Gotland is Sweden's largest island and one of its most popular summer destinations — a flat limestone plateau in the Baltic Sea with a character quite different from the mainland. The landscape is open farmland, wildflower meadows, and dramatic sea stacks (raukar) along the coast. The walled town of Visby is the obvious first stop and, for many visitors, the whole reason for the trip — but the rest of the island, best seen by bicycle, rewards a few extra days.
North of Visby, a free ferry from Fårösund crosses to Fårö island, quieter and starker than the mainland of Gotland, with the limestone sea stacks at Langhammars among the most photographed formations in the Baltic — this is also the island Ingmar Bergman called home for decades and used as a filming location. Further stacks stand at Lickershamn, on Gotland's own west coast.
Inland, Lojsta Hed is a nature reserve where Gotland's near-extinct native pony breed, the russ, still roams semi-wild moorland. Roma Kloster, the ruins of a 12th-century Cistercian monastery, hosts open-air theatre in summer, and Stavgard recreates a Viking-age village on the site of an excavated 10th-century hall. Ferries and flights connect Gotland to Stockholm year-round, with frequent summer service.
