There are few things Arabella Carey Adolfsson enjoys more than going fishing near her lakeside home in Sweden during the summertime, or getting her camera out and taking photographs of the natural beauty surrounding her.

She and her husband Stefan, a Swede, often take their boat out from Torpön, the island where they live, onto the waters of Lake Sommen, savoring the picturesque views of the surrounding fields, forests and cliffs.

“It’s gorgeous here,” Adolfsson, who was born and raised in San Diego, tells CNN Travel. “Sweden is beautiful. The lake is beautiful. The air is clean. There’s no traffic.”

Since moving to Scandinavia in 2022, after spending much of her life in California, she’s come to appreciate the rhythm of having four distinct seasons — though Swedish winters, she admits, “can be quite brutal.”

There are other pleasures too. Adolfsson says she enjoys being close to the rest of Europe. The couple sometimes drive to Copenhagen and then fly to Portugal, or drive to Stockholm, four hours away, where they can “jump on a plane to Latvia or Hungary.”

And yet, nearly three years into the move, Adolfsson says that settling into life in Sweden has come at a cost she hadn’t fully anticipated.

She and her husband, who met and married in 2009, had long imagined splitting their time between Sweden, Mexico and California. Stefan and Adolfsson who is Mexican American, have three children and three grandchildren between them.

They first tried living in Sweden together in 2016, moving to the southern city of Lund, near Malmö, but after two and a half years Adolfsson returned to the United States, homesick.

They decided to try again after what she describes as a serendipitous moment in August 2022, when she came across an online listing for a “beautiful” furnished lakeside house on Torpön. Within a month, they had bought the property and by October, they had moved in.

Only after arriving in Torpön did Adolfsson realize that their new home was “in the middle of nowhere.” The island, small and sparsely populated, is at least half an hour drive to what she calls “civilization.”

Despite having lived in Sweden before, moving to such a remote part of the country proved to be a culture shock for Adolfsson. Days can pass without her seeing anyone other than her husband.

“I’m very much a person who loves people and gets my energy from being around people,” she said. On Torpön, she added, residents tend to keep to themselves. Making friends has been difficult.

Back in San Diego, Adolfsson was surrounded by her large extended family. The absence of that community has been one of the hardest adjustments for her.

“There was a huge slice of my life that was taken away,” she says. “And I still haven’t figured out what to replace it with.” She is, however, grateful that her sister lives in Germany, which is in the same time zone as Sweden.

She recognizes that life might feel different in a city, rather than on an island with no public transportation and a single restaurant.

Torpön hums with activity in the summer — kayaking, paddleboarding, boating — but winters are long and quiet, the island more or less deserted.

Adolfsson and Stefan, who works as a substitute teacher, plan their grocery shopping trips to the mainland carefully, stocking up before retreating indoors. When a foot of snow is on their doorstep, they “huddle up in the house and eat and drink.”

Adapting, she has learned, requires a mental reset. “It’s a matter of reworking the program in your head that you were used to running,” she says, “and running a new program.”

Adolfsson’s “new program” involves seeing as much of Europe as she can. She’s traveled to Slovenia, Latvia, Portugal, Germany and Mallorca since moving to Sweden, making collages of her photographs for family and friends and writing a children’s book inspired by her grandchildren.

“This allows me the time to be creative,” she says.

Video chats keep her in touch with family and friends back in the US. Adolfsson cherishes her Sunday calls with her family, describing how her three-year-old grandson “hugs the telephone” before saying goodbye. “Thank God for the technologies that we have now, so that we can be expats and stay connected,” she says.

Language has been another hurdle. Although she had some Swedish before moving, Adolfsson was far from fluent. Classes have helped her better communicate, but her limited skill proved a barrier to integrating with Swedes. The reserve she perceives in Swedish culture has also required her to make some adjustments.

“I’m Hispanic, and we’re like PDAs all over the place,” she says. “The Swedes are more reserved. So you don’t have a lot of hugging and kissing.”

There are plenty of upsides. Her new life may be much quieter than the one she left behind in San Diego, but Arabella Carey, who works remotely, says there’s a distinct “lack of stress,” which she’s grateful for.

The cost of living is more favorable, too. “Everything is cheaper” in Sweden compared to California, Adolfsson says — particularly housing. The water in her home is free “because it comes from the lake.”

Health care in Sweden is far less expensive than the US, she says. When she spent five days in hospital after a fall a few years ago, she was amazed to receive a total bill of less than $100.

While she has grown to appreciate many aspects of Swedish life, the cuisine is not among them. She misses easy access to good Mexican food and says finding “a decent tortilla” has proved elusive. And, having come to appreciate the “finer things of life” as she’s gotten older, she finds herself at odds with “down to earth” Swedish culture.

She misses the ease of some aspects of life in the US, stressing that “Sweden is not a convenient country.” She’s bemused by what she describes as the do-it-yourself culture, which she finds “very admirable but way over my head.”

Looking back, Arabella Carey believes that the move would’ve been easier and simpler at a younger age. “Change is more difficult the older you get,” she observes.

She wishes she’d had more of an understanding of the techniques and behaviors required “to explore, integrate and assimilate” in a new place with ease before leaving the US, and feels that these are becoming “necessary skills” the “more global we become.”

For now, she plans to remain in Sweden, returning to San Diego every few months and hoping, eventually, to return back for good — if she can persuade her husband.

Her advice to others considering a similar move later in life is to ensure they “have a connection” to the place, and “understand that it’s going to take time.”

“You’re going to be lonely and alone at times,” she adds. “And you’re going to have some tough days where you wish you were home. But you’re going to make some great memories.”

A contentious housing bill that would have capped rent increases to 5% a year died in the Assembly on Tuesday, a decision greeted with boos and cries of disapproval from spectators packed inside the committee chamber.

Assembly Bill 1157 would have lowered California’s limit on rent increases from 10% to 5% annually and removed a clause that allows the cap to expire in 2030. It also would have extended tenant protections to single-family homes — though the bill’s author, Assemblyman Ash Kalra (D-San José), offered to nix that provision.

“Millions of Californians are still struggling with the high cost of rent,” Kalra said. “We must do something to address the fact that the current law is not enough for many renters.”

Assemblymember Diane Dixon (R-Newport Beach) said she was concerned the Legislature was enacting too many mandates and restrictions on property owners. She pointed to a recent law requiring landlords to equip rentals with a refrigerator.

“That sounds nice and humanly caring and all that and warm and fuzzy but someone has to pay,” she said. “There is a cost to humanity and how far do we squeeze the property owners?”

The California Apartment Assn., California Building Industry Assn., California Chamber of Commerce and California Assn. of Realtors spoke against the legislation during Tuesday’s hearing before the Assembly Judiciary Committee.

Debra Carlton, spokesperson for the apartment association, said the bill sought to overturn the will of the voters who have rejected several ballot measures that would have imposed rent control.

“Rather than addressing the core issue, which is California’s severe housing shortage, AB 1157 places blame on the rental housing industry,” she said. “It sends a chilling message to investors and builders of housing that they are subject to a reversal of legislation and laws by lawmakers. This instability alone threatens to stall or reverse the great work legislators have done in California in the last several years.”

Supporters of the bill included the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment Action, a statewide nonprofit that works for economic and social justice. The measure is also sponsored by Housing Now, PICO California, California Public Advocates and Unite Here Local 11.

The legislation failed to collect the votes needed to pass out of committee.

On Monday, proponents rallied outside the Capitol to drum up support. “We are the renters; the mighty mighty renters,” they chanted. “Fighting for justice, affordable housing.”

“My rent is half of my income,” said Claudia Reynolds, who is struggling to make ends meet after a recent hip injury. “I give up a lot of things. I use a cellphone for light; I don’t have heat.”

Lydia Hernandez, a teacher and renter from Claremont, said she used to dream of owning a home. As the first person in her family to obtain a college degree, she thought it was an obtainable goal. But now she worries she won’t even be able to keep up with her apartment’s rent.

Hernandez recalled noticing a woman who had recently become homeless last week on her way to school.

“I started to tear up,” said Hernandez, her voice cracking. “I could see myself in her in my future, where I could spend my retirement years living an unsheltered life.”

After Tuesday’s vote, Anya Svanoe, communications director for ACCE Action, said many of their members felt betrayed.

“While housing production is a very important part of getting us out of this housing crisis, it isn’t enough,” she said. “Families are in dire need of protections right now and we can’t wait for trickle-down housing production.”

In California, 40.6% of households are spending more than 30% of their income on housing, according to an analysis released in 2024 by the Pew Research Center. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development considers households that spend more than 30% of their incomes on housing to be “cost burdened.”

Lake Shasta and California’s other lakes and reservoirs got a big boost from wet holiday storms. Nearly two weeks into 2026, all of the state’s 17 major reservoirs are brimming above their 30-year average after atmospheric rivers dumped heavy rain on much of the state starting the week before Christmas, lasting into Wednesday, Jan. 7.

Both the rain and the rainwater draining from the ground into lakes helped raise reservoir levels, the National Weather Service said.

Lake Shasta waters lapped just short of 29 feet from the top on Jan. 11, after rising about 45 feet since Dec. 18 — the day before the first heavy winter storm of the season rolled over Shasta County, according to the California Department of Water Resources.

Two other major Southern California supply reservoirs were full or near full as of Jan. 11, according to state data.

• Lake Cachuma is 101% full. The reservoir contained 58% more water than its 30-year historic average.
• Lake Casitas is 98% full, 27% more than its average.

Lakes continue to fill for days after storms pass as the heavily saturated soil continues to drain into waterways, said meteorologist Bill Rasch at the weather service’s Sacramento branch.

Based on state water resources department reports, here’s how much water other major reservoirs held on Jan. 11, starting with the three biggest.

How full is Lake Shasta?

Lake Shasta, the biggest state-owned reservoir, was 82% full, according to the state’s latest data. With several months left to go in the area’s rainy season, the lake was 35% more full than its historic average over the past 30 years.

However, Lake Shasta started the water year 4% higher than average on Oct. 1, 2025, after Northern California’s super wet spring.

How full is Lake Oroville?

The state’s second-largest reservoir, Lake Oroville — located 80 miles north of Sacramento in the Sierra Nevada foothills — was 78% full and held 39% more water than usual on Jan. 11.