olaf ii haraldsson

Posthumously proclaimed eternal king and rapidly acclaimed as patron for Føroyar (the Faroe Islands) and a popular saint for greater Scandinavia, Norwegian realms extending over most of the region, the Vestfold ruler is venerated on this day, the anniversary of his death on the battlefield of Stiklestad in 1030, elevating his younger, half-brother Harald Hardrada to the throne. Olaf’s sainthood, saga and symbolism (attributed with qualities of Thor and Freyr) encouraged the widespread adoption of Christianity in the territory—though in his lifetime, after his own baptism in Rouen, wintering there with Duke Richard II of Normandy (see previously), was given the epithet “the Lawbreaker” for the forceful and exploitative means he used to win converts amongst the population.

bohus fästning

Crossing again the large island of Orust to travel inland on the outskirts of Göteborg, we came to the convergence of the Göte Älv (the River of the Geats and basis of the Göte Canal) to Kungälv to visit the ruined bastion once a stronghold of Håkon V. Magnusson to protect trade and defend from incursions at the former Norwegian-Swedish border, guarding the region from 1308 until the peace and territorial re-allotment of 1658.  Besieged no less than fourteen times, the fortress was never taken but allowed to fall into disrepair after it lost its strategic importance. The grounds held a variety of activities for those whose attention is not satisfied with history alone. Afterwards we toured the old town centre with its wooden structures. On the way back to the campsite for one last night’s stay, we stopped at an archeological site called Nedre Hoga—a settlement occupied for the past six millennia but with artefacts, a rune stone (locally referred to as Raimund’s Häll) and Thingstatte or Domarringar—a stone circle once believed to be a seat of justice but now believed to be the setting for funerary rituals that date to the ninth century and the transitional period between the Vikings and the Vandals.  The inscription reads, “I, Haur of Stream, raise this stone for Raimund—the name preceding the translation by hundreds of years just as Hoga’s farm refers to the proto-Nordic term for the mounds of the Iron Age grave-field. We also encountered a few current residents along the way, including a horse masquerading as a zebra, to thwart flies and hooded, I’m given to understand, to let him acclimate to new surroundings.

fiskeläge

We spent the day exploring more craggy coves and islets that were once crown dependencies granted to fisherfolk to settle and establish maritime industries on the nearby island groups of Orust and Tjörn. First we came to the anchor community of Henån that once specialised in traditional boat making and continues to supply craftsmanship and expertise to larger yacht and ship manufacturers. Continuing along the coast with several stops at lagoons and landings in between, we sought today’s catch at a small fish (fisk) market in a town called Mollösund with a vista over the archipelago and looking out to sea with a widow’s walk and a busy marina below. Stopping to marvel at the fjord that clefts the islands, we drove on to an Iron Age archeological site with numerous burial sites and standing stones called Pilane in Klövdal that annually hosts an outdoor exhibition of monumental sculptures, this season showcasing the work of artist Sean Scully and various others. The colossal bust over the ridge was especially transfixing in this natural setting and dramatic, ancient landscape.

bohuslän

Having secured a well-situated site to act as base camp at the marina of island of Vindön, we had the chance to leisurely explore the colourful and craggy harbors and fishing villages of the granite cliffs and fjords of Sweden‘s south central west coast, sharing the North Sea with Norway and Denmark—this rocky archipelago approaching ten thousand islands and skerries, though mostly linked by land bridges today. 

 

First we visited the larger port of Lysekil, a formerly important trading centre and a quarry but now focused on oil refining and tourism. 

Next we saw the cove of Kungshamn and Smögen with its ensemble of fisher huts. 

Not the Reeperbahn or St Pauli’s in miniature but picturesque and pleasant nonetheless, we saw Hamburgsund whose short-haul cable ferry takes passengers over the hundred-meter sound to the island of Hamburgö a hop away, and finally the beautiful Fjällbacka, built around a massive boulder in the centre of the village and holiday home to Ingrid Bergman.

läckö slott

Rounding out the southern aide of Lake Vänern, we ventured up the peninsula of the municipality of Lidköping and onto the picturesque island of Kållandsö, the second largest of the enormous lake and visited the medieval castle at land’s end. Originally a fortification of the local diocese, with the sweeping reforms of our Gustav I. Vasa, the nearly deposed, who made the monarchy heritable rather than elective of the landed gentry, converted the country to protestantism and appropriated church property and made Sweden a European power, it fell to various favourites of the court and caretakers who oversaw its expansion as an impressive receiving stage for visiting dignitaries.  Today it is a national monument and hosts a series of outdoor operas in the courtyard during the summer.

kristinehamn

Driving a few kilometers to the city on the shore of Lake Vänern—the larger of the two and biggest in all of the European Union, third on the continent, we marveled at the Brick Gothic Kristinehamns kyrka opened in 1858 and informed by a similar construction boom after the Wiesbaden school to my mind.  On the lakefront preceding the harbor, there is a monumental sculpture from Pablo Picasso looking into the blue expanse, the fifteen meter high pillar the artist‘s largest and part of a series called „les dames des Mougins.“ Not overseeing the construction in person, the location of the installation was reportedly a contest between Sweden and Norway, with the latter ultimately conceding.  Just outside of town in a meadow of daisies and guarded by a flock of sheep stands the Järsberg Runestone, a bit less verbose than the previous, the inscription is one of the oldest known. Essentially „I made a thing,“ the writing is translated as „Leubaz I am called…I, the earl, write the runes.“

sveafallen

After finding a campsite by Möckeln Lake in Degerfors, we went to the Cultural Centre with an ensemble of boutiques for handicrafts and local artist that was also the location of a micro-geological nature reserve that compressed various landscapes, miniature canyons, boulder-strewn forests, marsh-land into one compact park created by glacial erosion over the aeons and a rushing river under a primordial ice-sheet—though some more dramatic theories posit the environment was formed by an extinct massive waterfall, many times bigger than Niagara. 

Parts reminding us of home, there were also remarkable examples of weathering including glacial potholes called giant‘s kettles. In the end, we found the Bergteich—and though the trail was a bit of a parkour with climbing and jumping that was a fun challenge and treacherous at times, the markings were a bit wanting for first-time visitors, disorienting like the way-out markings in an IKEA that leads one through the entire store before one can find the exit. A bit of a hike for sure but a fine comparative introduction to the plant life and geology of the country.