It was his winter paintings that brought Gustaf Fjaestad fame, but at the same time, it is evident that he was a very complete artist. The first curator of the Rackstad Museum, Per Inge Fridlund, goes so far as to call him versatile "almost like a Renaissance painter.” We see evidence of this in the current painting at auction. During the summer months, Fjaestad used a rowboat he had built himself to venture out onto Lake Racken and explore various aspects of the Värmland landscape. This is how Fjaestad's wife, Maja, wrote to her mother:
"It was a celebration, I must say, when Gustaf got the boat ready; he went out to test the sails, and we went around the point and followed it with our eyes; it looked good on the lake. The next day, he sailed over to Ahlgrensson's and brought them back here, and in the afternoon, we all rowed out to a small island called 'Kampöla' and had punch and feasted on lingonberries that had remained from last year. It is a fine, elegant oak boat and holds a great many."