We’ve had a great time here in Högsbyns with our extended stay. However, our holiday is almost over as we can count down the days on one hand now. We made fast progress with packing and were almost ready to hit the road…when Flo managed to talk up our neighbours again. Our kids had briefly played with Oskar yesterday so today, he had no qualms about hanging out. At some point his father came by and Flo got into a serious conversation about travelling. It’s always good to meet fellow travellers’ and, due to the pandemic, none of our usual meet-ups had happened. So we were quite starved for this kind of conversation.

Once we were completely packed up, we stayed maybe another 20 minutes. I took the garbage out and when I returned, Flo already looked embarrassed and a little stressed. From far away, he called “Don’t hurry, the tiny battery is flat again”. Oh right, I had completely forgotten about this as it hasn’t happened on this trip so far. Once we camp somewhere for more than a night, we have to deliberately recharge our tiny 12 volt battery through having our car “running” or risk a flat battery. Obviously, Flo had forgotten that this is a problem (and might have left an interior light on). So it took us another, I don’t know, 45 minutes (?) to first ask our neighbours, then try a motorbike battery and then have Jan, the owner of the campground, drive his ancient Passat to our car to give us a jump start. Of course, we were somewhere on the hillside where no regular campervan would could go to help out. Oh well. Apart from the time loss and me trying to keep calm, this flat battery didn’t do any harm.

Today, we had planned a visit to one of the Unesco World Heritage Sites to look at Bronze Age stone carvings. Since we started the day so late, we got to the place and raided the cafe “Bronze” first to satiate our hunger. The lunch menu included fika aka coffee/tea and cookies which I found extremely satisfying. The little museum explaining things about Bronze Age culture here and the carvings and also the connectedness of the European world at that time was really cool. It had great gimmicks to keep the kids engaged and occupied before we took a hike to see carvings. Well, you pass the playground first so we had to pretend to be on an ocean voyage for a bit. 🙂

The hike was pleasant but overshadowed by a little pain. I had gotten many mosquito bites on my ankle and it turned out that I am also allergic to Swedish mosquitoes as well, so they all swelled up to ridiculous size and made walking itchy and painful. Plus, Number 3 was tired and not up for a lot of walking. Once we got to the site, it was cool to see the carvings but they also looked incredible fake to me. As if someone had painted them here yesterday. It’s a disputed restoration choice that the carvings have been painted in a deep red tone. It makes them incredibly visible but also looks as if they’d been done recently. All the wear and age of the place seems gone.

We hiked up to a cairn, which was as far as Number 3 was willing to go. Up there, he started to complain a lot and even fell down unfortunately. With a scratch on his palm, he started crying. Our saviours came in the form of a cookie monster plushy. A boy and his family hiked up as well and he had his cookie monster in the hood of his sweater. He then even entertained Number 3 and the Agent with a little cookie monster impersonation and shared his cookies with our kids! Munching happily even the walk back to our car was doable.

Another short ride later, we stopped in a village on the west coast called Fjällbacka. It’s only 80km from here to Oslo and somehow, it also starts to look Norwegian already. The village is famous for Ingrid Bergman having spend her summers here in retreat. It’s a cute place with wooden houses, right at the sea – a little bit of a resort feeling but them we didn’t stand out too much in our outdoor gear either. We got here just in time for our second fika in a cafe. The Agent was naughty, again, as she now started to pour out every drink in her cup right onto herself or the ground to see what happens. It was only water but it still is annoying. Especially when she then started complaining that it’s getting cold.

We strolled down the main road but then decided we were better off buying some things for dinner in the supermarket and start driving towards Göteborg. Tomorrow, for our last real day in Sweden, we want to spend another day in the city.

Fully stocked up, we drove along the coast, checking out potential free camps. At some point, we came across a basic “ställplats” which had everything except for drinking water. It even offered electricity so we put up the tent and stayed for the night.