Stockholm is scattered across fourteen islands where a lake meets the Baltic, so water is never out of sight.
The old town of Gamla Stan crowds its ochre houses onto one islet, while ferries thread out toward an archipelago of thousands more. It's strikingly handsome and strikingly orderly, a city of design, museums and clean Nordic restraint.
Swedes can seem reserved, but the daily coffee-and-cake ritual of fika is a sociable institution they take seriously.
Eat meatballs with lingonberry, pickled herring, and slow down for a proper fika.
Round trip from Prague, any dates in October 2026.