Gangway for the Ferry!

Now that I am forced to live ashore on the south side of Stockholm my commute has increased from 30 yards to 30 minutes. It is only a short walk from my flat to the Bagarmossen T-bana subway station. The following twenty-minute ride on the crowded train is my chance to wake up and read the morning paper (yesterday's highlights were Swedish Olympic scores and Dick Cheney shooting his hunting buddy).
Hopping off at the Slussen T-bana stop on the south side of the harbor, I walk down to the shore to catch the Djurgården ferry that will take me practically to the Vasa Museum's doorstep.

Despite being only a ten-minute trip across the harbor, the Djurgården ferries are indeed an experience. I would not describe them as shapely vessels of any particular grace or beauty, but rather as rugged little motorbarges with a heated deckhouse.

Fred points out that, "You can't really complain about a commute that gets you a boat ride twice a day." True. I do get a stunningly beautiful harbor tour twice daily and it is quite a lot of fun to go crashing through the ice and weaving around the big cruiseships.
Yet, there is something unnerving in riding the little ferries.

What concerns me is what is happening in the pilot house. I want to think that the ferries are just unwieldy, but something about the way they cut the corners and barrel through the shallow water along the banks of Kastellholmen or dive right under the looming bows of these Viking Line cruiseships coming in makes me wonder what the job qualifications are. More than anything, it is how the skippers execute a docking that makes me cringe--and demonstrates the ruggedness of these little tin vessels.

More than once while watching the boat come charging into the dock at a wildly oblique angle my friend David has turned to me and said, "Want to take the bus?"

Onboard you find yourself acutely aware of where the lifevests are stored and always braced for a collision. The adventure might be pleasurably exciting if it did not seem like wanton recklessness.

I can only imagine what summer will be like when the harbor traffic increases ten fold....