Busy every day but in a leisurely way with time to sit in the sunshine and read books and walk along the piers of the little fishing towns. On Thursday, we drove north to Tanumshede to see the bronze age rock etchings that dot the area. Apparently there are more than 10,000 boat drawings alone, scattered around Sweden. They are colored red in order to be seen better by tourists, as in their natural state, they’re scarcely noticeable and many have eroded badly due to pollution and weather. The world heritage site at Tanum included a replica bronze age settlement farm complete with a place of sacrifice (bog where offerings were made) and various hunting traps like the fox trap that John caught the kids in.
Bronze Age rock carvings at Tanum (photo: Anders Ek)
Thief warning! (photo: John Slaughter)
Caught in a bronze age fox trap! (photo: John Slaughter)
On the way home from Tanum, we stopped and ate in Fjällbacka, a pretty town on the water. We ate at Bryggan at Ingmar Bergman’s Square where the food was delicious, and then had huge 2-scoop ice-cream cones before walking up by the cliffside to explore KungsKlyft, a gorge in the rock that has split it in two. The temperature in the gorge was at least 10 degrees cooler than outside, and the view from the top of the rock (Vetteberget) was spectacular.
Daring to walk under the boulders of Kungsklyft (photo: Anders Ek)
View from Vetteberget over Fjällbacka (photo: John Slaughter)