The last ten days comprised some of the very best cruising I have had in Spellbinder. Not only was the weather superb, but I came to discover somewhere which, had I wanted to design a cruising area ab initio, would have been very close to a perfect model.

The Stockholm archipelago has some 30,000 islands, islets, skerries and rocks just outside Sweden’s capital. Once amongst them, the opportunities are endless, and you can lose yourself for weeks. Not months, for the season is short, and we were lucky to tour them in the first part of June, when most Swedes are not yet in holiday mode. We had them virtually to ourselves – it was a very well designed cruise in company with other RYS members. Crew for this part were Johnny and Lucy, who joined me just in time for welcome drinks and a dinner at the Grand Hotel in Saltsjöbaden, where we smartened up a bit. 

For the purposes of this blog post I won’t recount in detail every place we went to, but I do want to note the islands and places visited, for the record, and in case anyone knows them: Utö, Bullerön Hemviken, Lökholmen / Sandhamn, Furusund, Arholma Österhamn, Rödlöga, Finnhamn/Paradiset, Gällnö Hemfladen and Stockholm Wasahamnen.

There was an real variety of ways of mooring, including throwing out a stern anchor and attaching to trees or rocks, and picking up stern buoys when mooring bow to a pontoon or staging. With no tides, these things are possible.

The islands generally have houses on them, as most Stockholm dwellers seem to have some place in the archipelago, or know someone who has. Most are coloured reddy-brown, and have pontoons or landing arrangements to allow you to arrive by boat.

We enjoyed some great walks and nature trails: most of the bigger islands have them, together with composting loos and recycling facilities. It is all so well organised and encourages good behaviour. There are windmills, churches and small villages, but a lot was just open part-time, awaiting the arrival of the Swedish hordes, who come to party at midsummer, a huge event locally.

We enjoyed some great sailing too, in light airs, with much use of the cruising chute, in little or no swell.

We had a very sociable time, with a BBQ organised by the Swedish royal yacht club (KSSS) who were a source of great information, and who assisted us hugely in our planning. We also relaxed and enjoyed the wonderful weather, which held throughout and enabled us to wear shorts for most of the period.

We enjoyed some great raft-up parties, some unplanned, and I flew the drone to try and capture the scenes.

I used a rather novel boat scrubber in Furusund which removed some of the weed accumulated since leaving Portugal in March.

We generally stopped for lunch and anchored somewhere for a bite to eat, independent of the fleet.

Many of the RYS Members had chartered, but the hard core of 5 of us who had sailed our own yachts up had a final party together as the charterers returned to their bases. The following morning we steamed in convoy up to Stockholm.

We had time to visit the Royal Palace and to learn more about Sweden’s history and royal family, before attending a final tour and dinner in the renowned Vasa museum, which showcases the Swedish ‘Mary Rose’.

In all, an extraordinary 10 days. Thank you, Johnny and Lucy, for your great company and able crewing!