Hiking Through Sweden’s National Parks

By Author: James web
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Something about Sweden embarrasses you as soon as you enter its wilderness. It could be the unending sky, or the breathing quality of the forests, or even the living quality of the silence here.

My preconception about hiking involved the challenge and testing of my strength and endurance before I arrived. However, Sweden helped me to understand that it is much softer, closer to your heart, listening.

Before booking my trip to Sweden, I booked
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The First Breath of the Wild

I started in the Abisko National Park, far up in the north, when the mountains lead into the horizon, and the air seems to be pure. I recall as I left the train and immediately upon leaving it how quiet it was, not vacant but full.

This is the beginning of the renowned Kungsleden Trail, a 400 kilometer trail that beats like a heartbeat through Swedish Lapland. I had no intention of strolling the whole way, only to get a feel of its beat.

The initial few were brisk, as the ground ...
... was still wet with dew in the morning. The birch trees were chilly white and slim with their leaves shaking in the cool breeze. I went down the road until the country became a broad and gold-yellow valley, where reindeer grazed in the distance.

Between Water and Sky

To the south further, in Fulufjallet National Park, I discovered another form of beauty - dramatic and raw. The scenery was nearly as ancient as the time itself was to be hewn. The highest in Sweden was Njupeskar Waterfall, which was rushing through a small passage, and the spray of the waterfall reflected the sun and produced a splendid little rainbow.

I recall how I sat close to the edge, and I took off my shoes and my feet got chilled in the icy stream, and how I ate a plain sandwich that just tasted better than anything served in a restaurant. That is what Sweden does: it sanctifies simple things. Even lunch seems a sacrifice when there is so much space and silence around.

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The Forests that feel like Home.

In a different experience, Tyresta National Park near Stockholm was another experience. Only a bus ride out of the capital, but it was a whole new world. These pine-trees were straight and high, and the ground of the forest was plush with moss. The air had the smell of resin and wet soil--the odor that gives you the feeling of being down to the ground.

I came across an old couple on the road, both with walking sticks and contented looks. We chatted along, and they informed me that they had strolled through these woods every Sunday for forty years. It makes us young, the lady said, and it makes us stay together.

They walked in a gradual procession, close beside each other, and out of sight into the green. I dream of them frequently, and how happy they were, how serene.

A Lesson in Simplicity

Hiking in Sweden is not merely a matter of leisure, it has turned out to become a way of life. The idea of allemansratten, or the right of everyman, gives all people the right to wander in the wilderness, to camp, to pick berries, to explore, however, with the proviso that everyone must do so with due respect. It is some sort of a tacit agreement between individuals and land that is based on a sense of trust and concern.

And that is something very touching. It does not mean climbing the mountain or setting records, it is the coexistence.

I spent one of the final days in the Skuleskogen National Park, on the High Coast. The evening was glowing down on all, and making everything gold.

The sea was glittering way down below, and the cliffs flushed in the dying light. I found a place to sit somewhere quiet, hanging my legs hanging over the side, and watched the sky grow blue and pink and the soft gray of evening.