A Huge Adventure: Sailing NORTH to SCANDINAVIA

A little more, more, look at the mess, look at the windrows. You're heading towards Sweden. Yeah, I'm very excited. So a bit of an easier course as night settles in. I've wanted to sail to Scandinavia for a long time, and this summer we finally made it happen. I have so many images in my head of what I hope to find, but I have no idea what we're actually going to find. It's hard to say where we are. You trust this little guy. You don't need a mattress in Sweden, just a sleeping bag. I'm literally shaking. That was amazing. I'm Maya, this is Aladino, and this is our little 28-foot home, Magic Carpet 1. The idea to sail to Scandinavia first came to me over two years ago. I envisioned quiet anchorages surrounded by smooth rocks, small red houses on tiny islands, mossy forests with antlered deer. So we decided to go north. Our boat was in the Mediterranean at the time, so in the winter of 2019, we set off on a huge inland journey through Europe, traveling through canals and rivers from the coast of France all the way to the Netherlands, with our sights set on Scandinavia. But in early 2020, well, we all know what happened. Plans got pushed back, and then we started a crazy refit project on a different boat. But now, finally, this is the summer. This is the summer when we can finally make the dream come true. The summer of Scandinavia. It's so quiet here. The water is scarcely moving. There's barely a breath of wind, there's just birds and the sound of some insects buzzing. The land is dry, it hasn't been raining too much lately, although it's supposed to rain this afternoon if the forecast is correct. I know that Sweden is associated with a lot of folklore and stories and this kind of magical, I don't know, idea behind it, and I can see it. It's true. There's something so calming about this landscape that makes you feel like anything might happen. And that in the forest lurks thousands of magical possibilities somehow. It's just very open to imagination, I suppose. Yeah, open to imagination. That's how I would describe it. The journey began in the Netherlands after over a month of getting the boat ready to go. New varnish, new non-skid paint on the decks and new cushions made by a new friend. After all that, the boat looked spotless and we were very ready to go. We kept the compass pointing north and set our sails for this brand new adventure. We might have just said goodbye to the IJsselmeer for the final time. The story of this Scandinavian summer is a long one. From the Netherlands, we sailed across the North Sea to Denmark. I think it's quite funny how the color of the sky can change how you feel about a day because honestly, the wind is actually really good. I mean, we have some reefs in the sails, but with that, we're moving really nicely. The motion is very comfortable. The sea is flat. But when the sky is gray and it looks all stormy, your mind just thinks it's so much worse than it actually is. In Denmark, we wove our way through the Lymfjord canal, a series of saltwater bays that cuts straight through the country. We waited for a weather window to make the relatively short crossing from Denmark to Sweden. Finally found the perfect window, although it meant leaving at night. And then we found ourselves in Sweden, which was my unofficial goal all along. So we explored the West Coast in search of the idyllic Scandinavian coastline of my imagination. Turns out it's not just in my imagination. And along the way, we had friends join the adventure. I got inspired by the landscape and played music in beautiful anchorages. We learned how to tie the boat up in ways that we never would have considered before. And along the way, we filmed every step of the journey. So join us right here on YouTube every Friday as we tell the tale of this Scandinavian summer chapter by chapter. We'll start at the beginning. We'll take you through the Lymfjord canal and all of the surprising delights we found there. You can sail with us as we make the crossing to Sweden, and then marvel with us at the stunning coastline we find. So subscribe to the channel, and we'll see you next Friday for chapter one.