Peter and I met in ESMY, Smålandsstenar airport, early Saturday morning 27th of July. I came to Smålandsstenar the evening before, and stayed in a small hotel 1-2 km from the airfield which Peter booked for me.
When I arrived at the airport, Peter was doing the last paperwork. He had already prepared the aircraft – a Diamond DA40. Peter and I met each other on an annual Värnamo flying club’ trip earlier this year where we flew together in a PA-28. We worked well together, and already there agreed to stay in touch and to go on a flying trip somewhere afterwords.
Our tour was going to the Åland islands, an autonomous region in Finland, comprising of about 6,700 islands. The trip was around 300 nautical miles with headwind, and we estimated the flight to be 3 hours.
The weather stayed perfect: it was +25C at 06:00 in the morning in Smålandsstenar! We headed for Mariehamn.
Before we reached the eastern coast of Sweden, there was a thick and beautiful layer of broken clouds on our way.
Peter booked the aircraft in June, and at the same time I found a hotel for us in Mariehamn on Åland. It was a bit risky to book accommodation in advance, because nobody could guarantee the flying weather. But it turned out to be to our advantage: everything was sold out, and a couple of days before our arrival a few rooms left were in the 4,000 DKK per night (!) range.
I was very excited to visit Åland. Peter has been there, but for me it was the first time, and I never flew that much north from Denmark (or Sweden in this case) in a private aircraft before.
On final to runway 03 in Mariehamn:
Mariehamn has a very nice runway and facilities; the problem is that when the tower is closed (and this is most of the time), then everything is closed – no washroom, no toilet, not a glass of water… You can get fuel, if you can find out how the fuel station works. They rarely answer the phone, even when the tower is open.
Peter spoke to them a couple of days before regarding the fuel. We needed Jet A, and they advised us to be in the airport during the tower opening hours when the fuel personnel is there. There wasn’t anyone when we landed, so we inconveniently had to leave this task for later.
Our rented car already waited for us; we jumped in and drove to our hotel first. We stayed in the Gästhem Neptun, a very nice, comfortable and quiet B&B in the heart of Mariehamn. I highly recommend this place.
We picked up the maps, and set out on a journey: we decided to use the first day for exploring what is called Fasta Åland – the largest (685 km2) and most populous island of Åland, an autonomous province of Finland. About ninety percent of the archipelago’s population lives on Fasta Åland.
First stop in the marina of Mariehamn where we went for a stroll and had lunch.
There were several places we wanted to see. One of them – the ruins of the Bomarsund fortress that in the past was the most magnificent structure on Åland islands:
Bomarsund once was Åland’s economical and political centre. It was constructed by Peter The Great of Russia who began fortification of the area in 1830. Peter The Great had big plans, and brought the gracefulness of Saint Petersburg to Åland that attracted many people from all over Russia to settle in Bomarsund. Around 3,500 people lived there during that time. There were no cities on Åland yet, but Bomarsund was a society with cosmopolitan infusion that had everything from schools and pharmacies to shops and entertainment.
In 1854, French and British forces demolished the fortifications. All civilian buildings, many of those done in an Imperial style, were burned down to the ground, and later the main fortress destroyed. Some 2,000 men were brought to England and France as prisoners of war. The ruins of the main fortress, which was the showpiece of the fortress complex and the largest structure ever to have been built on Åland, can today be freely explored.
We continued to the neighbouring island of Prästö where we wanted to visit various cemeteries of the Bomarsund glory time. The beautiful landscape of Åland archipelago, with sparse pine forests on red rocks and calm blue seas:
The entrance to the cemeteries was this very long grass road with stoned walls on the sides (the last road?):
There were several graveyards, like Roman Catholic, Jewish, Russian Orthodox, probably others as well. We visited a couple of Russian Orthodox burial places. This one was established in 1842:
There are 16 graves today. Except for one grave, all of them have names on, and it is known who those people were. Some gravestones were quite special; Peter photographing one of them:
It was a very peaceful place to be in, as in many graveyards. We spent some time there walking slowly around the graves and talking about the fate of all those adventurous people that crossed lands and oceans…
We did more driving with stops where we admired the nature of these islands.
Kastelholm Castle was another place on our wish list. It is the only medieval castle on the islands, and it was built in the 14th century. Kastelholm was rebuilt several times after wars and fires, and eventually fell into decay. The castle had its glory days under Gustav Vasa when Åland and Finland belonged to Sweden.
Pictures of various kings and queens, feudal chefs and nobles that held the castle:
Swedish King Eric XIV was imprisoned in Kastelholm for several months during his imprisonment of 1569-1577. It is possible to visit his small room there on the 3rd floor. In the book “Ephemerides novae et auctae”, printed in Cologne in 1560 and nowadays exhibited in the castle, Eric made notes which provide an insight into his experiences of imprisonment:
It was interesting to see the castle with its many rooms, hallways, stairs…
Nobody knows exactly when it was built; it was first mentioned in 1388 in an inheritance contract of Queen Margaret I of Denmark.
And we had many places to visit yet. A short stop for a coffee by a local bakery. The place was about to close, the owner told us he was very busy and asked to sit outside. The bakery had terrible old filter coffee! Peter and I enjoyed it with the same terribly old crunchy chocolate cookies:
We drove a lot around the islands of the main archipelago, and saved the Eckerö island for the evening, because we wanted to be on a beach for the sunset. Eckerö church on our way:
Built in the 13th century of red granite, it was the first stone church on Åland. We noticed that all graveyards on the islands were very tidy and well-maintained. And never before saw I a proud sign on a gravestone “Farmer” – it was very nice to see that some people on Åland were happy about being farmers.
Peter and I were looking for a beach. It was about time to have a late dinner we brought with us. But the red granite, Åland is so famous for, seemed to be everywhere, with no sign of white sand beaches…
I wanted to have a memory photo by the license plate of the car we had rented (Åland has its own plate):
We finally found the beach (photo below). It wasn’t exactly what I expected… and I decided to drop swimming. The air temperature also went down from +31C to (shall I say only?) +22C; it was a pleasant evening by the sea. We stayed there till approx. 22:00, had our dinner and talked about all those experiences we have had on Åland so far.
The sun went down around 22:30 that day, it was light when we got back to Mariehamn. In Mariehamn, there was a rock festival, and we could hear the music from our guesthouse. At midnight there was a huge firework.
We had considered going to the rock festival, but – we drove around 200 km that day, saw lots of interesting places, and were tired. It was a long and wonderful day.
