I learnt the art of doing nothing (sober) on a Swedish archipelago

“What are people looking for when they come here?”, I asked Tommi, the owner of the deep-red cabin into which we had decamped after a three-hour ferry journey to Sodermoja deep in the Stockholm archipelago. “Doing nothing,” he said. 

We didn’t know it at the time, but our summer holiday on a remote Swedish island on which there were no shops, no bars and no restaurants was good preparation for the sustained period of isolation we are all going through at the moment.

Only we had entered into this voluntarily – and it had none of the downsides of our current predicament. We wanted to switch off, zone out, slow down and leave the achieve-achieve-achieve pressures of London life far behind – and we were surrounded by spectacular scenery and the ever soothing presence of water.

It did not take long for me to feel that I was something of a natural when it comes to this slow travel lark. We’d been in our rowing boat for a good half-hour when my wife observed that progress had been… modest. 

“I’m just getting into my rhythm,” I reassured her. “We’ll soon be there.” 

“There” in this case was the island of Moja, the bigger brother of our own Sodermoja and separated by a narrow stretch of water. Maybe we would get there soon; maybe we would not get there soon. To be honest, it was ceasing to matter; we had already moved into a very different time and space: Sodermoja time and the very special space that is the Stockholm archipelago. “It’s fine, my love. Take your time.”

The Swedes have long marvelled at the wonder that is the archipelago around Stockholm containing between 24,000 and 30,000 islands and islets, some consisting of just two or three random boulders poking their heads above the remarkably calm and brackish waters of the Baltic Sea.

Swedes’ eyes light up at the mere mention of it; their spirits soar as they recall long summers spent on its shores as children, sailing through its channels and enjoying the uncluttered, uncomplicated rituals of life in a wooden cabin. This is how Stockholmers like to holiday. And with this on their doorstep, who can blame them?

Looking back at the notes that I made during the course of that hugely restorative week, it reads as though I was on some sort of wellness retreat. Like some slightly strange premonition of what we are going through now, the word “silence” features frequently. I loved the silence that came from being in a place where there were no cars, no shops, no bars. I loved the silence broken only by the occasional gust of wind that stirred the trees and rushes or the faint splash and laughter of swimmers launching out into the twilight waters. I loved the silence that came in the depths of pristine forest and sitting beside an inland lake so still it appeared primeval in its perfection.

There were other words I noted: simplicity, serendipity, light, breeze, sleep – being slow, moving slowly, thinking slowly; not thinking. And, of course, lagom – a Swedish word that roughly translates as exercising moderation. In contemplative mood sitting on our small balcony, calmed by the gently flowing water in the distance, I wrote: “It takes a while to switch off completely, to stop trying to punctuate a day with one thing after another, a long list of boxes to tick and a mindset that can all too easily be transposed from the work situation into the holiday situation.”

We were there in July, when the days stretch into infinity (it was still light at 11pm). It was the peak of the summer season, and although there were fellow holidaymakers on the island, it never felt crowded or busy or – heaven help us – competitive in a towel-on-the-sun-lounger kind of way.

We were surrounded by Swedes, a placid, well-balanced people in the main. They noted that there were strangers in their midst and were polite but never pressed. They respected distance and space. (Maybe that’s why they don’t have to impose social-distancing rules so rigidly in the current crisis.)

Of course we did have to do some things. On an island without a shop, one needs supplies, and that’s where the rowing came in: Moja across the way had a mini supermarket. Moja also had a church (there has been one there for at least 400 years) and it was here that we bumped into Eva and the local priest who signed us up there and then for a 9am session of qigong, which involved light, mindful movement, sun salutations and joining in a rendition of Morning has Broken – in Swedish. There’s always a first (and possibly in this case a last) time for everything.

In the course of the week, as my rowing became somewhat more proficient, we journeyed to Moja twice more and explored further afield: swimming off the boulders close to Berg and then hiring bicycles to head north to Loka and Langvik and the gallery celebrating archipelago artist Roland Svensson, and the Wikstroms’ fish restaurant serving Baltic herring and Mojatoast with smoked fish where Carl Bildt, the former Swedish prime minister, once dined with John Major.

On another day we jumped onto a ferry and let the breeze run through our hair as we headed south to Sandhamn, an island popular with the king of Sweden, the yachting fraternity and families looking for more active pursuits, such as mini golf and tennis, as well as shopping and the sand beaches for which it is famed. 

There was a lot of life and bustle and some rather wonderful home-made ice cream on Sandhamn, but we were glad to return to the sanctuary and serenity of Sodermoja – a place that had inspired musicians and writers, we were told – and the peace of a routine that involved doing nothing (or very little).

We got better at it, appreciating the simplicity of life where we were – there may have been running water in the cabin but the shower was a short walk away in Tommi’s workshop shed and the loo was a very basic outdoor privy, which possibly would not suit everybody. We ate simple fare and drank very little (see the end for more on this). We read books and plays; we chatted but were also comfortable remaining silent; we swam; we walked; we slept. 

On our last evening we ventured through the woods to the southernmost tip of Sodermoja, where we found a bay beautifully framed by more boulders and a jetty that offered the opportunity for a final life-affirming swim. While there, we bumped into Gary, from Chicago but married to a Stockholmer and a true convert to the cause.

“Isn’t this sensational?” he said, drinking in the sublime vista. “This is like something out of an Ingmar Bergman movie. It’s the Swedish dream: to have a house and a boat and to spend the summer in the archipelago.”

Swede dreams, indeed, are made of these. And they can be our dreams, too, with an uncanny resonance in these testing, trying times. Less really can be more, quiet really can be kinder, and simplicity really can be very, very sweet.

Drama out of a booze crisis

Act one 

Having checked into our hotel in Stockholm I called room service and ordered two glasses of white wine. “Drink it slowly,” I said to my wife as I looked with horror at the 

£40 bill. “We’re not having another one.”

Act two 

On our first day on Sodermoja, we headed to the supermarket on neighbouring Moja and were directed to the Systembolaget, part of the nationwide network of government-owned liquor stores. It was Sunday and we were going to be there for a week. Modestly we ordered three bottles of wine. “Of course. They should be here by Wednesday.”

Act three 

We went to collect our booty on Wednesday to discover that only one of the  three bottles had been delivered.

Act four 

The cans of beer up to a maximum strength of 3.5% that you can legally buy over the supermarket counter just don’t cut it.

Act five 

At Stockholm Skavsta airport, where we waited for our flight home, there was a very agreeable bar with 5.2% lager on tap. I’m not going to say that was the happiest hour of the holiday. But it wasn’t far off.

Epilogue 

It may not have been our intention, but after a week of drinking very little, we really did feel so much better.

How to book

Adrian Bridge was a guest of the tourist authorities of the Stockholm archipelago (stockholmarchipelago.com) and Stockholm (visitstockholm.com).

A week in the cabin in which he stayed on Sodermoja in July costs from 5000 SEK (£400), bookable through skargardsstugor.se/en - accommodation in the archipelago tends to get booked up pretty far in advance: it may be worth looking ahead to summer 2021.

In Stockholm he stayed at the Haymarket by Scandic hotel (From 1,750 SEK per night) and attended an early morning yoga class at Downtown Camper (from 1,850 SEK per night); both bookable through scandichotels.com.