Visby, the city of roses

By Jonas Tyden

July 9, 2008 | VISBY, Sweden -- I spent this past week in Visby, which is the capital city on Gotland. Gotland is the largest island in the Baltic Sea. It is a very beautiful island, and approximately 50,000 people live on Gotland year around.

The people who live on Gotland are mainly farmers, but the inhabitants also make a lot of money from tourism. Every summer a lot of tourists visit the island and the island has a lot of summer residents. Especially hectic are the last weeks of July and the first weeks of August.

Visby is the biggest city on Gotland and approximately 20,000 people live there year around. It is a beautiful city with a lot of history, and in the medieval times it was a major merchandise city, since it is located in between Sweden and the Baltic countries. The city's harbor was used as a meeting point for people from all over northern Europe.

Visby is surrounded by a magnificent wall called "Ringmuren," which translated as "the Ring wall." The 3.5-kilometer wall stretches around the city in a circle and the wall has a total of 44 towers. In the past the wall was a good defense for the city and even thoguh it was built in the 1200s it is well preserved. Today the wall is a popular tourist attraction and people from all over the world have seen it.

The tiny streets of Visby are full of roses and therefore the city has the nickname "the city of roses."

The medieval week is the main attraction of the Gotlandish summer. There are a lot of activites during that week and many people are dressed in medieval clothing.

In the afternoons a lot of people go to the "after beach" at Kallbadshuset to talk or have drinks. Visby can offer everyone something and leaves no one dissapointed.

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