Beautiful Swedish Lakes

We headed off down the coast towards Sweden by bus to pick up our rented campervan in Jonkoping. There had been much mulling over whether we should spend our time in Sweden hiking the Pilgrim's Trail, and camping or kayaking but in the end it was proving difficult to work out where to go and how to get there so campervanning won the day. In hindsight either of the other two options would have been OK too though it has been windy most of the week and the kayaking might have been a bit hard. Sweden closes down at the end of August so a lot of the places that are tourist-packed in summer were oddly quiet. Strange as it seems a bit early to be shutting down for the winter to us. Anyway the camper has been cosy and comfy and we have all of life's necessities and a few luxuries only an arms length away.

So, to the itinerary... Started in Jonkoping which is near the centre of Sweden, and after some fiddling around to get enough cash to pay the bill, we took off up the western side of Lake Vattern for our first night in the wilderness. Good spot by the lake with a walk through the forest to a wee sandy beach perfect for a skinny dip. Nice blackberries too...in fact foraging for wild blackberries, raspberries and blueberries was to become part of our daily routine for the next week. Plenty of fungi too but weren't sure which ones were edible so played safe. 

Next day on to Hjo with friendly tourist office, supermarket and good park for elevenses.

Carried on to Tiveden National Park and had a few hours easy hiking to build up an appetite for dinner. A landscape formed in the last ice age with granite hillocks and lakes. Lots of lakes. Big and small. This we found to be the case all over Sweden. No streams or rivers or flowing water at all just lakes. As if they were giant green puddles. We camped up beside a lovely smallish sized lake all by our lonesomes and 'felt the serenity'. The darkening water and surrounding trees were so still with only an Artic loon calling and the occasional leap of a mysterious fish flashing silver in the light of the moon. Our coldest night for a long while and glad to have  a heater in the van and matches for a campfire.

Sorry no photos lately due to technical issues....