Day 54 Visby, Sweden

Before I talk about today's destination I wanted to show you a photograph that I took as we left Stockholm  yesterday and sailed through the Stockholm Archipelago back into the Baltic Sea.  It is a gorgeous evening as we cruise through the 24,000 islands with hardly a breath of wind and the ship leaves artistic waves in its wake. Perfection.

Visby is on the Swedish island of Gotland.  Gotland covers an area of 3160 sq km, a population of 58,000 and a coastline of 800sq kms.  It is not always a destination that cruise ships arrive at cruise ship but Philips guide said that they were trying to build the tourism industry on the island.  Once again Philip and I went separate ways for our tours.  Philip did, you guessed it, yet another bike ride and I did an historical train ride.  Philips tour left in the morning and mine was one of the last in the afternoon.  Tours are always on a strict deadline and today we departed our tour almost half an hour later than scheduled.  Two ladies were on the wrong tour and it took ages to track them down and relocate them.  Stupid women, but also stupid tour guides who weren't checking the tickets properly as people boarded the buses.  Consequently our tour was very rushed.  

Philips was much more leisurely and he thoroughly enjoyed it.  His bike ride took them first to the old town with its heritage listed 3.4km wall that protected the town in medieval times, then the botanic gardens and then inland to Högklint and lastly to Fridhem for coffee - a bike riders tradition.  Here are some of his photos

This photo is from the UNESCO world heritage website. 

My tour was not nearly as picturesque as Philips but I was trying to avoid another ABC tour.  As it turns out I still couldn't avoid a church.  Our bus drove inland to Dalhem where we boarded the train.  The train journey is only 5km long but took us 45 mins.  

After our short train trip we are back on the bus and heading to the well preserved 13th century Anga Church.  Inside, the walls of the church are lined with medieval murals.  Gotland is nickname the island of a 100 churches.

Next on the agenda is the tiny little hamlet of Gnisvärd.  We are shown inside one of the tiny fishing huts.  Watch your head as the ceilings are very low.  These little huts were only used seasonally and fitted out with only the basic items.

The one thing that I was very interested in seeing we only got to see from the bus window as we didn't have enough time to leave the bus!  This is the stone ship burial site where important people were cremated and the ashes spread over the stone ship ground.  This site is believed to be dated around 1100 to 400 BC.

We arrived back at the pier with minutes to spare.  Our guide did ask for an extension of time but the captain was very adamant that all tours should be back in time.  Once we were on board - the last tour - our ship set sail.