Weekend kayaking in Stockholm archipelago

 No wind.

 Saturday evening close to eight o´clock.

 Under the cliff of Stora Gryt

 Close to Dalarö Skans, a fortified old gun house, to defend Sweden. No canons there today.

The lovely view from my kayak, Blå Jungfrun!

My embroderied Artist Trading cards

Näckros Nymphaea-landskapsblomma

 I want to show you some of my ATC cards, made for trading projects on a Facebook group I´m following. Each swap has it´s own theme.

My favorite

Fairy tale

Inspired by Karin Bergöö Larson, swedish textile artist from 19th centrury.

Bortbytingen / the child of trolls

Sjörapporten, coastal weather report

Swedish summer night

We have vacation here in Sweden and internet is mostly accessed by mobile internet (if available). A few days ago we were out kayaking with the whole family, and I slept in my sleeping bag cover (hooray for mosquito nets!). The picture is the view from my sleeping bag.

Have a great summer, all readers!

Longing for another season...

Hamnskär in the Swedish South-East Archipelago, close to the city Nyköping.

Great day a few years ago, out canoeing with mom in the lovely August weather.
Nice warm weather, a light breeze and comfortable temperature in the sea water.
It´s really something to long for and to remember!

Soft pastell

Det har varit en intensiv målarmånad och jag njuter av att måla pastell.
Lavskrikor trivs i gammal lavrik skog.
(It has been an intensiv month of drawing and I enjoy using the pastels.
Siberian jays like old forests with many lichens.]

I april gjorde vi en resa till Örudden och Landsort och studerade ejdrar och andra fåglar.
[In April we traveled to Örudden and Landsort in the Baltic sea and watched eiders and other birds.]
Skåne är inte bara platt utan har även ett böljande landskap. Jag tycker mycket om våren och inspirerades av den slingrande vägen och blommande hagtornsträd.
[Skåne is not always flat, but can also have a hilly landscape. I love the spring very much and was inspired by the winding road and the flowering hawthorn trees.]

Stamp of the day: Skärgården (The Archipelago of East Sweden)

I´m going to the archipelago this weekend, kayaking and camping. The salty (bräckt) water is warm and the boat people have already gone home. I love to be there.

Little Cranberry Island, Maine, USA, North America, Earth, Universe

Update: I have updated the text since the original text was written late last night while I was really tired, and now I have some more energy to describe it better.

One day on our vacation in Maine we took the post boat to Little Cranberry Island, a wonderful island with 70 residents in the winter and 13 children in the local school. In the summer there are hundreds of people living on the island. It is maybe 5 km long and 3 km wide, but has real (short) roads and a few cars, including electric ones. The photo to the left is the "post boat/ferry terminal", and on the right is a very unhappy electrocuted seagull in the harbor. You have to be careful if you plan to sit on electric wires. The island is beautiful, and I can imagine living there, at least in the summers. The winters must be very cold though, and it must be hard to transport everything out to the island. And I mean everything - toilet paper, fridges, gasoline, frozen peas, and library books.

Religious house (church) and ornithological hat house. In the little and only village, Islesford, there is a wonderful art gallery featuring local artists, and we were contemplating buying several watercolor prints, but our finances aren't the best so we decided not to. But there was a lot of really good art, and AREA commented that my mom's paintings would fit right in with the others on the wall.

Xanthoria lichens on a brick wall (right), and a typical New England house with lots of "veranda" space (left). The houses are in various state of repair, from not at all to wonderfully kept large farmhouses. I loved the porch encircling this house, like a shawl protecting the inside against cold winter winds. These colorful lichens are common along the coast and love higher pH so often grow on limestone and cliffs where the sea gulls hang out.

On the other side of the island is a wonderful pebble beach with tide pools, seals spying on us by bobbing up and down in the water, a view towards the ocean (Sweden is on the other side of the horizon, so far away), and washed up seaweed. This reminded me a lot about Gotska Sandön in the Baltic Sea, because of the serenity, the sky and the ocean (both so incredible blue here in Maine), and the lack of people. This is one of my favorite spots we visited. The lighthouse in a distance is on Little Cranberry Island and at low tide you can walk over to the island next to it.









In the harbor is Islesford Dock, a wonderful restaurant in an old harbor boat house. Here we had the best views and the best clam chowder, a kind of soup, in all of Maine (that we have tasted). Lobsters dipped in butter of course, and drinking Bar Harbor Ale, which is the local beer and not bad at all. We had lobster rolls (more about that later) and chili shrimp too. When you eat lobster you need real tools, lots of napkins, and a bib. It was all delicious!






























The general store shares its space with the post office, which is minuscule. In the winter the store is open only a few hours per day. Everybody has to walk to the postoffice to get their mail. The store owner knew one sentence in Swedish which she proudly said: "Jag älskar min Volvo!".

Lobster buoys are color coded for each owner. These ones are definitely inspired by Sweden, right? To the left are some lobster cages, ready to be thrown in the sea.

Kayaking in the archipelago of Uppland

I went on a camping tour last weekend with some friends. We were kayaking in the archipelago of north Uppland in Sweden on the east side of Gräsö.

The weather was unsteady, lot of clouds and windy too. The kayaking became something different than in good weather, it required some skill in the waves and wind and rain in sunday morning. It was fun and exciting, and I got a few good surfs with my kayak. It was a nice outdoor weekend. I hope you enjoy the photos.

Svensk skärgård, swedish archipelago

Pictures from the Swedish archipelago for LS and all other blog readers

by EH

Skärgårdsnytt i Washington Post

It is not everyday you can read about Dalarö, Fjärdlång and Utö in an american news paper, but here it is. Some excerpts:

"Layer upon layer of isles, islets and barren outcroppings instantly begin to reveal themselves. There are more than 24,000 in all, stretching across a 50-mile arc that extends nearly into Finnish waters. The vast majority are uninhabited."

"The farmer surprises us all: Arriving in his truck, chatting on his cellphone, we soon realize that he doesn't speak English. That's rare in Sweden, even on a rural island, even for a farmer, even one who looks about 60. In fact, there's a good chance that anyone you happen to run into under the age of 65 or so will speak English nearly as well as you do.
Which is almost a shame, because the Swedish language is so melodic and sometimes so wonderfully confounding. Sure, it often seems easy, especially in writing: "bageri" for bakery, "parkering" for parking. Then there are the words that look like you should know them, such as "snart" (soon) or "snabbacash" (the "speedy cash" offered at the ATM)."

Maybe EH or O.K. could post some nice pics of the Stockholm archipelago (skärgården, which literally means the "island garden'), one of my favorite areas in the whole world? Please?

Stamp of the Day: Norwegian lighthouses

Living in lighthouse, now that would be a tiny place, but maybe you might have lots of space for bookshelves?