Things to do in Sweden

For one of the best things to do in Sweden, take a boat tour around its capital city, Stockholm. Just head straight to the Stromkajen harbourside, where various operators sell tickets for different sightseeing trips. You can also take smaller passenger ferries across to the smaller archipelagos where the likes of the ABBA Museum, Grona Lund Theme Park and Vasa Museum are. It’s easy enough to cover most ground on foot or by metro; the key sights are Gamla Stan (the Old Town), the modern art museum, the photography museum and Sodermalm’s hipster SoFo neighbourhoods. Browsing Sweden holiday packages? Stockholm has plenty of attractions to keep you busy, and is well connected with the rest of the country.

Dubbed as Sweden’s ‘second city’, Gothenburg is a delightfully unpretentious city with a large university scene. It’s an attractive city to visit, with broad avenues, leafy parks and impressive museums and galleries, and you can bank on a lot of fun in the quirky bars, cool coffee shops and ultra-slick restaurants. Most visitors head towards Avenyn, the main shopping street, which leads uphill towards the Konstmuseum (art museum), Liseberg (Scandinavia’s largest theme park) and the Universeum science centre

If you’re considering what to do in Sweden, make time for Malmo, the country’s most cosmopolitan city. Between the medieval squares and bohemian districts are Turkish restaurants, striking modern architecture and a network of cycleable lanes. It’s the perfect place to explore at leisure; most of the sights are packed in the medieval centre, with its imposing town hall, Gothic St Petri Kyrka and the pedestrianised shopping street of Sodergatan.

Gotland is Sweden’s largest island and as such it’s worth exploring in its entirety by car or bike. It has a spread of fabulous beaches but the highlight has to be Visby, a wonderfully preserved medieval town. Visby is full of crumbling churches and cobbled alleyways; use the 13th-century walls that circle the town to help navigate you (although getting lost is half of the fun here) until you stumble across the art gallery and history museum.

While most visitors stick to the main cities in the south, head to central Sweden, where you’ll find the delightfully deep-blue Lake Siljan. Deep in the province of Dalarna, there are loads of festivities held during the midsummer, celebrating long days and warm weather. And it’s from this point that you can take a brilliant rail journey, the Inlandsbanan, which trails to the Arctic Circle via the towns of Orsa and Ostersund. Try to time it with the midsummer festivities, which is when the place really comes to life. You can also pay a visit to the small Vasaloppet Museum, which tells the history of the gruelling annual cross-country ski race that’s been held here for the past hundred years or so.

Throughout Sweden, you’ll find many locals practicing fika, a small ritual meaning something along the lines of “to have a coffee, slice of cake and a chat with friends”. It’s a common cosy pastime, and it’s predominantly coffee shops that are taken over with Swedes making the most of fika-friendly afternoons. You’re spoilt for choice for coffee shops in Sweden – especially the more cosmopolitan cities like Stockholm and Malmo – so why not pause in a coffee shop and practice fika for yourself?