Island Games 2009

Every two years the Island Games takes place on one of the 25 member islands.

A harbour in Åland

In 2007 the Greek island of Rhodes played host and two years before that it was Shetland's turn, in 2009 Åland played host.

Åland is in fact an archipelago rather than a single island and is made up of 6500 islands though only 65 of them are inhabited and more than a third of the population live in the main town of Mariehamn.

The islands have a total population of 26,700 and the first language is Swedish, despite the fact the island is actually associated with Finland. Much like Guernsey though, despite its ties to Finland, Åland has its own system of government, Landskapsregering.

One of Åland's traditional buildings

Unlike Guernsey Åland is a member of the EU having joined along with Finland in 1995 and they adopted the Euro rather than the Mark as currency in 2002.

Much like Guernsey the archipelago is divided into various municipalities, much like our parishes, each of which have their own crest. The largest of these municipalities is Mariehamn, the main town, which was founded in 1861.

The smallest municipality is Sottunga which is also the smallest municipality in all of Finland.