Allemanstratten in Sweden
Out of Australia, an article on how it is legal to camp anywhere you want in Scandinavia (Sweden, Norway, Finland and Iceland), provided you keep 70 meters from houses and stay out of gardens and cropland.
I suppose the only problem might be finding a spot that is 70 meters from a house?This privilege dates from a time when travellers needed all the help they could get to cross a wild and sparsely populated region, not to mention allowing those marauding Vikings easy access on their way to raping and pillaging the rest of Europe.
Thankfully their descendants are a little more placid (and egalitarian - every woman has the same right), but they haven't lost their enthusiasm for a tradition that typifies the socialist outlook of Scandinavia. Every weekend families camp, ski, hike, cycle, canoe and swim, anywhere they like. Only Denmark forbids it, being more urban than its northern neighbours. In Sweden it is even enshrined in the constitution, and the country's environmental protection agency has been known to remove fences if they are deemed to obstruct public access.
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