I took my Brompton on another cycling and camping adventure, this time in southern Sweden, with my trusty Hilleberg tent and little old Trangia stove. Responsible wild camping is legal here, and is a beloved part of life that everyone is encouraged to enjoy. There is loads of space. It’s a joy to pitch quietly by a Swedish lake or in a wood, and sit there and listen to the birds and the wind in the trees. This region is really accessible actually, if anyone is thinking to try something similar. I started in Malmö, which is only 20 mins by train from Copenhagen airport. As soon as I left the city, I was straight onto gravel tracks and empty narrow lanes in the countryside. I picked wild strawberries and wild raspberries and had summer berry pancakes for my breakfast every day, and saw interesting and cool Scandinavan stuff such as a Viking-age ‘ship burial’ tucked away in an old oak copse. Lovely trip. This is part one. Part 2 coming up soon!
Actually this area is quite easily reachable from London by train too, instead of flying, and of course the train is a better way to do it really – Eurostar etc to Hamburg then the night train, arrive Malmö next morning. I tried the journey by train with my Brompton and camping gear (in the reverse direction actually, ie Sweden to London) and it was great.
About wild camping in Sweden, the Swedish “Freedom to Roam” rules are here https://visitsweden.com/what-to-do/nature-outdoors/nature/sustainable-and-rural-tourism/the-right-of-public-access/ “The only thing you have to pay, is respect for nature.”
Anyway I hope you enjoy the film!
So I’m in Sweden. This is Malmö, and I’m setting off on a 4-day ride. I think it’ll be 4 days I was in Sweden because my husband is Swedish. He was working here in Malmö for 4 days, and then we were going to go to the cottage that we’ve got in the countryside. So I thought why don’t I cycle there. I should get there at about the same time as he would. I hadn’t done the journey by bike before, so I thought it would be interesting just to do a straight line and see what I found. It would be a mix of gravel tracks and small lanes, wild camping all the way about 280 km in total, through two big and really different regions Skåne and Småland So I took my bike and tent and stove, and I set off from the centre of Malmö After a few kilometres of city streets and edge-of-town industrial estates I emerged into the Skåne countryside Ah, god it’s always a bit of a thing getting out of town isn’t it, but I’m out now, and it’s just beautiful So Skåne is famous for big farmhouses, big fields, and for being flat, but it isn’t all flat It’s not big climb, but this is a climb Parts of Skåne are pan-flat, but parts of it this bit for example, aren’t. I was climbing over the end of the Romeleåsen Ridge. So here is my planed route actually. So the cottage is here, and I’m going to ride through Skåne and into Småland and the thing is this whole area, Skåne and the neighbouring provinces, actually used to be Danish until really quite recently, like the late 1600s. And you can see it, there are little white village churches dating back to the 1100s everywhere in Skåne because this was the Kingdom of Denmark then, and in the 1100s the Danes built village churches all over their kingdom And another special thing you get here is big old manor houses. Here I stopped to watch the storks actually but then I wondered what this place was, and it was open so I went in to have a look, and it turned out this was an old manor in the Danish time and then when this became Sweden in the 1600s the king made it into a centre for breeding war horses and it apparently still is a massive equestrian centre Hello Hello Rio Gosh it’s gigantic You can get really strong winds across the big open fields but today things were in my favour. Look at the trees! Tail wind! It clouded over actually and it looked like it would rain Rain! It doesn’t matter if it rains, does it, it doesn’t matter It’s much more wooded up ahead. So tonight, I’m planning to camp wild take some tracks through the forest, and then camp wild. There are a couple of lakes in there. Thought it could be really nice So I picked up water. This is it, so I’m all set now for camping, but it’s coffee time I thought I’d go here, there’s a ship burial, Iron Age standing stones in the shape of a boat It’s down a track Fornminne, that means ‘ancient monument’ down here. So ship burials are a Scandinavian thing. I had never seen one before, and I was really keen to see what they are like I didn’t imagine it like this at all. It is right by a farm. I’d actually imagined them to be by water but I suppose that’s kind of silly. They date from around the same time as the Anglo-Saxons in England so kind of from 500 AD up to 1,000 AD through the time of the Vikings and they’re associated with the journey to the afterlife. Actually it turned out that the lake near here used to be a lot bigger so maybe they were by the water when they were made I’m really hungry, so I’m having these. So on this trip I knew it might be quite awkward to get food, so I had brought with me exactly enough food to last the four days So it’s about 4 o’clock, gone 4. Now I’m going to head back up to the main road, cut through the wood and then cross another road and then hopefully find somewhere to camp I got distracted however because I saw some wild raspberries. Raspberries! Yeah I can make a pancake or something with them. Brilliant. It’s quite hard to stop actually, once you start Right. Let’s go! oh god there’s loads more! Missed them! Perfect! good timing as well Okay. Now I’ve got to get through this wood. So I had to cross through one wood, and then cross a main road I’m on the main road. And then into a forest. So I’m going to try and wiggle along these tracks I’m going to look at this little bit of wet here to see if that’s good and then if that’s not good, I’m going to aim for this. I mean the track looks fine doesn’t it. In Sweden, wild camping is allowed anywhere as long as you’re not near houses or on farmland and of course you’ve got to be respectful and leave no trace. So what I was really hoping for was to camp by a lake. I’d already tried the first lake actually, but I’d met dog walkers there, so that was no good. Muddy muddy muddy Not going to be swimming from there are we. Hmm. It was actually not working out here quite as I had hoped Looks better there doesn’t it, possibly. I was trying to find a place with a view of the lake and where I was hidden from view, but it was hard to get away from the track When I’m wild camping, I often have to try out three or four places until I find a spot where I feel good That’s the thing isn’t it, you either go in the open space and have the view, but worry that people come or tuck yourself away. I don’t know what to do. This little spot was really open, but it was the best place with a lake view so I decided to go for it. OK, let’s do it, here, it’ll be gorgeous So unusually for me I camped where anyone coming along the track could see me The thing is I just don’t feel quite so comfortable if people can see me, but here I decided OK just do it So tonight it’s going to be pasta with fish and a sort of cheesy topping. So all I’m going to do is tip the sardines in and scatter some cheese on the top. That’s it. So, time for dinner! Looks good! it’s a little bit alarming to see all those fish tails. I’m not used to that. I’ve squashed them all in It’s brilliant God that’s so easy as well Good! It’s raining actually. Just started. My god it looks amazing So now I was in the Linderödsåsen Ridge area which rises to about 200m above sea level, and on the slopes there are beech and oak forests I like beech woods It was close and warm, and it started to rain gently again If I do this, it will definitely not be much, won’t it, it’s always the way That worked! It’s stopped. The forecast was actually for it to be a really hot day today like 30°. Bit much. I was doing quite a lot of rough tracks today with loads of rough gravel Wild strawberries! That’s what they look like. Teeny tiny. I descended from the wooded ridge area down to this little river From here I was going to roll over the flat plain and into the city of Kristianstad It’s quite warm actually. I mean it’s not boiling boiling, but it is warm, and it’s turned really windy Just before Kristianstad, I stopped at an old town called Vä, which was a place I was excited to see especially excited to see a church. It’s gigantic. It’s not what I expected at all I was really hoping to see inside, because it has got the finest Romanesque paintings in the whole of Scandinavia I went around and tried another door Yes! So the church was like tarted up in the 1800s, but this end bit is amazing. The paintings were done in the 1100s, commissioned by the Danish royal family, the queen actually, a Queen Margaret. Her family was connected to Kiev, and to the Byzantine Empire, which people say is why you get the strong influence of Byzantine art. I thought it was fantastic Vä, the town, used to be a big Danish town and there are other ruins of the old town. This was a hospital in the 1500s. It apparently looked like this. I love these little reconstruction drawings, really sweet And this was a chapel built in the 1400s for wayfarers and the poor and the sick. It’s a marvellous place And actually I felt a bit, not exactly sick, but I was just really tired and hot It is quite hot. I think I’m just a bit tired and a bit hungry, so I’m going to have coffee, and loads of these. Loads of butter. And just sit and be quiet The good thing was I was nearly there. All I had to do now was ride to the other side of Kristianstad and then find a place to camp. I’m nearly there actually. So I’m aiming to go and look for somewhere to camp somewhere around here. Oh that’s a nature reserve isn’t it. OK, um yeah So. Yeah. That’s my idea. So I need to kind of cut through Kristianstad and um yeah Basically I had no idea where I was going to camp, but never mind, I felt much better now I think it’s the coffee just cheers me up completely Food is a good thing. But I think it’s the coffee ah so nice Oof really windy I’m on the edge of Kristianstad now actually it’s quite a big town, so I think it’s going to be a bit of a muddle getting through it probably. uh anyway It was kind of a muddle. I crossed this river into town and then got confused. Hmm well I’m kind of messing around on the edge of Kristianstad, which I never really got into And it’s kind of 6 o’clock, and I need to get water and there’s just nothing really. I needed to get water before I left the city because there wasn’t much beyond the whole place just seemed to be kind of blank roads Finally I found a petrol station and the very nice people at this cafe gave me water This doesn’t look very hopeful does it. I’m heading north out of town and I’m hoping to find somewhere quite soon actually. I was hoping to camp with a view of the lake that I’d seen on the map. I can see the lake but the hill above it was a nature reserve so that was no good It was mainly huge arable I turned up a track, hoping to get into woodland and find a place with a view down to the lake This little copse is sort of promising Hmm. Have a look So I just scouted up there, and you can see the lake, just, but you’re pretty visible from that road A car just came through and I crouched down to hide. The reason I don’t want to be seen is mainly for safety and for peace of mind. So I think I’m going to drop the idea of the lake view and focus just on being somewhere really peaceful and secluded. Cos it’s just so restful if noone can see you. So that’s what I’m going to aim for. Find a nice spot That’s done! Great! Just jam everything in and it’s time to cook dinner. So, dinner today is going to be a kind of bubble and squeak. Ish. I haven’t actually got very much to put in it. Anyway. It’s going to be potato, and, oh I’ve got nuts, yeah potato, onion, garlic, nuts. That’s OK. That’s what it’s going to be It’s a bit brown isn’t it. Never mind. I think I thought I might buy some… like, in Germany, I bought asparagus, so that was really nice. But I haven’t really seen anything here. So it’s going to be brown. I’d thought I might see farm shops or stalls and things, selling vegetables along the way, but I hadn’t It’s good! Loads of garlic Everything’s done I just had a wash in my bath tub Feels so good! I just use half a litre of water, and I can wash my whole body. It’s so nice That’s a main road over there I quite like it when you can see roads far off. I mean it’s like a sense of connection, and at the same time you’re in a… in your own space Time for tea and biscuits oh so nice So I had crossed most of Skåne. Next I’d go through the wild old no man’s land between old Denmark and Sweden A hiding place of guerilla fighters in the 17th century And it turned out to be one of the hardest things I’ve ever done on a bike I’ve kind of lost my sense of humour now. That’s no use is it! Where am I?
2 Comments
Hooray for Susan's adventures!
My hero! So inspirational 🙂