Travelhector

Sweden is a wonderful country for relaxed travelling. Even though my heart is more into France and Italy –less distance + higher communication possibilities – I will surely choose Sweden again for future holidays. So here comes the personal reminder for my future self:

• Add some cities to the tour: Malmö, Lund, Gothenburg (Stockholm is just too good and thus more of an extra destination for extended weekends)
• Dancing! Get into touch with people of the Lindy Hop or other dancing scenes
• Enlarge wild camping: start in the south and continue along the way
• Look out for luxury camp sites: spend 75% on simple camper parking / without service and fresh up van + body every once in a while, then best on exceptionally good sites (if available)
• Go North! Armed with masses of no-bite head for Lappland and continue via Norway all the way up to the high North

Going through all places I have been in reverse order, the highlights have been the following:

Labussee / C24 Camping Bibertours

What?   Nature, a whole lot of it. Pretty lake, relaxed atmosphere, good showers (electricity available for few pitches only) and nasty mosquitoes.

Who?    Me, myself and I plus some smalltalk with other campers and the camping staff.

What else?         Slow down, use the boat rental or not, switch off your cell phone and forget about a world that only exists beyond the endless forest.

Warnemünde / Rostock

What?   Endless beach, touristic town, cruise ships and ferries. Camper parking on “Stellplatz Mittelmole” or close to the Ostseestadion (no service).

Who?    Friends + friends of friends. And the beach bar.

What else?         Perfect in-between. Between Germany and Scandinavian ferries. Between everyday life and holidays. Between sand and sea.

Kiel

What?   Ferry landing, Jogging + gastronomy at the Kiellinie, Camper parking in Wik.

Who?    Legendary Svenja with charm and travel stories.

What else?         Military base, Kieler Förde, starting point of the Kiel canal = the most frequented artificial water way worldwide.

Ferry Gothenburg – Kiel

What?   15 hours, 240m ship, restaurants + bars, comfortable cabins and Hector in the pole position.

Who?    Greedy tourists between me and the breakfast buffet.

What else? Pure luxury: my own bathroom. Colorful sunset + sunrise.

Marstrand

What?   Quiet town, Carlsten Fortress, camper parking (sea shore, no service) + Familjecamping, Kayak Skagerrad.

Who?    Hector, the skateboard and the jogging shoes. A bit of smalltalk here and there and the kayak rental.

What else?         Pretty close to Gothenburg, however very calm and inviting. Sincerely recommended: float through the Skagerrad by kayak (eventually with a stop at the Gästhamn), walk or run through cliffs / reed / hills / forests of the nature reserve, visit the fortress, eat delicious fish soup at Marstrand Wärdshus, sit in the sun at the harbour, count the wild sheep on the peninsulae, zzzzzh…

Orust / Tjörn

What?   Pretty islands in the Skagerrad, North / West of Gothenburg, dominated by local summer residence owners, strange mixture of lovely places and a repellent undertone.

Who?    Grumbling pensioners meet sullen Hector.

What else?         Eat at Café Borgen between Orust and Tjörn – and forget about the islands.

Malö

What?   Tiny island between Skaftö and Orust, relaxed camp site with places directly at the sea (w/o electricity) and regular pitches on the other side of the island’s sole street.

Who?    Chats with other campers, tents and vans mixing up at the shoreline and sharing the sea side meadow.

What else?         Free ferries from and to Malö. Instead of the camp site’s outworn showers you may prefer a bath in the crystal blue sea. Hector marked a cross in the grass with his tires, says he wants to come back.

Between Tanumshede and Norra Grundsund

What?   Ancient rock carvings, perfectly explained during the free guided tour. Small villages, yacht harbours and hard to tell if the landscape’s core consists of water or land.

Who?    Competent guide, mostly German tourists, ancient artists (at least their traces). Not a single soul found in Grundsund.

What else?         Grundsund is a pretty harbour with a small parking – but so void it was almost spooky, thus we hurried on until we found Malö. Good choice.

Fjällbacka

What?   Vivid small town that if nothing else attracts tourists for Camilla Läckberg. The sole camp site contains hundreds of residental campers + 1 meadow for spontaneous tourists. The long-established Hotel Bryggan (free WiFi in the lobby!), several restaurants / cafés / bars and the very best Kanelbullar mark the town as a high potential stop-over.

Who?    Foreign tourists and summer resident owners clash together.

What else?         The gorge is very special and the view from the Vetterberget cliff soaked me in for hours. The church at Kville looks like it just popped out of a story book and retrospective Fjällbacka turned out to be one of the best places of the trip.

Frillesås

What?   Small town with a beach and a camper parking in 15m distance to the sea.

Who?    Thanks to late sunset I enjoyed hours of animated conversation with the van travellers next door. Their daughter has made up a wonderful website about her Canada-via-mobilehome-trip and I really should contact her anytime and ask her to continue the blog…

What else?         There is a “real” camp site in Frillesås but I have preferred the service-free parking at the beach and a bath in the North sea after my early morning run. Most travellers that use simple parkings rather than regular campings are of the sympathetic kind with open minds and interesting stories – best conditions for shared wine in the evening.

Ringsjöstrand

What?   Luxury camp site (expensive, even for Swedish means) and a historic castle along the way. Around the camp site is: nothing (except the Ringsjö lake).

Who?    Friends, a whole family of friends – great that we managed to meet!

What else?         Next time I show off with acrobatic moves on the playground I should think of a warm up first (had hell of a muscle sourness).

Bolmen & Torpa

What?   A calm camp site at Bolmen followed by wild camping near Torpa (lake hopping).

Who?    Jogging chat with Thomas and a bit of smalltalk at the wild camping lake. The rest was Hector, the barbecue and the intensive use of my book shelf.

What else?         Stormy wind in Bolmen and the discovery of a quiet region with hundreds of lakes and endless forests, speckled with small villages. Elks hiding all the time.

Hällevik and the TradJazzfestival

What?   Hällevik at the Baltic Sea might be a nice town even in other times, but during the TradJazzfestival it buzzes with life. The same dozen of bands plays 5-10 concerts spread over 3 days, however leading to the sensation of live music popping up every half hour in another corner of the town.

Who?    Great to have met the Lindy Hop dancers, added by friendly pensioners and all kinds of people in good mood.

What else?         Lucky me that they all played my favourite kind of swing jazz! My favourite place has been the benches between the sea (3m to the right) and the large festival tent (3m to the left) – hard to imagine a better place for a festival, apart from the dance floor that is.

 

Eringsboda

What?   Nice village in the North of Ronneby, driving my bed into my uncle’s garden.

Who?    Two days with my uncle and my cousin.

What else?         Beside the beautiful lake in the North of Eringsboda we made our way along the coast line of the Baltic sea, passing by Sandhamn, Torhamn, Björkenäs and Kristianopel.

Simrishamn

What?   Sandy beach, little town with some restaurants and a large camp site.

Who?    Mainly Swedes, few contact – hard to tell if I have not been in the right mood for encounters or if folks in the campers around have been sort of reticent.

What else?         Millions of tiny black bugs – when wind came up it was a relieve. All along evolution the bugs have not learned to cope with the wind. On windstill days focus your outdoor activities on the time between 6:00 am and 8:00 am.

Leipzig & Warnemünde

What?   Parking at the edge of the Agra Park (Leipzig) and in front of huge, really huge cruise ships in Warnemünde. Beach, touristic harbour, reams of shops and restaurants and did I mention the beach?

Who?    Nico + Christian – thanks for the initial encounter of the holidays, for beer, for dinner and for the bath in the sea.

What else?         Swimming pools with a spiral toboggan on top of a cruise ship – now, really??

 

Overall

The trip was a wonderful mixture of time for myself and people I met, beautiful nature and reliable super Hector.

I have been to Sweden once before, in a convertible car and with different company. Then, in 2003, I have seen the main cities, have discovered Astrid Lindgren land and Öland, I have been to the two huge lakes (Vänern + Vättern) but I missed being closer to nature, let alone diving in any of the waters we passed by. Consequently the 2017 Sweden trip focused on different aspects. Whatever expectation I could have had (while in fact I had none due to a lack of preparation), sure enough they have been fulfilled.

For next year I have different destinations in mind, but already now I am looking forward to coming back to the South of Sweden, then extending the trip way North and with even more time to spend. It will be a pleasure!

When asked how the trip to Sweden has been, the prompt answer is: No rain, few mosquitoes.

In fact, I had not a rainy day for three weeks, only (few) rainy nights. Plus one short rain shower that passed me by on the cliff of Fjällbacka, presenting the surrounding in the most dramatic light I could ever have asked for.

German mosquitoes are way nastier than their Swedish relatives: the statistic speaks up for itself. Consequences are five bottles of no-bite, Antibrumm and similar stuff, all left over and waiting for upcoming holidays.

Now, what about costs? Sweden is supposed to be expensive and that is more than true for prices on camp sites. At average, I paid about 30 € per night on regular campings, usually coming along with low sanitary standards and extra charge for hot water. However, based on the “Bordatlas” and the gain of routine in seeking nice spots, I spent more than 50% of my nights on any kind of camper parking or similar places, then with average costs of about 10 – 12 €. Best of all has been my wild camping experience at a small lake in Småland – the wild camping / allemansrätten is one of the best reasons for camper van holidays in Sweden.

When it comes to food, eating out in the evening is expensive whereas breakfast or lunch are available in the range of 4 – 8 €, supplying hungry mouths with masses of good food. Prices for wine or beer are okay when you are already used to the hilarious amounts of the Munich bar scene: 5 € for a beer (0.5 l) or 8 € for a glass of wine are okay when compared to the white wine in Munich’s “Goldene Bar”, charged with 12 € per glass without being ashamed of their obvious greed.

 

The route has developed itself. I gave up any discussion with Hector of where to go, easy enough with all the sunny weather my van has subscribed to. The German distance is worked up best with departures in the late afternoon – thanks to camper parkings that are open all night long, there is no timing restriction for this kind of travelling.

Impatient as usual I only spent a few hours in the Leipzig suburbia, all fine with the Agra Park right beyond my doormat. Warnemünde / Rostock was tempting enough for 2 stop-overs and consequently would be first choice for the Sweden ferry any other time.

Sweden’s South welcomed Hector and me with empty roads, easy travelling and harmless people. Most of the villages around the coastline offer restaurants or further gastronomy and sandy beaches are as likely as grassy meadows at the Baltic Sea.

Severe planning would have saved some hundreds of back-and-forth kilometres, but as far as it comes to me or Hector there are no complaints. I love following spontaneous ideas like antique shopping along the route, a festival weekend and all of the encounters that unfolded along the way.

The skerry coast around Gothenburg is even more beautiful than the South but less inviting. The Alemansrätten (the basic right to camp a night in plain nature) is invalid there and despite of the higher number of pretty harbour villages, there hardly are any welcoming restaurants, let alone cafés or bars. People are less friendly to strangers, fighting tourists more than living on them. At least Fjällbacka is vivid enough and always is worth a day or two.

 

Now what was best?

Nature.
The wild camping.
Encounters with all kinds of people, some planned and some not. With enough books on the shelf and food in the fridge you will always get by. If looking for action though, be prepared to spend time on your own, best when combined with sports like jogging, hiking or kayaking. Cultural events are rare with exception to larger cities (Malmö, Lund), but as I have not gone to Sweden for their bull fighting tradition, it was all fine. Perhaps I would look for further festivals next time – that is probably the best chance to catch Swedish folk let loose, dance and party all night long.

 

 

I stare at the map on the little screen of my smartphone. Looks like there are quite some lakes around the Müritz… Everybody tells me that the region North / West of Berlin must be oh so beautiful, but they did not warn me of the variety of lakes, rivers, more lakes and hundreds of camp sites.

Simplifying life, I let loose and follow the recommendation of friends. On my way to the Labussee, I see that the villages around offer a restaurant here and a supermarket there and decide to go back later in the afternoon. Seven kilometres later with incredibly bumpy roads culminating into the dirtiest dirt road since 3.000 km, one fact is clear: I will only shoo Hector on that route again when we leave the place for good.

Before the check-in is through I count five new mosquito bites. Now great, why did I substitute a wide beach by endless forests with my bike being flat and my ankle slightly damaged?! It takes a while to catch up with the frightening things (nature! mosquitos!) that turn out to be the charming elements of this place: nature, a whole lot of nature. With casual people, low sounds of paddling kayaks and chugging house boats, topped by a welcoming camping crew that supplies me with chips and wine.

On second glance, the Biber Tours camping is a nice spot to calm down. Even when the pontoon bar opens the relaxed atmosphere remains. I spend lazy hours in and around the Labussee until it is finally time to leave and head back to Munich.

Back home my holidays end in perfect harmony with the last weeks’ experience: darling of fortune that I am, I am spoiled with best of both worlds. I am free to travel on my own and never felt lonely. Upon arrival, I receive a warm welcome by my house-sitting friend and the trip fades out with some wonderful summer days in the most beautiful of cities. Isn’t life fantastic?!

Three weeks have passed since my stopover in Warnemünde. Blue skies with bright sun draw me back to the sea, thus it is time for a second halt around Rostock.

I stroll through the streets of Warnemünde with houses that look like Disney’s pastry cook creations and enjoy the relaxed atmosphere.

An hour later I have my feet in the sand and exercise my starring-at-the-sea-hobby. When the cold wind beats the warming sun rays, I change to the beach bar and think about how wonderful life is, especially when being on holiday.

Tomorrow I will leave the sea behind and look for a welcoming camp site around the Müritz. By now it is time to face the end of the journey: from here, all roads will take me back south, but before that I take a deep breath of salty air and let holiday feeling take over again.

The evening fades out in friendly company, showing once more that travelling on my own does not mean keeping to myself all the time. The more I travel alone, the more I get into exchange with all kinds of people – that, beside landscape and food, is what travelling the world is about.

 

There is no bed like Hector’s bed. Even though the ferry cabin is comfortable, I wake up at 5:10 am. The glimpse out of my window tells me to take the camera and run.

With nothing but water around, the sunrise is the most colorful start into the day. The hardest part is to keep the camera still while my body is shaken by strong wind. There is less than a handful of people on the open deck, probably due to the coffee serving starting too little too late. With the stormy wind, the other theory is that some of the early birds have been blown over the rail – you never can tell. When 90 minutes later I stand in line among dozens of impatient travellers, I have to revise the second theory: still masses of people are on board, all waiting for the restaurant doors to open.

Most of the buffet is worth the effort of pushing greedy pensioners and starving kids out of the way. The only mystery is the consistency and the chemical formula of the so-called scrambled eggs, made out of anything else but eggs.

At 9:10 AM the ferry lands in the Kiel harbour and I hurry down to Hector. I jump behind the wheel just in time to leave the sea and get back on solid ground.

First I go straight to the camper parking in Kiel Wik and Hector settles down on the last available parking slot with view on the canal. Only inches away from the windscreen huge freight ships pass by the Watergate of the Nord-Ostsee-Kanal – and that is not even the biggest highlight of the day.

I spend the early afternoon in the city of Kiel with increasing tension. Only hours from now I will meet a lady that will show up in a cute dress and long dark hair, talking about trips across Europe that are twice as cool as mine.

While I sit in the sun, the eyes half in my book and half on the Kieler Förde, a green bicycle comes to a halt in front of me and there she is: legendary Svenja. Seconds later we have a glass of Prosecco in our hands and start with what seems to be an everlasting conversation about life, travelling, motorbikes, camping, food, wine, culture, friends and whatever else makes the world go round.

 

It feels like only a few minutes have passed when Hector proudly presents his inner and outer qualities and we finally have to part. So much is still there to be discussed and talked through, but we both know that travelling is about moving and so we say farewell. It only is a matter of time until Svenja + Greeny may cross our paths again.

Kiel: Keep on moving…

 

Marstrand is a nice part of the Gothenburg region and I decide to stay one more night. However, having just passed 2 service-free nights and with 3 more yet to come, I change to the ordinary camp site for my last night in Sweden. Beside the bathroom and waste water, I also invest entire two minutes in the cleaning of the living room floor, put fresh blankets on the bed and whatever it takes to make Hector sparkle and shine.

The result is great: I could start right away for further three weeks or months. I take a breath and dream of endless travelling, all calm and relaxed, all cosy inside Hector and all comforted with people I meet along the way and sunny weather and great food and… wait: here and now I am in Sweden and I do have sunny weather, so I stop the dreaming and continue the living.

The camp site, like almost all of them among Sweden, is okay and that’s it already. Later I promenade down to the heart of Marstrand’s village, get some liquorice at the local supermarket and find a wind-shielded bench in the sun with view on the harbour. My only concern is the risk of catching a sunburn, but I prefer sunscreen over rain and am able to deal with the conditions.

The next morning is cold but sunny and my jogging route takes me out to the nature reserve of the skerries. A lot of the distance is deep within nature with rocks, high reed and hardly visible paths. Thanks to the jogging routine that sneaked in during holidays I see a lot of my surrounding and appreciate the different landscapes.

This evening I have to catch the ferry from Gothenburg to Kiel and, aiming not to miss it, I decide to pass the day with easy hobbies. I take my skateboard and get started, definitely out of habit on the first meters. Little by little the moves develop and with sun on my skin and wind in my hair I stroll direction downtown. Before I realize what happens I drop in the local kayak rental and sit inside a bright yellow boat.

I never would have guessed that the North Sea can shimmer in all those shades of blue. I paddle through the Skagerrad and pass by tiny red houses with greeting inhabitants, a sailor café and rough stones in azure water. Whenever a yacht passes by, my boat dances on the waves and I enjoy one of the most wonderful hours of the entire Sweden trip.

When taking the kayak back to the rental shop I pay 80 SEK and with a wide grin I jump happily on my skateboard and get back to Hector. The jogging-hiking-camping-kayak-skateboard-chick is back, yeah! Not even the road charge controls at Gothenburg’s city highway (nor the expected tickets) inflict my euphoria. In the late afternoon, Hector stops in front of the Stena Line ferry that will swallow us up for the night.

Sure enough Hector snatches the pole position while I go upstairs to a cabin that is almost as huge as Hector’s inside.

My own, private, all-mine bath room has to wait. First things first, I think, and minutes later I discover the open deck of the ship. Compared to the Rostock-Trölleborg ferry this is larger and contains several restaurants and bars, one even at the open deck. I invest my last Swedish Kronor in a beer and wonder how much this day has in store for me.

The nature path in the skerries, the beautiful kayak trip, a bit of skateboarding and now I look down at Gothenburg and watch out for ice bears.

Sure, it would be possible without Hector. But not the same.

Along with the sunset we coast into the ocean. Tomorrow morning Kiel will welcome me and there still is a lot more that I look forward to.

The morning has started wonderfully with jogging and sunrise on Malö, not knowing yet that this will be the last of the really-beautiful-pitches oft this trip.

It is Monday morning, 9:30 am when Hector looks out for legal parkings in Hällevikstrand on the isle of Orust. It is there that we start learning about parking restrictions and rules-above-reason attitudes. Hällevikstrand in the Skagerrak of the North Sea has nothing to do with Hällevik at the Baltic Sea, both being nice small harbour villages. Hällevikstrand contains one museum (closed) and one café (closed on Mondays) and nice houses and a nice harbour.

Next stop is Mollösund, recommended by my travel books. Indeed it is more touristic in here: a café (currently closed), a restaurant (opening only in the evening) and a small supermarket (closed, ignoring the opening hours presented outside).

The islands close to Gothenburg may be beautiful, but they are sort of closed up. Without a summer residence and friends among your neighbours, you are not welcome and there is nothing to do and no place to go. The latter being true also for the huge parking with about 70 pitches. With 2 small cars + 1 small Hector, it is far from being crowded. But, oh, I ignored some of the signs that seem to indicate (in Swedish) that even automobiles that fit into the parking slots must not use them unless classified as “Klass I”. For whatever that means. Anyway, the pensioner and his Swedish verboseness is no fan of our journey and is not willing to stop his tirades until I turn the engine and start to move. I would have made a wheely while Hector, being more decent, only honks the horn and off we go.

Thanks to the fantastic kitchen of Café Borgen with its friendly chef, this episode will not impact today’s mood seriously. Whenever you are between Orust and Tjörn, make sure that you drop in here for breakfast, Lunch or any other meal – you will not be disappointed.

Next island I try is Tjörn with a camp site close to Skärhamn. Despite the mid class sanitary facilities and neatly cut meadows, it does not feel appealing. The access to the sea is adventurous, the distance to the small village of Skärhamn is 2 km and my folded bicycle is out of order (flat rear tyre, reserve tyres do not hop-on automatically and my toolbox misses the one crucial wrench that might do it when put in professional hands). In fact, this part of Sweden is too little too strange and I decide to go for one last try and then (if required) skip the sea and turn inland.

Finally, after six hours of driving and some loop ways around Kungälv, Hector finds a camper parking at Marstrand. Gravel, the back side of some industrial building and reclusive van neighbours are one facet, the other one is the free view out on the skerries while on the peninsula in front of Hector graze wild sheep.

Marstrand with its islands Koön and Klȧverön is more vivid than the places I have seen on Orust or Tjörn. It must have been important once, proved by the Carlsten Fortress and the imposing houses around.

Today is the first (and only) day of the entire Sweden tour that I feel exhausted. Usually I like strolling around and find unforeseen beauty on my way, but sometimes the search for a sleeping place takes its told. It is more by routine than by enthusiasm that I take some pictures of the fortress until I settle down for dinner in the sole open restaurant in town. Food & sleep fixes everything!

Electricity and sanitary facilities would have been nice for the night, but I rather go for a simple parking with an agile town and a view than for a soulless camp site. And, lucky me, Hector agrees.

It is time to move on. The Fjällbacka Camping is probably the only spot in Sweden where you can not pay by card, but I am well prepared and do not even ask why two out of three days come with a bargain.

Hector takes the road along the coast line direction Tanumshede and in the late morning we arrive at Vitlycke. We find free parking (even overnight, if desired) and the presentation of ancient rock carvings.

Right upon our arrival, an English guided tour starts (once more: for free) and for the next 30 minutes we learn about the technique, the possible meanings and further vivid scenes around the artful relict.

After applause for the guided information, I stroll around and see burial mounds from any time BC plus further rocks with their carvings. It is incredible that the bronze culture continued the art of carving over a period of about 1.200 years, then probably performed by several generations of artists.

While I am still fascinated by the figures, Hector ignores my rhapsodies and turns South.

Apart from a stop at the beautiful church of Kville we have no plans for the night and barnstorm across the peninsula of Bokenäs. At it’s very end lies Grundsund with a neat little harbour and – nothing else. A closed hotel / restaurant, private houses, nice atmosphere. Shall we stay here for the night?

Although not bad it does not feel like our home-for-the-night, thus we are back on the road. A few kilometres and a minute-maid ferry (for free) later we arrive at Malö, an island so small that it is hardly visible on our map. Five driving minutes after the ferry has landed we reach a small camp site, cut in two by the island’s sole asphalt road. One side is for caravans and offers electricity, two toilets & showers while the other side is just a meadow that leads to the sea.

Sure enough we know which side is ours.

Since long (ever!), Hector and I share a common hobby: stare at the sea and observe how waves or light alter the entire surrounding.

Finding a jogging route that comprises more than just a few hundred meters is not easy, but the more gravel roads you try left and right, the more you learn about the size of private properties and harbour villages.