Stora Karlsö, Nature reserve island off Gotland, Sweden
Stora Karlsö is a nature reserve island off the west coast of Gotland in Sweden, shaped by limestone plateaus and tall coastal cliffs. The island can be explored on foot along a network of paths that run along the clifftops and through the interior.
The island was home to people in the Stone Age, as shown by finds made inside several of its caves. In the medieval period, a marble quarry operated here and supplied stone for churches across Gotland.
Stora Karlsö is known above all for its seabird colonies, which fill the cliffs each summer with noise and movement. Guillemots and razorbills nest in the rock faces in large numbers, and watching them from the clifftop paths is the main reason most visitors make the trip.
The island is reached by boat from Klintehamn harbor on the Swedish mainland during summer, with a crossing of around 30 minutes. Sturdy shoes are worth wearing since the paths cross uneven limestone ground throughout.
The limestone beneath your feet on this island contains fossilized coral reefs from a time when this part of the world sat near the equator, around 400 million years ago. Walking the paths here means walking over what was once a tropical seabed.
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