Karlby- Kökar

The scenery from Sälsõ around the low-lying islands gave an exceptionally beautiful route. We made the most of the sun and were up early to leave our rock and get the code0 up for the light north westerly wind to arrive before the rush in this popular harbour with tight mooring space. The chart photo shows the 'keep your eyes open' route with all the marked rocks and the narrow shallow channel approach into Karlby. The 'hi vis' harbour guy was right on us, guiding us helpfully in full air traffic controller signal mode to the spot dedicated to multi hulls . It seemingly was the only spot in amongst the reeds end on to the pontoon, but it was 'a spot' & we were just grateful to have got it! One by one, the boats came in carefully, smoothly all under the very capable guidance of buzzing 'hi vis' guy , who all afternoon and into the evening ran back and forth along the harbourside .

By the time hi vis guy was bar side we had enjoyed lunch at the restaurant followed by a tour on our bikes exploring the island. The laundry slot was booked whilst we enjoyed listening to the live music from visiting American duo touring Europe all the way from Georgia.

Kökar is known to be one of the more isolated and distinctive islands in the south eastern region & Karlby is the county town on Kökar . Åland has just a couple of hundred inhabitants or so & many have multiple jobs to maintain the island life and connections and manage the municipal finances.

Our afternoon bike ride took us all around the island visiting the church and the ruins of the Franciscan monastery from the Middle Ages.

Obviously, the bread shed had to be checked out.

In the past the economy was based almost entirely on fishing and hunting. Most important was the seasonal fishing for the Baltic herring that took place at the outmost skerries Ören and Mörskär. Every year in August, the men moved out there for six weeks in order to fish enough herring to sell at the autumn markets in Stockholm, Helsinki and Tallinn.Read more