Sweden

February 2013: Stockholm was the second stop on our Scandinavian trip. We took the train from Denmark, and stayed at the Hotel Adlon on Vasagatan Street, which was really close to the train to the airport (super convenient). It was also close to a good walking/shopping street called Drottninggatan. 

highlights

. Gamla Stan . Vasa Museum . Stockholm Underground . Observatorielunden

lowlights

. Vasa Museum . ABBA . Cold

gAMLA STAN

Gamla Stan is the old town in Stockholm. Narrow streets, souvenir shops, great restaurants and pubs, and just a cool place to walk around. We found a neat little troll shop called Tomtar and Troll. It was a good little shop for some unique souvenirs (we bought our moms a little "kitchen witch"). We ate at a delicious Thai restaurant, and visited a few pubs in the area. 

vasa museum

This was one of the most interesting things we saw in Stockholm. The Vasa was a warship built in the 1600's that sank after only sailing like 1300 m into it's maiden voyage. They salvaged the ship in the 1950's or 60's, and it's now in the museum. It's neat to see this giant ship up close, although you can't go on it. I would recommend visiting the museum, as it's also in a great area for walking around.

stockholm subway

Trevor did some research on other interesting things to do in Stockholm, and found out one of the subway lines was this kind of art masterpiece. So one night we bought a ticket that lasted a couple of hours and rode the subway to different stations. It has a cave-like feel to it, and different artists have painted, sculpted, and engraved each station. They were all so different, and so cool! I definitely recommend taking a visit down there.

foOD AND DRINK

I don't think we had much traditional Swedish food (we had some meatballs at some point though...of course). But Stockholm has every type of food you could want. I would research some top restaurants in the area. We ate at a couple of really good Thai restaurants, and I really can't recall much else in regards to food.

stories worth mentioning

1. Observatorielunden: we happened upon this Observatory Museum at the top of Drottninggatan Street. No one was there, and the man who ran the place showed us around. He was so interesting, and talked about his lifelong dream to go to Churchill, Manitoba (what?!?) to see the polar bears. I hope he made it! The museum I believe is now closed, unfortunately.

2. ABBA: okay, so my sister and I are ABBA fans, and wanted to get some souvenirs while in Sweden (who wouldn't). However we quickly realized that there was NO sign of ABBA. Anywhere. Souvenir shops didn't have a single thing, and there was no special store, museum, poster, nothing! We were so disappointed. We ended up finding their old recording studio (just a random office building now), but that was it. I found out that only a few months after we left, an ABBA museum opened up. I guess it just wasn't meant to be. 

3. Trevor plays music, and ended up having his Sweden debut at a random bar in Gamla Stan. The place was packed and had live music. The manager (?) was Egyptian who actually lived in Kuwait for awhile (we have found through our travels that this is way more common than you would think). So naturally, we chatted the whole night and drank way too much tequila. He found out Trevor plays music, so Trevor got up there, grabbed a guitar, and sang some Johnny Cash.