Yesterday evening the rain cleared up and we got one of those blue-and-gold Nordic nights, when the sun is so low on the horizon it doesn’t reach the water, so the sea is deep blue while the islands seem to glow with their own honeyed light. It was a harbinger of our first proper day of summer, blue skies and turquoise water freckled with white and the breeze starting gently and getting stiffer until, after failing to reef (reef line too short) we opted for the better part of valour and motored the last little bit to a splendidly sheltered bay where the wind can’t be felt at all. It was immediately so hot that we jumped into the water; then we were cold (17 degrees) until we gout out, whereupon we were hot again. It’s a hard life. (Here’s our bay at Husarö and Wolfgang working up to going for as swim).
On the advice of the Frenchman in the boat next to us at Vaxholm, we decided to head south against the wind and cut through a long but extremely narrow channel between two islands. “It is like a river,” he said. I don’t think he meant river. I think he meant “ornamental stream”. A journey both beautiful and exciting, what more can you want?
Possibly what one could want is one of the beautiful and expensive houses that line the shore. Anyone who tells you Sweden is an egalitarian state is lying!
