Compared to the tiny uninhabited
island of Flaggskär, the town of Karlskrona – famous as a naval town – is a
huge metropolis! The military base was
established in Karlskrona because it was easy to defend and, unlike Stockholm,
free of ice for most of the year.
It occupies several islands – one of
them, Stumholmen, used to be totally occupied by the naval base and its
suppliers – bakers, butchers, distillers, workshops, factories and so on. Stumholmen was not ravaged by the fire which
swept through Karlskrona in 1790, so many of the original buildings have
survived.
A comprehensive and famous Maritime Museum has been established on Stumholmen, which had to be our ‘first port of call’!!
This is the galley and debark house
which was built in the 1780s for the storage of the fleet’s smaller boats. The roof of the building has a unique design which
consists of ten intersecting saddle roofs.
It now contains the Maritime Museum’s collection of wooden boats.
This is the Royal Barge, used during
Royal visits to Karlskrona from 1844 until 1988 – you can just see the gold
crown on top of the jackstaff in the bow …
There’s a nice collection of old
wooden boats, from this whaleboat which had ten sets of oars and could hold up
to 31 men …
… to this tiny ‘jolly boat’ …
… and a rather uncomfortable-looking
life-float – you’d be glad to be rescued, but would have very wet feet!
This was the Navy’s ice sledge, used
in emergencies during the winter months when the inshore waters were frozen
over …
Outside there were three larger
ships to view – a minesweeper/ minelayer …
… a square-rigged sail-training ship
…
… and a torpedo boat. We noticed some Russian tourists looking with
interest around the torpedo boat which had been used to defend Sweden from
their country – amazing how things have changed!
Inside the
museum there was a submarine exhibit – one of the submarines was a very early
one and looked more like a surface ship that dived, the other was more
familiar-looking. We went inside and saw
the torpedo tubes and some of the accommodation, but we didn’t join the queues
of families to get into the main part – the first time we’ve experienced queues
of any kind in Sweden really.
There were
also boat models, a very high-ceilinged glass hall to display some massive
figureheads and an exhibition on tattooing!
We then had
a pleasant walk round the island of Stakholmen – really just a large rock in
the bay and joined to the main town by a pontoon bridge …
From the
top it afforded good views of Karlskrona and its adjoining islands. This is one of the smart residential
districts …
… and this
is looking towards the main town …
The town
itself has got a number of notable buildings, particularly in the main
square. This is Holy Trinity Church, still
called the German Church by many people.
It was built by and for the German-speaking inhabitants of
Karlskrona. Building work started in
1697 and it was eventually opened in 1709 before it was completed, but it
wasn’t until the 1750s that they finally put the copper on the roof!
This is its most impressive and unusual feature – the
wooden, painted domed ceiling …
Another
unusual thing about Holy Trinity church is that the altar is in the south
instead of the east …
This is St
Fredriks Church on the opposite side of the square, which is one of the
churches along the Pilgrims Way, the long route connecting the holy shrines of
Santiago de Compostela in Spain, Vadstena in Sweden (where we went with Astraia
in 2013) and Nidaros in Norway …
The
interior is cool and lofty and decorated in white and gold …
This is the
Town Hall …
I took myself on a self-guided walking tour of the town
on a beautiful sunny day. Karlskrona was
an important commercial harbour and shipyard, as well as a naval base, and that
activity took place on the north side of the island of Trossö because it
provided the most accessible moorings. A
wharf, Excise Office and Weighing House had already been established there by
the 1680s. This is ‘Kungsbron’ – the
Kings Quay …
This is the
Palanderska Court, an early 18th century building, one of the
grandest houses in Karlskrona and the residence of the Lord Lieutenant for most
of that century …
This is
Bastion Aurora, part of the original wall which divided the city into civilian
and military parts …
Next the
Royal Admiralty Church, built in 1685, one of Sweden’s largest wooden churches
…
… inside
decorated in cool blue, white and gold …
This is Old
Man Rosenbom, a wooden figure which has been standing outside the church since
the mid 18th century. In 1956 the original was replaced by a copy and put in a
safer place inside the church. The life-size figure is actually a poor box – if
you lift his hat, you can insert a coin for the poor.
This is the
Clock Tower in the Admiralty Park, built in 1699 as a clock for the dockyard
workers. In 1909 it began to be used as a
bell tower for the Admiralty Church.
This is the
pink and white residence of the County Governor, built in 1909-1911 …
I then went
to explore Brändaholm, a sort of ‘colony’ of little red wooden holiday cottages
founded in 1923 …
I had a
delightful stroll around the neat, narrow gravel paths …
All the little
houses have beautiful lush gardens, all tended to perfection …
… and
everywhere there’s a lovely scent of roses, orange blossom and honeysuckle …
It’s an
idyllic spot, very picturesque – if perhaps a bit
twee …
I walked
back over a number of bridges – I read somewhere that Karlskrona is spread over
33 islands – past some quite large residences on Ekholmen (‘holmen’ means
‘island’) …
… to
Bjorkholmen, the oldest part of the city, with small cottages and narrow alleys
– some of these houses are not much taller than I am!
The first
dock workers built their homes here, and the streets are all named after ships
or admirals. It’s said that the reason
the houses are so small is that there’s not a single beam or rafter in them that
is longer than the timber they could ‘acquire’ from the dockyard!
Our final
sight-seeing trip in Karlskrona was to the famous rope-walk, which is situated
in the part of the dockyard still in use, so we had to go on a guided tour and
produce our passports to get in, and were restricted in what we could
photograph. This is a very old wooden
boatbuilding shed dating from the 17th century …
… still
with its original roof beams intact …
This is the rope-walk which operated here from the
1690s until 1960. It is 1000 feet (300
metres) long to enable the lengths of rope required in the days when ships had
rope rigging to be made …
First the
yarn (such as hemp fibre) is spun and twisted into strands, then several
strands are twisted into the rope, all using basic hand-operated tools and
machinery …
We were
able to have a go at it with some tar-soaked hemp – it’s surprisingly hard work
manually twisting each end – but a lovely smell of tar!
Some rope
was plaited (rather than twisted) using this machine to avoid it curling itself
into knots …
A nice
collection of the finished article …
We also saw
the dry dock, which had been blasted out of the rock. As there’s no tide here in the Baltic, once
the ship was inside and the gate closed at the far end, the water had to
originally be emptied by hundreds of men with buckets! Nowadays of course it’s done with pumps …
And so back
to the boat – this is the effect an afternoon’s sightseeing has on Charles!!
We spent a
couple of days anchored in a little ‘nature harbour’ off the island of Norra
Bollön – there are not so many places where you can anchor or tie up to trees
around here, at least not compared with the Stockholm Archipelago where there
are hundreds – if not thousands – of nature harbours, but this is a nice little
spot …
It was the
perfect place to relax, read, swim, do a few jobs around the boat, and watch
the sun going down …
We were
boarded by ‘pirates’ from another boat anchored in the bay which was flying a
Chinese ensign! It turned out to be the
Whimbrel, which is from Hong Kong, but has a British crew who invited us to
come aboard for a drink once the sun was over the yardarm!
Later the
sunset was even more fiery …
Time to
head ‘back to Blighty’ for a couple of weeks.
We returned to Karlskrona and left Astraia safely tied up in the marina
there …
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