A few days have passed..

..and she is growing..
(Photo: Dag Ehrenpreis)

Welcome, little Princess of Saba!

Yesterday she arrived, the little princess of Saba! (Here 4 hours old) After 36 hours of hard labour she entered the world on the 7/7 - a beautiful summer´s day!
Happy parents Lina - my daughter - and her Pontus are all well. Pontus and Lina met when they were babies in Tanzania long time ago (when their parents lived and worked in Africa) - and bonded! In Kiswahili, the 7/7 is called the Saba-Saba day. (Saba is seven in Swahilii) That´s why she is now given this "working" name. For the time being!
We all wish her welcome to this world and are dying to meet her! I am heading for Stockholm now - you bet!

Beautiful days in the archipelago

Midsummer Day at Brandskär far out in the archipelago..

Midsummer- Sandhamn..

The boat that took us from the mainland to the island if Sandhamn the evening before Midsummer! The following morning, we found it had sunk and couldn´t believe what we saw!
There is no explanation on what has been going wrong! I am so glad nothing happened on the way here, at sea!
Midsummer everning at the house of good, old friends at Sandhamn was a great comfort! The house has a wonderful view of the sea and the weather was great! And so was the food - heering, shrimps, eel, smoked whitefish with beer and snaps! And strawberry cake for dessert - or pudding as the English would say!

Summer! The first swim!

Ok. I live in Paradise. And today summer came to Gotland!

Time to climb into the cab and head for the beach!

This is Svarthäll Beach in northern Gotland. Kilometers of white sand and..no people.

My niece Stella is the first one in the COLD water! She frolics and splashes around for quite sometime! Brrrr..

Then my sister joins her..

As for me?OH no -over my dead body! Too cold! I pretend cowardly be very busy watching the beautiful scenery of this lovely island!
Tomorrow I am off heading for Midsummer celebrations on the smaller island of Sandhamn in the Stockholm archipelago..Maybe there, I will dip a toe in or so. Anyway the rumors are that the turbot is on in the Baltic. I will for sure go fishing instead. At least some encounter with this element!

After all, it was not sooo long ago the Baltic looked like this!! Ha!

Two cottages to let at Sandhamn during the Gotland runt races..

Two cottages to let in Sandhamn, each with two beds, with small equipped pentries, hot outdoor shower, close to the sea and beach, during the Gotland Runt (Eurocard Round Gotland Race, 6-10 July) and Sandhamn Race (3-5 July) week. (Baltic Classic Race)
For further info contact me at: piaehrenpreis@hotmail.com

A 2009 Gotland Runt winner is honoured the traditional way!!

Eurocard Round Gotland Race is a classic offshore regatta - one of the largest in the world. Start and finish is in Sandhamn, in the Stockholm archapelago. To the 2010 race the following classes are invited: IRC Endorsed, ORC Int. SRS and One Design Classes with more than 8 participantes. Baltic Classic Race are held at the same time. This is a regatta for classic yachts.

Today..

..my daughter Lina and her husband Pontus happily called to inform me they finally bought a gorgeous apartment downtown Stockholm.

It is situated close to the water and parks on a nicely treed avenue. I figured it was quite high time since she is due with their first child in a few days! And live in an old, crammed one room apartment for the moment where not even a baby´s dressing table could fit in!

The building used to an the old postoffice in Stockholm which have now been totally remodeled by wellknown architects. This is what it looks like. There is quite som celing hight, huge windows and with open plan arrangement.

To be in the city, there are quite some green areas around the block. And a considerable park hidden behind the house was originally made for the former postal staff working in the house.

A modern, stylish bathroom (a far cry from mine in the old farm!)

I am so happy for them! And wish them good luck in their new home and with their new baby! (We know it is a girl!)

Paris 26 Gigapixels - Interactive virtual tour of the most beautiful monuments of Paris

Paris 26 Gigapixels - Interactive virtual tour of the most beautiful monuments of Paris

On the Sunday excursion..

..far into the deep woods of northern Gotland, I found her, the wonderfully scented
Lesser butterfly-orchid!
(Nattviol, in Swedish)

The forest was filled with a variety of orchids - en masse! Trips to these areas must have been a highlight in Swedish botanist, physician, and zoologist, Carl von Linné´s (who laid the foundations for the modern scheme of binomial nomenclature) excursions all over Gotland in the mid 1800-century.

Sunday, we went with a group of people and a guide to visit the iron age (500 BC – 800 AD) village of Höglundar (by Garde gård, Stenkyrka), deep into the woods. During this period, the climate in the Nordic area grew colder. Rainy summers and harsher winters led to lower yields from crops and farm animals. When iron came to the North in about 500 BC, it brought with it considerable changes however. Unlike bronze, iron was an inexpensive metal that could be used in everyday life – for tools, weapons and many other things.

The we spotted the foundation of a typical Gotland long house (I have one like this just behind my house!)
(A reconstruction in Gotland)
where people once lived together with their cattle in these areas of rather poor soil. Some evidence of farming has been discovered though, in the lower, more fertile areas of Höglundar.
In the 6th century, Gotland went into economic decline; as trade became more difficult and violence and plundering became more common. Perhaps this is the reason that many farms were abandoned and burned, many fortunes were buried, and the great defensive forts were built.
During this period, the dead were buried in large grave fields. Superficially, the grave fields appear to be very modest affairs, but they often contain rich assemblages of weapons, jewellery, coins and glass. At Höglundar, the many graves are shallow because of the stony ground conditions, and the corpses are buried in limestone coffins under the cairns.

Our guide, Per-Åke, (sitting, ) is himself living on farm close to Lickershamn not far from where we were, which stands on the foundtions of a iron-age dwelling. The farm has been passed on for "he did not quite know many gererations!" There he found the skeleton of "Gotland´s oldest human being" some years ago. It is now placed in the Gotland Fornsal museum. He has also found a number of treasures on his farm: silver, iron items, brons and claypots.
Here the group studying the layout of the iron age village.

A beautiful Juniper tree in the middle of the Höglundar woodlands!
Increased trade eventually led to increased prosperity on the island. New farms sprang up on Gotland, and the first longhouses began to appear; they were built on solid stone foundations and had high roofs.
Today we know of about 1,500 dwelling foundations of this sort, some of them over 50 metres long. In days gone by, they were called kämpagravar – giants’ graves.
Ironworking thus became an important craft, and the smiths made many items that the merchants could sell. The Roman Empire was at its height during the second century AD. Its border with the Germanic tribes followed the courses of the Rhine and Danube. Many of the archaeological finds unearthed on Gotland show that there was extensive trade with the Roman Empire and Germanic tribes.
At the many trading centres along the Baltic, furs, skins, salt, glass, wine and other commodities were eagerly exchanged. (info: by Gotland Tourist Information)