MONDAY, AUGUST 13, 2012—Öland
Mari-Anne and I were up early, out the door, and headed in the car for Öland, a long (85 miles), narrow (9 miles) island off the southeast coast of Sweden and known as a summer get-away location. Enroute, we bypassed Stockholm by taking a ferry to the west of town, and then passed old manufacturing towns, seaports, rolling farmland, and lots of forested land. We stopped for a break along a canal in Söderköping, found a geocache (that I have failed to log), and strolled through some of the town to stretch our legs. The buildings were old and many streets were quite narrow as were the sidewalks, but the town really was charming. I would have liked to explore more, but we had many more miles and things to see this day.
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| Canal in Söderköping |
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| Apartments made out of 4 silos in background (Söderköping) |
The area became less populated as we drove south to Kalmar where we turned east to take the bridge to Öland. We stopped immediately on arrival on the island for a late lunch; I had some kind of a shrimp salad sandwich. I like shrimp but I didn’t particularly care for some of the other ingredients they put on the piece of hard bread. Oh, well, there was a lot of shrimp and a couple of tomato slices, so my hunger was satisfied. It was certainly a different dish than what I thought I was getting, though.
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| Shrimp Salad Sandwich |
After lunch, we headed south along the west shore of the island. This was definitely farming country with many farms along the way. The soil is rich except on the Alvaret plateau, which runs roughly down the center of the island where the limestone bedrock comes to within a couple of inches of the surface or right to the surface. I saw very little grazing on the plateau because of the lack of vegetation—it reminded me of New Mexico with the current drought conditions. However, as soon as we drove away from the plateau, the farmland was lush with a variety of crops under cultivation. It was late in the summer, so some harvesting of small grain was underway. Some of the crops observed included corn, onions, beans, carrots, wheat, and alfalfa. I also saw hogs, cattle (especially dairy cattle), sheep, and chickens on farms. Farm buildings were generally very old, close together, and were usually built in a square to provide a windbreak.
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| Typical Öland farm |
I saw John Deere farm equipment all around the island—there were a few other brands from other countries there, too. However, it looked as though JD had a good foothold on the market. There were quite a number of wind farms on the island and I saw some offshore, too. They are definitely putting their naturally occurring wind resources to good use.
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| Village street |
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Öland farm buildings
Same group of farm buildings but extending in opposite direction |
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| Farm house and outbuildings |
We traveled to the south tip of the island, which is a nature preserve and world-class birding site. Unfortunately, the visitor center had closed by the time we arrived, but we did visit with some birders out on the shoreline and looked at a sea eagle through a spotting scope. An operating lighthouse adorns the very tip of the island.
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| Öland lighthouse |
We turned northward along the eastern shore of Öland and before long we passed by “King Karl’s wall” for the second time. King Karl X Gustav ordered farmers to build the wall in 1653 to keep deer a previous king had imported, and which multiplied mightily, from eating farmers’ crops. The wall is about 15,200 feet long running east/west from shore to shore. The wall did not deter the deer as they continued to leap over it. The limestone wall was protected by law and was in quite good condition in the areas we saw.
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| "King Karl's Wall" |
Our next stop was the Eketorp ring fort originally constructed about 400 AD during the Iron Age. The fortress was enlarged and reconstructed during the Middle Ages and was in and out of use for periods over the centuries. It was late in the day when we arrived and everyone was gone; however, the gate was open so we went in and viewed the interesting exhibits from different periods of the fort’s history. It never ceases to amaze me when I look at centuries-old buildings how well constructed they are. Even though this fort has been reconstructed in some areas, the fact remains that the basic structure is truly awesome.
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| Eketorp Ring Fort |
We continued northbound from Eketorp, crossing the island a couple of times so I could get a good feel for the Alvaret. We saw many farms along the way when off the Alvaret, passed through some small towns, and drove past several ancient (500-1,000 AD) burial grounds.
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| Ancient burial grounds along the road |
We also saw quite a few thatched roofs on old buildings as well as numerous wooden windmills, which are not in use. Roughly, the south half of the island is a UNESCO World Heritage Site so the area is preserved much like it was in centuries past.
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| Some of the approximately 400 old windmills on Öland |
We stopped at one well-preserved linear village open-air museum, which was closed for the day. It was interesting to walk around and see how the farm buildings were arranged as wind breaks as well as how they were constructed 200-300 years ago.
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| Himmelsberga Museum--Öland |
Darkness was approaching fast and, since we couldn’t find anywhere to eat along the way, we had dinner consisting of hot tea and the snacks we brought along in our hostel building lobby. Not elegant--but good! We spent the night in Köpingsvik, on the west shore about midway between the north and south end of the island.
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| Dinner on Öland |
I cannot begin to elaborate on all that I saw this day. It was really mind-boggling from the modern cities, to iron-age relics and graves, to modern farms using centuries-old buildings and stone fences along with modern farm implements. We passed dozens of very old windmills no longer in use to grind grain along with new wind turbines providing electricity to Sweden and probably other countries, too, on the international grid system in use in this part of the world. However, one of the neatest things observed this day was the delight in Mari-Anne’s demeanor and voice when we got to the island. Öland is an area of the country that she clearly feels comfortable in and loves!
FAST FACTS: Biogas is made in small refineries in different locations—we had to search out fuel stations that carried it. In Uppsala, it is only sold to residents holding a special card to activate the pumps since only enough is made to service residents. Biogas is made from garbage in Sweden.
What we call “gingerbread” on a house in the U.S. is termed “carpenter’s happiness” in Sweden.
