At 05:30 in the morning someone repeatedly knocked on my room door in the Gästhem Neptun in Mariehamn. Who on Earth could do so on a Sunday morning? It took me some time to get out of bed. When I cautiously opened the door, I saw Peter. “We have a window of opportunity”, he said repeatedly, before I got it. He talked about fuel, of course. The tower in Mariehamn airport had some peculiar opening hours, like 05:30 – 07:00, and it wasn’t clear whether those hours were local time or UTC. As a responsible pilot-in-command, Peter didn’t want to take chances. He wanted to go to the airport now. It was absolutely reasonable. We didn’t want to have a refuelling stop in Arlanda – that would have costed at least the same, as our whole trip. I made Peter an offer he couldn’t refuse: he would drive to the airport alone, and do the refuelling. Peter agreed – he is a real gentleman, always, and I was so grateful for that! When Peter returned, we had breakfast in the garden, and he told me the refuelling story.
The tower was closed, so was the airport. Pilots can get in and out via a gate with a code. There wasn’t any personnel at the aerodrome. Peter didn’t give up and tried to find out whether he could use any of the fuel cards that were in the aircraft. Some of them expired, others didn’t work… The fuel station had a menu in different languages, but if you were thinking longer than anticipated, it would switch to Finnish. It came up with the funny questions like “How many litres of fuel do you need?” Finally, after trying all cards including his own, and different languages, Peter succeeded! The fuel station did stop refuelling a couple of times, but what’s the problem – you just try again and again. We had the same troubles with Vagn in Reims on our tree-week tour earlier in July…
Well, we were happy we didn’t have to worry about fuel any longer, made a wish plan for the day, and got on the road.
First – sightseeing in Mariehamn. There were many charming old buildings. The one on the photo below was built in 1896; even tourist buses stopped by:
On our first day on Åland we drove around Fasta Åland, from Prästö to Eckerö, and Dånö to Mökelö. On Sunday we decided to explore the southeastern part of the archipelago: islands of Högskär, Långnäs, Långholm, Degerö, Backö, Ôstersocknen, Sonnbodalandet…
A small picturesque fishing harbour in the southern Högskär:
Many islands on Åland are connected by small bridges. One of them, we called The Golden Gate of Åland:
The roads are of red granite and have a distinctive red colour. There were not many cars on the roads, we could just stop almost anywhere, enjoy the view, and take pictures.
On a ferry from Långnäs to Föglö islands:
Degerby area near the harbour, with small shops and a traditional fence we saw everywhere on Åland:
In one of the shops we saw a watch with a sign “Best time of the day”; we loved it.
In one of the other shops they were selling ice-cream. I ordered 2 balls, and got a chock when it appeared in front of me: the portions were enormous! They were also expensive – 3 EUR per ball! I wouldn’t be able to eat it all, and lucky me – Peter agreed to take half of it. The colours of the ice-cream suggested it didn’t come from the natural ingredients, but almost any ice-cream tastes good in a blazing heat of +32C.
In the tourist office I asked where they had a nice sandy beach in this area. I didn’t want to take any chances, and again to end up in a place where I don’t want to swim. We were recommended to drive to Börstingsnäs:
We discovered a small sandy beach, and I got into the water:
The bottom of the swimming area was a kind of clay, it went down very steeply, and then lots of plants… You basically couldn’t do any swimming… I entertained myself by taking pictures of small fish that were plenty around:
It was nice to get into the water, but our stay on the beach was very short. The sun was burning, and we hurried up to our air-conditioned car. We went north, to the island of Långholm. In one place, between the islands, there was a cable ferry. It transported any car from one side to another, never waited for being full, neither for a specific timing:
We returned to Degerby, and went around looking for a place for lunch. In general, there are only a few restaurants outside Mariehamn, and even in high season they can be closed. Another option is supermarkets that are not many either, but they have fresh salads and sandwiches of healthier choices than some of the cafes/restaurants.
A ship pilot cabin in Degerby, from 1860:
The first ship pilot cabins were established on Föglö islands in the beginning of 17th century. There were a customs chamber and a ship pilot station that operated till 1968.
One of the harbours and a ferry in the background from a closed restaurant’s terrace in Degerby:
The last thing we wanted to visit before taking a ferry back to Mariehamn was a church on Ön island:
Around the church was an impressive precinct wall of stones, with owner’s marks still intact to mark those who delivered the stone. The church was first mentioned in the 13th century, but rebuilt several times later.
We left Föglö islands with a bit of nostalgic feelings; we loved the raw beauty of them.
Peter and I were going to fly back to Sweden, and I also was going back to Denmark that evening. Before leaving these magnificent islands we wanted to experience one more thing: Åland’s traditional dish – pancake:
Any cafe worth its salt serves the Åland pancake. We got ours in a cafe in the Mariehamn marina, with the nice view to the boats. The pancake was made of rice semolina, sugar, flour, eggs, and cardamom; and was more like a pudding. Served with prunes compote and whipped cream.
Interesting fact about Åland is that it belongs to Finland, and their currency is Euro. But they speak Swedish! It was fun to switch to Swedish sometimes, though English was widely spoken.
We drove 150 km that day, and our tour looked like follows:
Last photo on Åland, in the airport:
The tower was open, probably on request from someone, because it was supposed to be closed. We were asked to fly in 2,500 feet or below when in control zone and in TMA. First when we left TMA, we could climb.
The weather was nice over Sweden, a bit misty, and we had a tailwind.
Peter and I were overwhelmed of all that we experienced on Åland. It was calm in the cockpit – we didn’t talk much, just enjoyed the flight:
We reached Smålandsstenar ESMY airport in about 2,5 hours:
I don’t like tall trees on final… In fact, I don’t like trees on final at all. But Peter mastered the landing fine, as he always does. I feel very safe flying with him, and Peter as a pilot always does his homework.
On the aerodrome, we took the chairs out to the grass, and – before saying goodbye to each other – had a cup of tea with a couple of apples, and with the best view a pilot can get:
We had an outstanding weekend on Åland islands… Many thanks to Peter for making this trip happen, and for being a great companion!