Childhood summer holidays often spark enduring love affairs with the places where we spent them, tinting disparate corners of coast and countryside with that fuzzy filter of nostalgia and innocence. For generations of stylish Stockholmers, that sentimental sanctuary has been Gotland — Sweden’s largest island, a short flight or scenic ferry ride south of the capital. While its medieval town, Visby, is the island’s most populous spot with climbing roses, fairy lights and cobblestones, the real trick is to hit the road. It only takes two and a half hours to drive the island’s length, bouncing from giant sea stacks to pine forests peppered with falu-red cabins, and tiny townships dealing in crafty wares. A glove box stuffed with lösgodis (Swedish pick-and-mix) is optional, but advised.
Best of all, you’re touring under a near-guarantee of blue skies. Gotland, long dubbed the “sunshine island,” banks circa 2,100 hours of sunshine a year (on par with the northern Mediterranean and blowing London clean out of the water). Last month, Ikea installed two massive stone chairs onto the exact square metre of Swedish soil that receives the most sun, as a permanent monument to their nation’s collective obsession with chasing it. The spot is marked on Google Maps — Sveriges soligaste m² — by the town of Burgsvik, on Gotland’s southern tip.
