Swedish Message: Meet the Folks

A common refrain among those of us who travel often is that we’re doing it “to get to know the people.” But all too often, especially on a first visit to a country, we find ourselves herded about in groups, getting acquainted with someone from Cleveland on a shore excursion of Rome or chatting among ourselves about gasoline prices while stumbling through Delos, Greece, far behind our Greek guide.

So when we heard about a new land/cruise program called “Impressions of a Swedish Summer,” from Sven Olof-Lindblad’s Special Expeditions, we speculated somewhat cynically about how many Swedes we would actually get to know.

The seven-night program, created by Sven’s wife, Maria, to show Americans what summers are like where she grew up, combines a land and sea tour, with daylight hours spent exploring a few of the 24,000 rocky islands and islets in the Stockholm Archipelago aboard the 49-passenger day vessel Swedish Islander. Nights are spent in country inns along the way.

But we needn’t have worried about meeting and getting to know the Swedes, even if we did have a little trouble pronouncing place names. The first Swede we met, when we got off the plane at the Norrkoping airport, south of Stockholm, was our guide Ulrika Hamren, who was wearing a traditional Swedish costume--a gold, blue and white dress. A model of efficiency and organization, she was also full of fun. Before the week was over, she was telling us Swedish jokes and challenging one of our group, an 18-year-old swimming champion from Montana, to a diving contest off the rocks of Bullero into the chilly waters of the Baltic.

Then there was Stig Ekblad, our tall, dignified innkeeper in Soderkoping who took us along the Gota Canal in a vintage yacht built in Germany for Czar Nicholas II of Russia. He also led us on a long, loping jaunt through Sweden’s new Eknon National Park, a large meadow that also doubles as a venue for cattle grazing.

Our handsome, 31-year-old captain on the Swedish Islander, Goran Forss, very correct in his white uniform, demonstrated for us one of Sweden’s favorite summer pastimes: the messy art of crayfish- eating. By his method, you eat the claws but save the meaty tails for last. You eat one piece, follow it with a glass of aquavit, take a second piece off the plate with another glass of aquavit and so on, until you have a heap on a plate. It’s astonishing how many of these little scarlet shellfish you can gobble down once you get the hang of it.

On the tiny island of Bullero, Warden Johan Stake took us through the hunting lodge of artist Bruno Liljefors, famous for his bird and animal pictures in the early 20th century.

“It’s a special occasion to have this warm, sunny weather,” the gruff and taciturn Stake commented as he showed us through the lodge, now a museum. Stake and his daughter Linnea were the subjects of an award-winning documentary for Swedish television about what it is like living on an island that is empty and frozen over in winter. Linnea, her mother and brother now live in town so she can go to college, but Stake remains as warden and protector of Bullero.

Another day, we strolled on the island of Uto, once a mining center, now a nature reserve covered with tangled vines of wild raspberries, trees filled with ripe cherries and tiny clusters of wild strawberries by the roadside.

One of the highlights was a two-hour tour around the canals of Stockholm in an inflatable rubber Zodiac, each of us attired in bright, patchwork-patterned life jackets, as we cruised past the Opera House, the Grand Hotel and the Town Hall, where the Nobel Prize winners are feted each winter.

Our lodgings were in four pretty hotels, with two nights in the Romantik Hotel Soderkoping Brunn, a member of the international Romantik Hotels group. Built in 1774 and set beside a tree-lined canal, it’s Sweden’s oldest spa hotel. The town of Soderkoping was a perfect size to explore on foot and get rid of jet lag cobwebs.

In the village of Trosa, we stayed in the 19th century Romantik Trosa Stadtshotell, where we enjoyed a splendid dinner of gravlax, herring, venison and a dessert of elderberry ice.

As for history, the Grand Hotel Saltsjobaden, where we spent two nights, dates from the turn of the century, and the Gripsholms Vardhus and Hotell in Mariefred, where we stayed the last night of the trip, is Sweden’s oldest inn, dating from 1609.

Prices for the program are $2,180 per person, double occupancy, not including air fare. Kids under 16 travel at a reduced rate.

For information or a brochure, contact: Special Expeditions at (800) 762-0003.

Slater and Basch travel as guests of the cruise lines. Cruise Views appears the first and third week of every month.