Day One Hundred Forty-Three May 28

Our arrival time in Mariehamn is at 08:00. At the dock, the island's flag proudly flying looks like Sweden Blue and Yellow with a Red Cross superimposed over the yellow strip.

Mariehamn is the capital of Aland and is an autonomous territory under Finnish sovereignty. Its autonomy allows Aland to self-govern. What you might not know is that 88% of the inhabitants speak Swedish as their native language rather than Finnish. The island's proximity to Sweden with Roslagen being 38 kilometers (24 mi) by ferry as opposed to Helsinki roughly 200 miles away is probably a major reason for the language.

During our stay we could see that Sweden cars were prevalent on the streets. OK it is time to explore the island, did I say it is raining!!! Passing through the terminal building we reach the road above and turn towards the Pommern, a four masted barque (ship) that is permanently moored in Mariehamn Harbour which has become a museum.

We are in search of the viewpoint which will give us a view of the harbour as well as the city. On our way we pass the MS Birka Stockholm ship moored in the harbour. It does not look like anyone is on the ship currently.

As we climb towards the viewpoint, we are passed by two tour buses, one from an Oceania Tour. Each bus takes passengers to the top to see the views; we on the other hand walked up.

While here we see people playing Disc Golf. This is where you take a frisbee, throw it the direction of a yellow-coloured steel mesh net and record a score. The players have several frisbees depending on how far away you are from the net. I assume heavier weighted frisbees for short distance etc. A player will then throw his or her frisbee in the direction of the hole, find it and continue until the frisbee in the hole.

The nine-hole course begins on the flats and gradually climbs to the highest point before starting your way back down.

We make our way into the town along a well treed boulevard to look for a Decaf Coffee for Janice, but Finland does not do decaf. Oh well it is back to the ship. We did not find any decaf in all of Scandinavia but luckily for Janice the cafe's serve wine.

The abundance of bike trails in the city would have been a great opportunity to explore further but the constant rain prevented this from happening.

As we leave at 19:00 it is now onto Stockholm for two days. It is only 64 nautical miles away, so you can see the affinity to Sweden and not to Finland.