Now as some of you will attest, I don’t mind a tipple every now and then, a glass of sherry on one’s birthday, perhaps some egg-nog at Christmas, but only on special occasions. So when the opportunity presented itself to catch the ferry from Stockholm to Helsinki, I decided the chance to sail through the Archipelago Islands too good to pass up, of course it had nothing to do with the rumours surrounding how this is one of Europe’s biggest organised piss up's.
Now, in Sweden alcohol is controlled by the state, you can only buy it from government run stores and it is very expensive, as a result the Swede’s like to jump on the ferry to Helsinki, where it is duty free, get on the gas all the way there, dock for a few hours (some don’t even leave the ferry!) and get blind all the way back. Not to be outdone by the Swede’s, the Fin’s also like to make a few trips a year, it is like an old school Viking stand off, in fact when you board the ferry those who have just sailed in to port can be found on board already drunk and by drunk I mean 16 hours of drinking, drunk.
Firstly let me describe the vessel; 6 decks of discos, casinos, restaurants, duty free shopping, a sauna area, this place has the lot, even a sleeping room for those of us who could only secure deck tickets. After placing all my belongings in a locker I went on deck to watch the Archipalego islands sail by, sitting there in the sun, beer in hand I did manage to spare a thought for all my friends back at work … well actually no I didn’t but now I type this I'm thinking it probably would have been the right thing to do, so let’s just say I did. However for all the hype and despite a few drunk Fin’s gambling in the casino, it all seemed pretty tame.
The actual course sailed is quite amazing, winding through tiny islands and rock formations, some which are so small they look like the top of a whale, there is little to no room for error. As the sun went down though the real show began, the colours in the sky were quite incredible, scorched reds, brilliant oranges, imagine a sunset/twilight that goes on for about 6 hours, I had never seen anything like this.
After a while I decided to head down and grab a beer, that was my first mistake, in the few hours I had been on deck someone seemed to have got everyone on the boat absolutely maggot. Keen to play catch up I met some Fins (who I find are much more friendly than the Swedes) and kicked on. There are about 4 night clubs open all night and every one of them was heaving, in fact given the state of some people I am surprised people don’t fall over board. When the bar finished serving at about 5am my new friends decided they would scour the boat for more booze. They did manage to find a carton however drinking warm beer at 5am was the end of me (I know some of you out there are thinking ‘hey but you’ve done that before’ but the language barrier at this time is also an issue) so I decided to call it a night because the views sailing into Helsinki are meant to be incrtedible and I wanted to make sure I was up for that.
I awoke with the cleaner vacuuming in to me; apparently we had been docked for an hour so I will have to buy the video of the trip into Helsinki. Having said that if you are ever in this part of the world this is one ferry trip that must be done, incredible scenery, one of the most amazing sunsets I have ever seen and as much drink as you can handle, hell I even had enough time to spend 2 hours in the Sauna/Spa!
Next ... Nude Sauna's in Finland ... you know you want to!
