Efter lunch gick vi till en liten lekplats nära sjön.

Because Swedish often leaves out the article with meals when speaking generally.

• Efter lunch = after lunch
• Efter frukost = after breakfast
• Efter middag = after dinner

If you mean a specific lunch that has already been mentioned, Efter lunchen can also be correct.

• Efter lunchen gick vi hem. = After the lunch, we went home.

So in your sentence, Efter lunch sounds natural because it refers to the general mealtime, not a specially identified lunch.

This is because Swedish follows the V2 rule in main clauses. That means the finite verb usually comes in the second position.

Here, Efter lunch is placed first. That takes the first position, so the verb gick must come second, and the subject vi comes after it.

Structure:

• Efter lunch = position 1
• gick = position 2
• vi = subject after the verb

So:

• Efter lunch gick vi till en liten lekplats nära sjön.

If you start with the subject instead, then you get:

• Vi gick till en liten lekplats nära sjön efter lunch.

Both are correct, but the word order changes because of the V2 rule.

Gick is the past tense of gå, which means to go or to walk, depending on context.

Some useful forms:

• infinitive: gå
• present: går
• past: gick
• supine: gått

It is an irregular verb, so you cannot predict gick from the infinitive just by adding a regular ending.

Till is used for movement to a destination.

So:

• gå till en lekplats = go to a playground

This fits because the sentence describes going somewhere.

Compare:

• till = to, toward
• på = on, at
• i = in, inside

Examples:

• Vi gick till lekplatsen. = We went to the playground.
• Vi var på lekplatsen. = We were at the playground.
• Barnen lekte i lekplatsen is generally not natural; you would usually say på lekplatsen for being at the playground.

Because lekplats is an en-word in Swedish.

That means:

• indefinite article: en
• adjective form with an en-word: liten

So:

• en liten lekplats = a small playground

If the noun were an ett-word, the adjective would look different:

• ett litet hus = a small house

So the form of the article and adjective depends on the gender of the noun.

Yes. Liten is an irregular adjective.

Its common forms are:

• en liten
  • en-word singular
• ett litet
  • ett-word singular
• små
  • plural
• lilla
  • definite form

Examples:

• en liten lekplats
• ett litet barn
• små lekplatser
• den lilla lekplatsen

So in your sentence, liten is the correct form because lekplats is singular, indefinite, and an en-word.

Because Swedish usually writes compound nouns as one word.

Lekplats is made from:

• lek = play
• plats = place

So literally it is something like play-place, meaning playground.

This is very common in Swedish. English often uses two words where Swedish prefers one compound word.

Examples:

• sjukhus = hospital
• fotbollslag = football team
• sommarstuga = summer cottage

So lekplats as one word is completely normal.

Sjön is the definite singular form of sjö.

• en sjö = a lake
• sjön = the lake

Swedish usually marks definiteness by adding an ending to the noun rather than using a separate word like the.

Since the sentence says nära sjön, it refers to a specific lake, probably one that is known from the situation or context.

The noun sjö is an en-word, so its definite singular ending is -n.

That gives:

• en sjö = a lake
• sjön = the lake

This is a basic Swedish pattern:

• en bil → bilen
• en katt → katten
• en sjö → sjön

Notice that English uses a separate word, the, while Swedish often attaches the definiteness to the end of the noun.

Here nära is a preposition meaning near or close to.

So:

• nära sjön = near the lake

A useful point: you do not add till after it here.

• correct: nära sjön
• not natural: nära till sjön

So in this sentence, nära directly introduces the place relation.

Yes. That is also correct.

Both versions are natural:

• Efter lunch gick vi till en liten lekplats nära sjön.
• Vi gick till en liten lekplats nära sjön efter lunch.

The difference is mostly about focus and style:

• starting with Efter lunch puts the time first
• starting with Vi puts the subject first

Swedish allows both, but once you put Efter lunch first, the verb must come second: gick vi.