Taking sail in Abba land

Several places vie to be the "Venice of the North" but Stockholm gets my vote. The city is dominated by its water and boats are as regular form of transport as gondolas. Boats also provide my favourite memories of a family holiday in the Swedish capital – a very old one, one we stayed on and one that took us to the Stockholm archipelago.

The first of the trio dates back to the 17th century. The Vasa has similarities to the Titantic (both ostentatious ships that sank on their maiden voyage) and the Mary Rose (both over 300 years old and raised from the sea bed and restored in modern times). The Vasa – 95 per cent of which is original – looks and looked magnificent, decorated all around with life-size carvings of figures but its design was fundamentally flawed. As was immediately apparent to the contemporary observer, it stood much too tall out of the water and also wasn't carrying enough ballast at launch, which caused it to capsize after 20 minutes. As ever, it's the human aspects of the displays which most strike a chord: the tin buttons of sailor's jackets, their pewter mugs, boots and combs. One section also includes waxworks based on recovered skulls that almost bring the drowned back to life. The design of the museum is as brilliant as the design of the ship was woeful. A rich variety of exhibits is shoe-horned into every corner and on a number of levels, the giant ship is always at the heart. One moment you're walking down a tableau of a street scene depicting reaction to news of the sinking then exploring a recreation of the inside of the Vasa and then examining an model showing the stages of her recovery in 1961.

Permanently moored on an island reached by a short crossing from the Vasa, the af Chapman was built in 1888 at Whitehaven and is still going strong as a youth hostel. For a night's accommodation this little piece of England in Stockholm provides unbeatable novelty and value. We had drinks on deck beneath the rigging at dusk while looking out over the brightly coloured medieval buildings of the old town on the far side of the water. My son later took his position on the top bunk in our cosy cabin with a porthole at his head and side. It must feel like sleeping in a washing machine. The 75-metre long vessel was very ship-shape having recently undergone refurbishment.

Stockholm is a very walkable city with lots of quiet open spaces and we didn't have far to plod with our rucksacks to the quay for ferries to the archipeligo, my favourite part of our holiday. Most passengers disembarked at Vaxholm, the busiest island. For us, though, this was where voyage really began, although it still seemed like we were in a vast harbour.

Islands were everywhere – 24,000 freckle the map – but there was no sign of the open sea. Some jetties were so small it was remarkable that such a large vessel like ours could dock at them so quickly and adeptly. Sometimes just a couple of passengers disembarked. I watched them as they carried their bags up footpaths then disappeared into the trees heading for one of the numerous little red houses. (I thought all the islands were called Kabel until I realised that the signs warned skippers of underwater power connections). Low-lying and pine-clad, the islands look the same but I was determined to identify one of them, Viggs, and kept nipping inside to check the sat-nav map. The reason? This unassuming few hectares was where the Abba boys owned summer houses, one on each side of the island, and composed some of their biggest hits. We had sailed for nearly three hours but our destination, Grinda, next to Viggs, was no far flung outpost because of the dominance of its hotel. Dinner was deep-fried herring on the decking of a restaurant overlooking the sea. After a twilight dip my daughter and I watched as a helicopter dropped its passengers beside the hotel.

We were glad to return to the south of the traffic-free island and the idyllic seclusion of our accommodation in the forest. What's described as a cottage is more accurately like a timber Wendy house – right down to the floral curtains that hung directly from the rails.

Elsewhere inside we found four wooden chairs upturned, classroom-style, on a tiny table and, in the same open plan area, a kitchen and two beds, one of which slid out from under the other. The only other room contained bunks. The Three Bears would love it here. Our breakfast wasn't porridge but a continental selection in a hamper delivered by quad bike from the hotel. Well, we deserved a bit of luxury. Water was supplied in the form of a standpipe shared with the other four cottages in our plot, the loo was a similarly communal compost toilet (with a disabled facility which must be something of a collectors' item) and the shower ran with lukewarm seawater.

The back to basics facilities were fine and made our stay all the more of an adventure especially for the children but at 100 per night the cottage was pricey.

As I wrote my diary at dusk at a dimly-lit outside table I looked across at the neighbours and wished we'd brought some tea light candles to brighten the evening as they had done.

All I could hear were crickets and the occasional distant drone of a motor followed a few seconds later by the gentle crashing of the wash on the narrow strip of sand 100 yards away through the trees that we had grandly taken to calling "our beach".

In truth, there's not a lot to do on Grinda unless you're aboard one of the many vessels that ply purposefully up and down every sound, going where and why who knows. We're not beach holiday fans but the next day we were more than happy to get into full Mediterranean mode with barely an English accent in earshot. For our children, used to wet walks in Wales, this was a rare treat. We dipped in and out of the water all day and, in between, basked on the large, smooth rocks that form the coastline like lions on the kopjes of the Serengeti.

Later we had barbecued burgers listening to two blokes with acoustic guitars performing a distressingly bad salsa version of Hotel California. Change the singer and the song but keep the sunshine and the mood and we could've been in a re-make of the Mama Mia! film just a stone's throw away from where the songs were composed. I prefer Abba – the Movie. As the credits roll, the group are inside a summer house on Viggs. Thank You for the Music plays and the camera pulls away from the window and takes off to reveal more of the endless archipelago. The Abba islands had been the perfect ending to our adventure too.

WHERE TO STAY

af Chapman ship. See bit.ly/chapmanship.

Grinda hotel and island. See grindawardhus.se/en.

Guide to the Stockholm archipeligo include timetables. See bit.ly/archipeligo.

Vasa Museum. See vasamuseet.se/en.

Fly to Stockholm with Ryanair from Stansted to Stockholm Vsters.

YP MAG 20/11/10