Sara Hammerzmith

And finally, the time was yet again upon us! To board a ship here upon our own lands, celebrating another cruise with Sabaton. As so has it, this was the 10th anniversary of the cruise, and for the occasion they’d upgraded to a bigger ship (apparently) and changed the route. Instead of the like, 14 hour trip it was now a three-day cruise stopping in Tallinn over the day. Yay! Why not I mean?

So, Ivan and I came into Stockholm the day before, and Misa had been around since forever, or something along those lines. Toivo had made a stopover at Dreamhack for some shows, so you could say we were a bit scattered. Around lunchtime the first three mentioned of us met up for Lunch, getting out excitement about the cruise ready. They’d said they’d post the schedule at 13, and frantic as I am, I was sitting and kept hitting refresh like a maniac until the schedule was posted. The bands announced was Bharuk Khazad, Eleine, Manimal, Sabaton, Civil War and Thobbe Englund. Decent schedule, with some bands I like, some I don’t but overall rather good! And still a bit of a “Sabaton Family” cruise, but I guess I just can’t expect anything else.

Toivo was set to arrive around 15.30, so we got ourselves to port about 16.00. checked in and sadly I saw I wasn’t about to continue my tradition. My first Sabaton Cruise I was awarded the cabin 8807, and my second 8809. Needless to say, the pressure on what cabin to receive was high.

But all in all, the cabin we got was, again, good. I seem to, at any cruise I ever went, got really lucky with my cabins, having them rather central and close to stairs or elevators. Yay me, right?

Unexpectedly, when sheepisly looking for programs, we ran into an old friend of Misa! What are the odds for that? Great nonetheless!

After some time, the boarding started and much to our delight, the baggage checking had been removed! How amazing isn’t that? Makes it all alot faster! We made our way onto the boat, and onto our cabin and for the first time really sat down to relax for like 10 minutes before starting.. Whatever we were doing. Misa and I were doing our make up, Ivan did his own thing and Toivo went on and about.

Since Sabaton wasn’t the first band playing tonight, we weren’t as stressed about getting ready as previous years. This days particular schedule started with Bharuk Khazad, followed by Eleine and Manimal before Sabaton. And Eleine was the first band for us today.

At some point, we heard some knocking on the door. Ivan went to open, tightly followed by Misa. And a certain tranquility of shock set in, as them both just stared at whoever was at the door, and the person at the door doing the same. I leaned in a bit, and noticed it was Roy that we’d met on Grapsop earlier this year. We invited him into the cabin for a little chat before it was time for him to hit his own cabin, and for us to get to Starlight Palace for the first show of the evening.

Eleine

Eleine is a band I think I have seen once or perhaps at most twice before, and I was really excited to get to see them again, and this time a little closer up than a hill far, far away.

They played for around 45 minutes, and they put on yet another energetic set, with beautiful views in Madeleines dancing and her enchanting vocals, another supreme performance from the band, and a great start for the cruise for us!

After the show, a lot of people left the venue, and while initially we had thought too, we instead scouted for a great location which would give us minimum pressure, a great view, and enough space to goof around, so Ivan and I stayed to hold down the fort while Misa went to take a little rest during Manimal.

Manimal

I think, legit, it’s been… 12 years? Since I last saw this band live. At least that I have a concious memory of seeing them. Sadly this is a band I never really fell for, but it did not make their shows any less enjoyable! Thank you, Manimal!

Misa had already arrived back during their set, and as they wrapped up, the Soundtrack version of their album started playing and the excitement was high.

TO BE CONTINUED…

This entry was posted on December 7, 2019 at 5:17 pm and is filed under Concerts, Music, Uncategorized with tags eleine, manimal, sabaton cruise. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.