of an old archipelago village and keeping the island's agricultural look alive. They also run a very well visited youth hostel, restaurant, small shop, café and guest harbour on the island. Even so, there is no feeling that all of this intrudes on the feeling of stepping back in time. They have done it all really well and with a sensitivity to the natural surroundings. We bought fika at the café and sat in the garden under a sweeping oak tree enjoying the green and silence before walking via the old village and back to the beach where we had left the dinghy.




We arrived back at the boat just before a big shower of rain hit, so I was able to salvage the washing and hang it under the shelter of our cockpit tent. That tent is a treu godsend as it extends the usable area of the boat considerably when we are moored. It provides a whole new room for us, allowing us to be outside in windy or wet weather - something you get rather a lot of in Sweden.

We feel ready to move on again tomorrow, though we are feeling a little uninspired about the constant cloudy weather as there seems no end in sight. We tuned the tv and watched the weather to see a map over a larger area and it appears that the weather here in the south of Sweden is dominated by a large system sweeping up from Denmark and Germany. Ironically, a little further north it is fine weather and in the Stockholm area where we would normally be this time of the year, it continues to be a hot, clear summer with no rain in sight. Which makes us wonder of course what the hell we are doing here.

So we will prepare to head eastwards again and hope that summer will come back soon. Though I have just looked out the window and seen a team of ducks flying in formation and heading south. Already! Do they know something we don't? "Come back" I called out to them waving my arms about "it's only August!".