Naomi, Stephen, Dan, Rob, Fiona, Mark and Dave spent a memorable week paddling in the Stockholm archipelago at the beginning of June. The Baltic is beautifully tranquil at this time of year with virtually no other boats to be seen. The sea was like a lake – very calm and not very salty – and the weather was excellent. The wildlife highlight was spotting sea eagles (which i have never seen in the uk). We did a mixture of staying in wood cabins in two locations and wild camping. Cooking on an open fire by the beach as the sun went down was as amazing as the photo below suggests. My favourite trip was when we all met up on st anna – after a few days in the wilderness the little campsite shop felt like proper luxury!
We rented boats and camping equipment locally via a british firm called nature travels. Everything supplied was really good quality and the friendly local contact in gruyt gave us excellent advice on routes and places to stay.
As per usual for a CSCC holiday, there were lots of running jokes including the search for the missing cake (it finally turned up in the bow of one of the boats), rob’s imaginative ways of pitching his tent with no tent poles, the quality of the dinner as supplies ran low and the comparative advantages of using dave’s GPS against using our own eyes.
There was time for a spot of sight-seeing in stockholm and a drink in benny from abba’s hotel before we began the difficult journey back to the uk.
It was a real team effort when it came to organisation, so thanks everyone!
A few pictures:
