A week in August on the island of Gotland
This image is available as a print here → Summer Storm No. 2
This post is a throwback to 2017 when my brother and I spent a week on the island of Gotland, where we grew up. August can be quite fall-like in Sweden, and it was a beautiful, but pretty stormy week. But in between storms, we had this one day when everything all of a sudden went completely quiet.
We went to the beach across from our old house, sat and looked out over the water and reminisced. I took a lot of pictures too, it was such an amazing morning, so peaceful and serene.
We drove across the island and stopped at other favorite places, including the lake Tingstäde Träsk, which is about halfway between Slite (“our” little town) and Visby, the main town on the island.
The clouds and the calm, mirror-like water were spectacular, and I spent quite a bit of time shooting there too. It was completely empty; we had the entire place to ourselves. Gotland is a major vacation spot for Swedes (it’s kind of like the Nantucket of Sweden), but schools usually start in mid-august, so we were there at the perfect time when it was still summer, but most tourists and “summer-Gotlanders” (people who live on the mainland but have summer homes on Gotland) had returned home.
We ended the day watching a stunning sunset over the sea outside Visby, on the west coast of the island.
It was such a magical day, and a really special week. And it was extra special to get to share it with my brother, whom I don’t see a lot, since we live in different parts of the world. I realized when I wrote this post that I still have a LOT of shots from that trip I haven’t even gone through yet, so that’ll be a fun project this winter!
