Our sleepy spot was not so sleepy. We parked next to a group of ‘raving’ elders. With reindeer skin blankets and sheep skin rugs they boomed acid music until sunrise. Mac n Tosh were not impressed either as they yapped to the beat until they were pooped.

Bronze Age Carving

A man wth a spear

Not far to our stop today, the region in and around Tanum. An area full of bronze age rock carvings with the earliest dating from around 1000 BC. The concentration of these pictorial images is such at it was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1994. We started our journey at the Vitlycke museum, which is free with lots of information about the carvings albeit presented a rather uninspiring way. Outside to the rear of the museum, a mock bronze age farm setting (which we didn’t see) and to the front a walking route. We followed the path up and over the stream where we arrived at the largest carving, covering 200 sq m. You can walk freely amongst the rock carvings with little information boards at the beginning of each section. We walked to all 6 rocks and up to the top to the once burial site.

The world heritage site covers a total of 45 sq km with over 500 different carving sites. We jumped back in Vin and spent the day driving from site to site exploring and debating the different carvings. Some sites focused on hunting scenes, others images of ships; and at Asberget scenes containing animals, ploughs and axes. We spotted the spear god, horsemen, sun horse, the lovers and even a Mac n Tosh.

By late afternoon, it was time to find our sleep spot for tonight, so we hit the main road and headed north. Passing hardly any traffic we weaved along passing endless inland farms nestled between rocky outcrops. Cows and horses grazing in the cool afternoon air, whilst hares darted like bullets across the fields. The farm houses made of brick and copper, with traditional gable roof. In the main, residential wooden houses were painted yellow or red, a common feature across Sweden. This colour tradition stems from when wooden houses were considered not so attractive so they were painted red to make them look as though they were built of brick, or yellow to represent stone.

We arrived in Stromstad and drove to the north end of the town and parked up next to the waters edge. It was a beautiful calm evening with an moody sky and a steel grey sea. The odd sea gull dive bombing the water to catch its final meal of the day. As we looked back beyond the high street, the road curved around the bay, leading out to a narrow headland and after a half a kilometre or so it presented a fetching view back to the harbour town. A great place for us to park up for the night.

Our sleep spot in Stromstad

Our sleep spot tonight, quite a nice car park over looking Stromsted harbour with little fishing boats bobbing in sea and plenty birds to drive the dogs bonkers.

GPS position N058.940858 E011.167513

Route: Grebbestad to Stromsted

Weather, low 6 high 16. Overcast with the odd drizzle but at least the winds backed off.