The Archipelago

Last night we went on an archipelago dinner cruise. The boat was a ferry for some of the islands, but with a nice restaurant on board. It's not marketed as a tourist tour so it was mainly locals on the way home to their islands.

Stockholm city is spread across 14 islands - but the greater archipelago consists of over 40,000 islands (there is disagreement over the total number - some say there are as many as 80,000 islands). Many of the islands are dotted with summer houses, while others are not much more than a pile of rocks with some vegetation. Some of the islands are quite large with castles, hotels and permanent residents.

For about 4 hours the boat threaded its way through many of the islands and we were able to look at the summer houses. All the summer houses are either red or yellow.

The red is the traditional colour - the paint is made from a byproduct of copper mining and has a natural preservative that protects the wood. It was favoured by poorer people as it was cheap and as it protected the wood so well they wouldn't have to repaint or make repairs that they could not afford. It works very well - some of the summer homes are hundreds of years old.

The yellow houses were for the rich. They could afford the more expensive paint (and the repairs).

It was a very relaxing evening, but it is difficult to get used to the idea of putting on sunscreen before a night out.