Scandinavia

Weeks in the World – Scandinavia – explained

I post my blogs after my travel, but still in reverse order, so this post is to summarize what you will read below. If you want to read from the beginning, scroll to the bottom.

This blog records and celebrates my first trip to Scandinavia. I decided to do the capitols, so Stockholm, Sweden; Copenhagen, Denmark and Oslo Norway. I’d also heard that if you take an Iceland airline you can do a free stopover there, so I added a couple of nights in Reykjavik to my trip.

Farewell, Scandinavia – final thoughts

July 25, 2017

Farewell, Leif Eriksson, Viking (he’s standing outside Reykjavik’s iconic church).

This is the final post in a blog about Scandinavia, where I spent July 10-24 on vacation (via Iceland).

To read the blog from the beginning, scroll down. To read other blogs about other trips, see other parts of this website.

Am I glad I went? A couple of people have asked me. Yes, I am. I’m also glad I went in July: I’m a natural for hot weather and less so for cold, so I think this would be my only season. Although I would love to see the northern lights sometime. I’m also glad I visited all of these Nordic countries continuously as there is much overlap in their history and in some cases culturally.

Since I’ve returned people have asked me which city I liked best and it’s hard to say: I liked the canals and grand buildings in Stockholm, the cobbled streets and big city squares in Copenhagen, the smaller size and good use of the waterfront in Oslo, and the natural landscape in Iceland. I’m also not an expert given my whirlwind, although I did feel like I got a good taste of each.

Now that I am back home, I am trying to stretch out my remaining chocolate for as long as possible! My big Melkesjokolade bar is in the freezer to be doled out at intervals, and I have saved some Icelandic chocolate to share with my family at the cottage in a few weeks (surprise!).

I did get lazy and made little use of the phrase sheets I printed off from the Internet, since there is so much ready English in Scandinavia, but here I will close with “Bless!” the sweet Icelandic word for goodbye.

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Special issues, final thoughts

July 24, 2017

On my way home today, after another walk around Reykjavik one last time to re-photograph everything on my first sunny day here. Seeing the city without the haze and cold of rain definitely gives me another perspective. I also bought some last-minute souvenirs, including lava salt and Icelandic chocolate.

Back on the plane where I’m writing this up and contemplating the whole Nordic experience, here are a few more special interest categories:

 

 

 

CHOCOLATE

One of my favourite things to do in a new country is sample some of their local snacks and regional foods. In England, I enjoyed sampling different crisp flavours for example. And the supremacy of British chocolate over anything in Canada must also be acknowledged. But I digress. While I do eat a few meals out (detailed in other posts), I’m not a serious foodie partly because I can’t really afford to be one when travelling on a budget. But I do like to go into the local grocery stores and see what’s on the shelves. I often eat there too, to keep costs down. Especially in countries where the smoked salmon costs are lower than in Canada.

I also like to try out the local chocolate bars with funny names. Ditto snacks. In Scandinavia, it’s been the chocolate. Here are my records:

Stockholm

I tried out three that seem popular, partly because I got a 3 for 1 price deal. Then I tried a couple more on my return. Okay don’t judge; I’m on vacation:

Plopp: squares of chocolate filled with caramel that’s like Caramilk in North America, only the filling seems a bit more heavy and syrupy
Sport lunch: wafer and chocolate, like Kit Kat in North America
Daim: this is the winner for me, with English toffee inside, like a Skor bar in North America
Marabou: there seem to be many exciting flavours of this bar, but I tried milk chocolate
Mars: one of my favourites in North America, and especially in Britain (where all chocolate is better, did I mention that) so I had to sample it here: good news, more British than North American

Copenhagen

Tom’s Guld Barre: great smooth rich chocolate. Again, several flavours but I got the milk. To be scientific in my testing of course
Too much chocolate already left over from Sweden, so left it at that!

Oslo

Troika: Raspberry jelly, truffle and marzipan. A troika of flavours. Not for me
Smash: milk chocolate with bits of salty cornflakes inside? Interesting
Melkesjokolade: different flavours but I tried the milk! Great! I bought such a big bar that most is in my suitcase enroute for home

Iceland

Packed some Icelandic chocolate in my bag to take home, which I have now tried. I sampled the one with caramel and salt, which was very tasty!

PENNY CANDY

Judging from its availability and prominence in most supermarkets plus the 7/11 (yes, it’s here, and more full service than North America, with sandwiches, pastries and pizza for sale), the Scandinavians have the same love for gummies and penny candy as I do. Many good choices in flavor, including cola flavor and fuzzy peaches. But many other flavours too, like this marshmallow type called skum (ha) or sockerbit.

And now a word about licorice, where the Scandinavians and I part ways. I looked it up online to find out more https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salty_liquorice, since I dislike any licorice flavor, but this one seemed even stronger and apparently it is since it is made salty with ammonium chloride it is supposed to have a salty metallic taste. Apparently, it’s an acquired taste and Scandinavians love it! I am not yet sophisticated enough for this. PS-the word to look out for on packaging is lakrits or salmiak if you are also trying to avoid it.

A view from my hostel window in Iceland, with proof of the time!

ARCTIC LIGHT. NORDIC LIGHT?

Moving on to topics other than sweets, I am also fascinated by this arctic light phenomenon, which I have not experienced before. It really throws you to be in fulltime light all the time, and I wonder at what it is to live in that for an entire season.

I appreciated that my hotels had good blackout curtains and blinds.

On the other side, I wonder what it is to live in mostly darkness for the other half of the year, or to visit in the colder climate of winter. For almost my entire trip the temperature hovered between 9 and 14 degrees Celsius, although it did get into the low 20s a few times. I don’t like being cold, so this meant a lot of cardigans for me.

I am not sure I could handle the weather (ironic to say from a Canadian) although I am very curious about the northern lights, which I only experienced in museum exhibits but must be really neat in real life.

COSTS

I was also thrown a bit by the currency conversion, and then also by the realization of how expensive Scandinavia is! Firstly, I think I got a lousy conversion rate in Canada, and then it was also challenging to do the conversions in my head – different currency in each place, although they’re all called kroner/krona. Eventually I started using the internet currency converter on my smartphone, which was helpful. Iceland was even more expensive, with even modest restaurant meals starting at around $25.

Anyway, while I thought I was taking a two-week trip to economize over my usual three week vacations, I think I ended up spending almost as much. I will tell others going to save up their kroner beforehand!

INTERNET ACCESS AND GOOGLE MAPS

Another investment I decided to make was in some data for my smartphone, mostly in order to keep up with clients etc. and my family. In retrospect I might not have, or may have bought less, because the good news is that most places have Wi-Fi. Even the sightseeing tour buses boast about their Wi-Fi.

Of course, the one place where internet access became indispensable for the directionally challenged was in using Google maps to navigate from train stations to hotels. The system warns that it is still in beta, and while I think it does need work in some places, it was invaluable to the directionally challenged like myself. Long live the blue dot!

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Last full day in Reykjavik

July 23, 2017

My last full day in Iceland and I decided to visit the National Museum, then the National Gallery, then to find a swimming pool/hot tub, which is apparently where all the Icelanders hang out. My kind of place!

I thought the National Museum http://www.thjodminjasafn.is/english/ was well done, with a good sense of the history and variety of objects. I was less excited about the National Gallery http://www.listasafn.is/english although admission to the museum also included a visit to the Culture House http://www.visitreykjavik.is/culture-house where I found that I learned more.

Iceland has a pretty neat history as it was established relatively recently around 800 AD, and has an interesting relationship with the other Nordic countries (I’m glad I attached it to this trip as it seems continuous to learn about this history at the same time) being settled by Vikings then Norwegians, then in political union with all the Nordic countries at one point and then Danish rule at another before becoming fully independent after World War II.

I decided to try more of the local food today too, at a place called the Loki Café. It’s just across from the Hallgrímskirkja, the largest church in Iceland and an iconic building that you can see from almost anywhere in the city. I had an Iceland sampler plate that included smoked fish and mashed fish, and the best homemade rye bread. It was good to try, although I think I am more of a meat soup convert.

From the deeply historical to the deeply steamy, I was excited to find out that the pool at the top of Iceland Magazine’s top swimming spots in Reykjavik, Vesturbæjarlaug, was just around the corner from where I was staying: http://icelandmag.visir.is/article/5-best-swimming-pools-reykjavik-and-capital-region In addition to a regular pool heated to 29 degrees Celsius, there are several hot tubs, most of which were 38 to 40 and the hottest of which is 40-46 degrees (that is hot!). This was a great way to spend a final evening in the city.

And yes, did seem like a meeting place as it was full of people chatting. In addition to locals, who I could just smile and nod at, I chatted with an Australian who works in London, and a woman who lives just outside New York city making a stopover with her family on the way to Israel. Unlike the fancy spas advertised to tourists (Secret Lagoon, Blue Lagoon – they look fabulous but involve a commute and $60 admission compared with $10 at these local pools) this one did look like a regular community pool, except for the hot tubs. Who do I write to in Canada about getting some hot tubs added to our local community pools here?

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Golden Circle, because everybody does it

July 22, 2017

Today I decided to take what seems to be the most common tour of Iceland, the Golden Circle http://reykjaviksightseeing.is/ The tour takes eight hours, and visits three major attractions. First there’s Pingvellir National Park to see the “birthplace of the oldest parliament” called Althing, where the leader used to go and proclaim the new laws from a pedestal on the mountain. Next, we went to Geysir hot springs, apparently where the original word geyser comes from, and where the Strokkur Geyser erupts spectacularly every 8 minutes or so (I saw 2 or 3 of these) and there are also other dormant geysers to look at and feel nervous around. Last, we visited the Gullfoss waterfall, a glacial river that cascades down 32 metres into a canyon. For those of us close to Niagara Falls there was a natural comparison, although this falls into a narrower canyon.

We had a great tour guide who was very knowledgeable as well as cheerful, and made a few unauthorized secret stops (although I wondered how unauthorized when I noticed other buses stopping too). First we stopped at a lake to fill our water bottles with glacier water, then to meet some of the legendary Icelandic horses https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Icelandic_horse, then at a mall in Hverageroi that was broken apart by a 2008 earthquake measuring 6.3 on the Richter scale and now housing an exhibit featuring the crack in the foundation https://www.south.is/en/services/the-quake-2008

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Flight to Reykjavik

July 21, 2017

This morning I took the high-speed train back to Arlanda airport, which is about 40 kilometres north of the city. I’m on my way back home via Reykjavik.

This time I’m staying at a hostel. Despite it being my most modest accommodation (concrete floors, bathroom down the hall), it is the most expensive. This will turn out to be a theme here even more so than in Scandinavia.

I arrived around 3:00 pm, so went again on my usual wander around the city to get oriented, checking out the City Hall that overlooks a huge lake/pond, the parliament, shopping streets, church, sculptures. It is cold and rainy today, and seems a similar forecast for the weekend! Although I hear it’s a place where the weather changes regularly.

I was also surprised to read that despite the country’s name the climate is temperate, never getting much below zero Celsius (although never above the mid-twenties either).

For dinner I tried meat soup, a local specialty.

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Last day in Stockholm

July 20, 2017

Today is my last day in Stockholm, and bright and sunny. I took a nice walk down to the water and went to the Nordiska Museet https://www.nordiskamuseet.se/en, which is a museum about the Swedish people. I really liked this museum because it focused on insider knowledge of the Swedes, such as traditional dress and folk art, holidays (the Swedish national day is June 6, Swedes celebrate name days in addition to their birthdays) and festivals (May Day, a midsummer festival), marriage customs, and the like.

There were also exhibits about interiors showcasing Swedish design, and I took a photo of my own IKEA Ivar bookcase in an exhibit. Also an interesting exhibit about the Sami, the Nordic indigenous people (a people I’ve already seen covered in other places like the outdoor museum in Oslo – Scandinavia seems to have a similarly complex relationship with its Indigenous people we do in Canada). The museum has and makes good use of free audio guides, so there’s lots of information and you could spend a lot of time here. They also had an installation to experience the northern lights, and an exhibit on the Arctic daylight, my new fascination.

After the museum, I walked around the waterfront a bit more and then decided to take a cruise “Under the Bridges” which drives around the waterways for just over two hours, telling stories about the local scenery. We got a look at examples of apartment buildings featuring Swedish functionalist architecture, went through a lock to get out to the water beyond the city.

For dinner I had a kebab, one of my preferred takeout foods in Toronto, but partly just to verify against the kebab that I had one night in Copenhagen, which was made with what seemed like Tzatziki and tastes very different than in North America. Anyway, here it was even more strange as the Swedish version had tomato sauce and something that seemed like sour cream on it! Looking online, it seems this is a Swedish invention combining Turkish and Italian cuisines. If you’re not used to it, it’s very strange to order what you think is a kebab and get a pizza instead (apparently kebab meat is also the most popular Swedish pizza topping).

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Another day, another train

July 19, 2017

Took the train back to Stockholm today, around six hours. More eventful than expected when less than an hour into the trip we were told we needed to get off and change trains because the other train was experiencing “minor technical difficulties” and the conductors wanted to send it back to Stockholm. Not that thrilling to learn one is being loaded onto the train with the technical difficulties. Maybe one technical difficulty was the lack of air conditioning in car 7, where those of us booked there were asked to move again and be reassigned to cars that were properly air conditioned. Again, travel adventures!

With attractions soon to close, I decided to do some souvenir shopping and general shopping. H&M is Swedish, did you know?

So, I walked along Drottingsgatan, a pedestrian street that leads downtown to Gammla Stan. It’s distinctive by its black and white tiling and statues of lions at each cross street.

In the evening, I finally tried Swedish meatballs! Yes, they are like the dinner I occasionally enjoy at IKEA, with meatballs, light brown gravy, creamed potatoes and lingonberries. But the meatballs are much tastier. I’m not sure if I’m more impressed by that or the fact that IKEA makes a pretty good approximation.

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Oslo day two

July 18, 2017

Today I went to the Historical Museum http://www.khm.uio.no/english/ which was just around the corner from my hotel, and free with my admission to the Viking ship museum. It says it’s under renovation, and it’s kind of quirky, although perhaps will become even more so considering a note says renovations are ongoing.

Afterwards, I went to the National Museum of art, architecture and design http://www.nasjonalmuseet.no/en/ where I learned about some Norwegian painters including nineteenth century artist J.C. Dahl and the one I liked best Peder Balke, who I thought had a really original style (example: http://samling.nasjonalmuseet.no/en/object/NG.M.02614). The museum also had examples from more international artists, plus some interesting context about how the Nordic artists fit into different traditions.

I also saw Edward Munch’s The Scream (identifiable from the crowd of tourists around it) and took the requisite photograph (there’s an entire Munch museum with all of his artworks that he apparently left to Oslo; for that matter, there’s also an Ibsen museum, neither of which I got to due to time and budget).

Admission to the National Museum also included admission to the contemporary art museum and the architecture museums, so I went there next. At the contemporary, there was a large retrospective exhibit by Tori Wranes http://www.nasjonalmuseet.no/en/exhibitions_and_events/exhibitions/museum_of_contemporary_art/Tori+Wr%C3%A5nes.+Hot+Pocket.b7C_wBzM5g.ips, which was very sensory installation with flashing lights and people’s body parts cut off and hanging out of suitcases, and a wheelchair moving on two opposite moving treadmills. She also does video installations exploring the phenomenon of trolls, a favourite here in Scandinavia judging from the shops and souvenir signs.

In the architecture museum, part of the focus was on the museum’s recent renovation that returned it to its former state. Another display featured 25 top architectural projects from Danish architects, including a hotel on Fogo island in Newfoundland.

After so much time in museums, I felt like being outdoors again and enjoying that waterfront, so wandered along the waterfront then back up to my hotel, stopping to walk also through the fortress Akershus Festning. Nordic daylight is particularly noticeable here, so you feel like you can always be outside. Sometimes you wonder why you’re tired and look down at your watch to discover it’s not 5:00 pm as it appears but in fact 10:30 pm!

 

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First day in Oslo

July 17, 2017

My first full day in Oslo and I decided to take a cruise out to the Oslo fjord. I had wrestled with the idea of going to the western city of Bergen, Norway, as well, the gateway city to the fjords, and the closer I got to it the more I wished I’d extended my trip by another two or three days, especially after I read that the train ride itself to Bergen is stunning. So, I thought I’d at least see the smaller Oslo fjord here, which was a fun cruise although the fjord is not particularly breathtaking. We did travel on an old tall ship (motorized) and the weather was right this morning, sunny.

On my return to land, I went to the Norsk folk museum http://norskfolkemuseum.no/en/, another outdoor museum that’s like a smaller version of Skansen, with lots of farms and shops from various eras in from the eighteenth to twentieth century. Many of the houses had grass growing as their roofs which was interesting, and it was a nice walk.

Next I went to the Viking ship museum https://www.khm.uio.no/english/visit-us/viking-ship-museum/index.html which houses three Viking ships, the Tune, Oseberg and Gokstad, plus a few other exhibits, a couple of films and some details of the grounds where the ships were found.

These museums plus others that I did not visit due to budget and time (a Maritime museum, the Kon-Tiki about a twentieth-century explorer retracing the Vikings’ routes, and the Fram about a polar ship that tried to reach the arctic in the late nineteenth century) are all on a peninsula called Bygdoy, which you take a ferry to get to (you can also take a bus from downtown).

After I went for dinner along the waterfront, where I definitely needed a blanket. I had smoked salmon quesadillas. I am trying to eat as much of my favourite food as possible!

 

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Train ride to Oslo

July 16, 2017

Another train day on the way to Oslo (9+ hours!) catching up on my journal. Somewhat eventful because my habit of being ahead of time for transportation led me to the platform early, when another train was already there. All trains transfer at Gothenburg to Oslo, and I asked the train conductor if it was the right train and she said yes. But I should have looked at my ticket because it turns out I got on the milk run train instead of the express! So even though it left 12 minutes earlier, it arrived in Gothenburg after the express connection. And another train was not coming for another five hours! In retrospect, I should have just chilled out, checked out Gothenburg, which is a decent sized city, 2 stars in my Michelin guide, but since it was Sunday I was untrusting of schedules so hopped on a bus for the second leg. Travel adventures! Oh well, I arrived in Oslo around the same time I would have on the train anyway.

When I got there, I checked into my efficiently budget hotel, a budget brand called Smarthotel, well located. Then I walked around taking photos, getting oriented. Because it was around 7:00 pm and arctic sun, it was a great time of day for that.

According to my guidebook, Oslo was founded in 1080, became the capital in the thirteenth century although that title was taken away when Norway was annexed by Denmark, so Copenhagen was the capital for a long time. In 1624 when the town was destroyed by fire, the king Christian IV rebuilt it and named it Christiana. In 1814 Norway and Sweden were united, and in 1925, twenty years after Norway regained its independence they decided to go back to the name Oslo.

Oslo seems like a more compact city than Stockholm and Copenhagen, with most attractions based within walking distance. I decided against a bus tour here for that reason. I also think they also do a lot more with their waterfront, and you have a sense the city hangs out here, although there are also a lot of tourists too. This is particularly evident at the relatively new opera house, which is supposedly developed with marble and glass to mimic an iceberg, and attracts people hanging out on its roof. When I first happened on it, I didn’t know what it was and thought it was some sort of public park. Beside it is a new library also being developed, so there is a lot of construction in this city too.

As you walk along the waterfront, other attractions include the fortress Akershus Festning and the distinctive Radhus city hall, done in red brick with twin towers and a large square in front of it across the street at the waterfront. Apparently, the city hall is home of the official ceremony for the Nobel Peace prize, and there is also a museum for the peace prize here.

Down at the other end towards the ferries, there are a lot of restaurants and apartment buildings on canals that seem like they would be nice to live in. I like that all the restaurants in Scandinavia seem to have fleece blankets on hand for sitting outside, which I did partake in. I can’t imagine what it’s like in other months if I need a blanket in July.

Further from the water, the main drag in Oslo is Karl Johans gate, a long shopping street that stretches from the royal palace which is at the top of the hill, all the way to the train station. There is a huge park that surrounds the royal palace which is apparently free to the public; seems like a nice gesture.

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Copenhagen day two

July 15, 2017

Today I went to the National Museum of Denmark, which was very well done, then the Statens Museum for Kunst (kunst being art – this is their national gallery). I also went to Rosenborg, the king’s summer palace, decorated with many paintings and painted ceilings. In the evening, I went back to Tivoli and watched another pantomime show (Cinderella!) plus music on the outdoor stage.

I love it when a capitol has a museum about its people, since I go to a country not only to see it but to try to get some insight into the history. The National Museum of Denmark http://en.natmus.dk/museums/the-national-museum-of-denmark/exhibitions does a good job of this. The prehistory section is particularly interesting because so many items are so well preserved (it seems people kept throwing things into the bogs which were excellent preservation spots), so there are all these bog bodies and artefacts that are fairly pristine. Following up online after, their website is also pretty good and allows visitors to tour around http://en.natmus.dk/museums/the-national-museum-of-denmark/exhibitions/the-danish-prehistory/virtual-tour/ There is also a lot to see on Vikings.

Next, I went to Rosenborg, what was intended to be a summer palace for King Christian IV when he built it in 1633, but ended up being a favourite residence. Inside, the rooms are distinctly decorated with different art and themes, plus the crown jewels are in the treasury. There’s also some nice grounds attached, where people were taking advantage of the sun, I think especially in light of how rainy it was yesterday.

The art museum, abbreviated to SMK http://www.smk.dk, was also good to get an overview of Danish artists, although they are under renovation so all that was available was the highlights of the collection. Still, it was good to learn about new artists, among them Jens Juel, C.W. Eckersberg, J.C. Dahl, L.A. Ring (I am just refreshing my memory by looking at them online again after the fact, how nice that some art museum websites now allow you to do that).

I finished my last day by taking the other route offered by the double decker bus, which took us a bit further afield to the new opera house, a naval base and onto the islands including Christiania, a supposedly controversial free living community, reading more about it after the fact here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freetown_Christiania.

According to my guidebook, the city was founded in 1167 and the name Kobenhavn means merchant’s harbor. The city saw its golden age in the late sixteenth century under Christian IV, and then faced a Swedish invasion in the seventeenth century followed by devastating fires at the start and end of the eighteenth century. The town walls were dismantled in the mid-nineteenth century and replaced by parks, and after World War II most of the old centre was made pedestrian-friendly.

I think that’s what I like best about this city, the cobblestone streets and squares where people can just hang out. Because of the jazz festival for example, there was live music in the squares in the evening, which was nice. But a lot of Copenhagen is under construction right now, including some of the main squares, so it would be nice to see when everything is finished.

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First day in Copenhagen

July 14, 2017

Today I took a double decker tour to orient myself, although the tour had too many stops that were hotels not attractions! On the upside, here they let you ride it for 72 hours rather than 24. Also Copenhagen feels a bit more spread out somehow, so it was helpful to have an orientation.

The tour let us get off at the famous Little Mermaid statue, based on the Hans Christian Andersen story, so I took her picture.

Besides the tour I bought a Copenhagen card which allows admission to dozens of attractions for 24 hours so I accept that challenge and will see what I can see. These city cards seem popular here, seems like a good idea.

I started my run of admissions today with the Glyptotek art museum http://www.glyptoteket.dk/, which is based around the personal collection of Carl Jacobsen, founder of the Carlsberg brewery (the beer factory is another attraction here, although not to me since I’m not a beer drinker). Lots of sculpture as well as a nice winter garden in the centre of the Glyptotek.

I also went to Tivoli, an outdoor amusement park https://www.tivoli.dk/en/ Tivoli was probably the attraction mentioned most to me before I left, so I was curious to see it. Although I am not a fan of roller coasters so I think it may be more suited to those who are, as it has all sorts of fun looking rides if you are not scared to death of those things. I did like the grounds, and in the evening they have pantomime shows which are cute and well done (practical I guess too since there must be lots of tourists here who wouldn’t understand Danish).

They also do music nightly, and because the city was holding a jazz festival there was a free concert by Erykah Badu, who was really powerful. Unfortunately, the night did get rained out, so we the brave were there in our multiple sweaters – single digit temperatures in July!

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Train to Copenhagen

July 13, 2017

Today was mostly a train travel day (I bought a Eurrail Scandinavia pass) to Copenhagen, but I did take a walk in the morning in Stockholm to see the modern art museum http://www.modernamuseet.se/stockholm/en/exhibitions/the-collection/. Unfortunately, it seems that the national art museum is closed for renovation.

I left Stockholm around noon and arrived in Copenhagen around 7:00 pm, so went for a wander to orient myself.

Already I like the cobbled streets and city squares here, which apparently date back to the middle ages.

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First day in Stockholm

July 12, 2017

According to my Michelin guidebook, which recalls one of Stockholm’s descriptors “Venice of the North,” the city is built on 14 islands between two stretches of water, Lake Malaren on the west and the Baltic to the east, and is part of a larger archipelago. The city is now three times the size as it was in the thirteenth century, as the land has risen by three metres since then.

I’m reading this over breakfast at my hotel – I love hotels with breakfast included! After filling up on bacon and eggs and trying out the pickled fish and blue cheese (not sure if I’m a convert to blue cheese for breakfast although it is excellent variety), I continued the double decker tour for a full loop.

Next I went to the Nobel museum, then the outdoor museum Skansen. I also went to Vasa, a single object museum centred around on a ship that was dredged up from the Stockholm harbor in the 1960s after sinking there in 1628.

The Nobel museum http://www.nobelmuseum.se/ is soon moving to a bigger building and will become an academic centre, which may be why the exhibits seem a bit temporary. Despite that, there are some good multimedia displays where you can look up every winner since it started in every category. The awards also have a tradition where winners donate an object of importance to them, so many of those are on display. I took a tour, and the guide said that the award has become like the Oscars in Sweden: people dress up and have their own Nobel parties. The official ceremony is held at the Opera House (which is near where I’m staying) and includes a lavish dinner for 1,300 people. The laureates are allowed to invite a fixed number of guests, but above that number they have to pay out of their prize money for any extras!

Next, I went to Skansen http://www.skansen.se/en/, which is like Upper Canada Village in Eastern Ontario (or Black Creek Pioneer Village in Toronto), an “outdoor museum” they call it here. Apparently Skansen is Europe’s first. There are whole farms as well as the usual town buildings like school houses and shops, mostly from the eighteenth and nineteenth century. They also have domestic and even wild animals: a bear, reindeer, cows, moose, lynx, etc., plus smaller ones like reptiles and even a domestic cat, funny to see one in a museum.

Vasa museum https://www.vasamuseet.se/en is created surrounding the wooden ship that sank in 1628, and now stands as the best example of its kind. The museum features the ship at its centre and floors of exhibits along its edges describing everything from how it sank to the backgrounds of the 30 people who drowned. Apparently, the maiden voyage made it only 1,500 metres from shore before sinking, supposedly due to a poor centre of gravity that nobody had wanted to warn the king about. The museum also explains the details of the recovery in the 1960s, and how the ship is being preserved now (apparently it is slowly deteriorating, so they are trying to find ways to fix that).

Other than the museums, I’ve been spending a lot of time walking around and getting lost, as per my usual directional challenge. What I like about Stockholm so far is the canals—I didn’t realize it was built on so much water. Luckily, I will return to this city as there are museums yet to see.

For dinner, I had what is supposed to be a national favourite, an open-faced sandwich. I tried one with my favourite food, smoked salmon! Very tasty. Also tried a Swedish cider called Briska, also great. So tasty I forgot to take photos!

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Toronto-Stockholm-Copenhagen-Reykjavik, July 10-24

July 11, 2017

I’m dating this July 11th but if I could I would double date it because it really was one big long day: I was awake for almost 30 hours.

I left home at 7:00 pm Monday July 10th and landed in Reykjavic, Iceland’s international airport (called Keflavik) six hours later, then a 1.5 hour stopover and on to Arlanda airport in Stockholm, Sweden.

Took some neat pictures in the plane over Greenland, at least I think that’s where we were.

My hotel room in Stockholm is small but well designed, as I would expect in Sweden. It is also in the basement! The booking had said no windows, which I assume is why it fit my budget. I figured with the rumour of the Arctic sun that would probably be just fine with me, as I like to sleep in total darkness (brought an eye mask and a backup just in case).

On the Tuesday morning that seemed like one long Monday (Muesday?) I bought a double decker bus tour pass and rode around, took a walk to the old town of Stockholm called Gammla Stan. Then went to bed at 8:00 pm, which was as long as I could manage to stay up – I’ve read and now believe through testing that the best way to get over jet lag is to stay up until as close to regular bedtime as you can.