Gorgeous Gotland

Total distance: 884 km
Farö - Katthammarsvik - Visby 

We spent 7 days on Gotland and cycled the northern half of the island. Start and end point was Visby. On our Gotland tour we followed the well-marked bicycle path "Gotlandsleden" that led us through Kappelshamn, to the island Farö and back, Katthammarsvik and again to Visby. A post about our last days on that wonderful island.

Gotland is indeed a great place for cycling. Destination Gotland ferries bring you and your bicyle either from Oskarshamn or Nynäshamn to the island. If you don't have a bicycle and camping gear, you can rent it on the island. We saw many people with rented bicycles, trailers and camping gear cycling everywhere on Gotland.

Farö island is a little island in the north-west of Gotland. A free ferry connects Gotland with Farö. Surprisingly the Farö people call Gotland the "mainland". Not sure what they call mainland Sweden then. When we came onto the island the sky cleared up and wonderful weather welcomed us. Since the dark clouds stayed on the "mainland" side, we decided to spend 2 days on Farö. We picked the first camp site - we wild camped the night before and needed a shower - that was just a few kilometers behind the ferry station and were surprised by a German speaking couple at the reception. Retired couple Ingrid and Uwe from the Stuttgart area helped the 80-year old Swedish landlord and managed the camp site. The camp site was kept natural what we liked a lot. We envied Ingrid's and Uwe's great job in that environment. Both made our stay very pleasant. They were so kind as to borrow us their 3G internet access and that is the reason why you could read several posts from Gotland. In addition they fed us with good Ritter Sport chocolate from home and shared their TV. Yes, we did watch the football match Germany - Australia :-) Good match! Farö island is famous for its chalk erosion formations. The "dog" formation can be seen on many Farö photos.

We didn't know but Swedish traditional meatballs Köttbullar are pronounced (do it the German way) "Schöttbullar", like "Schiosk" for kiosk. Funny! I had a full pan of Köttbullar for myself :-)

On the same camp site, just next to us, we met Dutch cyclists Ingrid and Kees. They were on a 4-week tour in Sweden and celebrated their 20.000 km total distance on their bicycles. We won't make that so far on our trip though.

Before cycling back to Visby and off the island again, we spent another day on the east coast of Gotland. We pedalled the 80 km from Farösund to Katthammarsvik in a day, had dinner (let's call it dinner) at a wonderful beach. The sea was so calm, it mirrored the sky and the clouds. Birds were flying around and dived for fish. A picture like the ones sold at IKEA. We stayed at the place for one night.

The day after we made it back to Visby. We bought the ferry tickets to Nynäshamn and stayed at a camp site close to the city. One thing about camp sites on the island and close to Stockholm area: most of them require that you are older than 25 years old and that you hold a "Scandinavian Camping Card". We were told that the 25-year rule was introduced in response to the many drunk party-teenagers from Stockholm area. Travel with parents, guys!