Cruising From Stockholm

Kalvholmen (an island in Stockholm’s archipelago) — It would be difficult, if not impossible, to fully comprehend the Swedish soul without first learning to appreciate the Swede’s love of water and the archipelago. Nothing facilitates that appreciation more quickly or more tangibly than to stand at the end of a brygga (pier), muster up your courage and plunge into what you know will be a cold current in the Baltic Sea.

That’s easily enough done in the summer, when the sea reaches 68F (20C), but consider that some hearty Swedes “bathe” year-round. You can imagine that the water is particularly frigid during the winter months (after all, Sweden’s capital city is only a little more than 500 miles south of the Arctic Circle). During the coldest parts of winter, some Swedes actually cut holes in the ice to plunge in.

Kalvholmen can be reached in about two hours on a water taxi that departs from directly in front of Stockholm’s Grand Hotel. The transit alone is remarkably beautiful.

One of the 30,000 islands, islets and rocks that make up the archipelago, Kalvhomen is populated by residents who have summer cottages here. Anyone could visit Kalvhomen, although it might feel a bit awkward to be a visitor among the few dozen or so families who live here (Sweden’s Right of Public Access law, known as Allemansratten, allows anyone use of another’s land for swimming, camping or picking flowers, mushrooms or berries. But be sure to know the rules of the law and the proper etiquette before doing so.)

For visitors, the archipelago offers many uninhabited and/or public islands. Here in the islands, you can kayak, swim, walk trails or simply relax.

It’s hard to imagine a place that offers a more idyllic summer than the archipelago. Kids dive, swim and splash. Adults plunge off the end of the pier. Families gather out of doors for dinner, sitting long hours at the table during the long days of summer.

Certainly, summer seems endless here in the archipelago, where the sun tints a rosy hue in the sky and on the water even after midnight (the picture above was taken at midnight, by Hedda Thorell; sunrise comes again as early as 3:30 a.m. during summer).

To sit under the pastel colors of the summer sky, to listen to the sounds of water lapping against the shoreline, to listen to the melodic sounds of distant water fowl, is not only a pleasant experience for the visitor but also a quintessential one for the Swede.

Venture out to the archipelago and return with an understanding and appreciation for the Swedish soul. Go ahead, take the plunge.