CROSSING TIME ZONES
This summer I had the pleasure of visiting the beautiful Koster Islands off the west coast of Sweden. My article about my visit has just been published in Sierra Magazine:
Ursholmen, photo by Annika S. Hipple
Rain and wind lash at my Gore-Tex as I make my way up a trail on the island of Ursholmen toward Sweden’s westernmost lighthouse. On a fine day, I’d linger to take in the solitude, the salty air, and the stark outer-archipelago scenery. But today the sea is dark and opaque, and the land—a treeless expanse of gray rock and brown and green grasses, with a cluster of decaying buildings—feels like a place where human visitors are tolerated, but only just. Looking seaward, I find it hard to fathom the unseen wonderland beneath the dreary surface.
It’s quite a change from yesterday, when I biked and hiked under sunny skies on North and South Koster, the archipelago’s main islands. I wandered through woodlands and fields to secluded inlets and stood atop the rocky heights of the Valfjäll lookout. That evening, in the Scandinavian summer’s lingering twilight, a thunderstorm roared in, rattling the windows of my rustic cabin and illuminating the northern sky with pulses of lightning.
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