Last Day in Sweden :(

Amanda and Lily left for Paris this morning but Dan, Nick and I have one more day to explore more of Stockholm. We left the apartment around 11:30 and went to the Hotorget subway station to head down to the archipelago known as Soldermalm. This island is known as SoFo - it is more bohemian than where our apartment is. Nick wanted to take us to a Vegetarian buffet restaurant called Herman's which is right on the Harbor. Unfortunately we couldn't get a table with a view but the food was delicious!!

We split up after lunch - Nick went to spend the afternoon with his friends, My and Erika, and Dan and I headed to the Vasa Museum. We walked over the bridge to Gamla Stan where we caught a ferry to the island of Djurgarden which is where the museum is.

The Vasa warship- sunk in Stockholm Harbor in 1628 just after setting sail due to insufficient ballast and too many cannons on the upper decks. It was salvaged in 1961, brought to the surface and reconstructed to 95% original. Now it is housed in a huge museum that is humidity controlled to preserve the wood

Vacation is now winding down. Time to go back to the apartment and do laundry, pack, etc. Heading back to the states tomorrow, getting into Portland late so we will stay near the airport and drive home on Wednesday morning or whenever we wake up!!! Nick is heading to PARIS to meet Eryn (on her way to Burkina Faso for a 3 month internship) and Amanda to celebrate New Years!!! How fun for them!!

Tuesday evening addendum - Had a 6 hour, excruciating layover, in Chicago. Arrived in Portland at 9:30pm and there was 4 inches of snow on the ground and more falling. Glad I reserved a room near the airport!!! Nick's luggage is lost in Amsterdam or Paris - so he is in Paris with no clothes - guess he will have to go shopping!!!

Absolut Ice Bar - Stockholm

Stockholm Ice Bar - temperature is minus 9 Celsius. For 180 kronor ($25) you get admission with fur lined poncho and gloves and a very strong vodka drink. It is touristy but we just could not come to Stockholm without doing this!!

By the way, Amanda and Lily went to the airport today and discovered that she does not need her passport to go to Paris tomorrow - so they will be on their way and will deal with the US Embassy there to get the temporary passport!

Brunch Cruise in Stockholm Harbor

Today we took a 3 hour brunch cruise in Stockholm Harbor and Lake Malaren. It's not really a lake but an inlet off the Baltic Sea where Stockholm harbor rests. The harbor itself is surrounded by beautiful and majestic architecture which has a lot of Russian features to it. High spires and turrets. They say that Helsinki has even more of the Russian influence. The cruise went from Stockholm up to Vaxholm, which is a quaint little summer town at the gateway to the archipelago.

The brunch was a smorgasboard of Swedish dishes - salmon, lox, an assortment of herring dishes, cole slaw, potatoes, etc. Saffron cheesecake for desert. I couldn't believe they did not have Swedish meatballs. I have to have some before we leave here!!

It was a wonderful day today with everyone together and it was a pleasant trip. The weather was cold but no snow, fog or rain in site.

Back in Stockholm!

Got back into Stockholm around 6pm and met Amanda and Lili near Central Station. Dan and I went to the ICA for groceries and the kids went shopping for clothes. Met back at the apartment, relaxed and got rested up for dinner. We didn't want to go far so we went downstairs to a Lebanese restaurant called Tabbouli. It was marvelous! Moussaka, grilled prawns, fatosh, salatet rocca, halloumi, rakhat, falafel and eggplant.

Upstairs to finish the Yahtzee tournament. Girls went back out around 11pm!

Tomorrow we are going on a brunch cruise all around the Stockholm archipelagos.

Uppsala, Sweden

Arrived in Uppsala on the train from Stockholm with only 2 hours of sunlight left in the day. This is the town that is where Nick has been studying since August. The population is 200,000 but it is a very quaint, small town compared to Stockholm. The Fyris river runs through the town with many little bridges to cross. If you look down into the river you will see bicycles that were not chained down, that have been thrown into the river by drunken college students. Nick promised me he never did this.

We walked through the town square - beautiful cobblestone pedestrian only streets and colorful buildings with hot dog, roasted almond and doughnut stands all around. What a beautiful downtown area - Eugene could learn a thing or two about downtowns from these small European towns!!

The picture below is of Dan and Nick having a French hot dog near the river!!

The largest cathedral in Scandinavia is in Uppsala. It is called the Uppsala Cathedral!! :) It has been around since the 13th century. The architecture is amazing. It reminded me of Notre Dame in Paris with knaves all around the inside of the church. But the spires are much higher than Notre Dame. The choir and organist were rehearsing for a concert tomorrow night and it was moving to sit and listen to them sing in this magnificent church!!

We walked up the hill to the Uppsala Castle, built in 1549 by Gustav Vasa. It doesn't look like your typical European castle, looks more like a very fancy barn. To the north of the castle though is the botanical gardens of Carl Linnaeus, who is the father of taxonomy and modern ecology. The gardens were covered in snow as you can see in the picture below but Nick said that in the summer and fall they were very beautiful!

We walked back to the town and had lunch in a small, intimate and cozy cafe that Nick had frequented with his friends, called "Cafe Linnaeus". We had cappuccinos and amazing sandwiches and deserts. He does know how to pick them!!

Christmas Day in Stockholm!

The snow is melting on this Christmas day in Stockholm!! How sad. It doesn't feel like Christmas here in the apartment but when you go outside the city is all lit up. We lounged around in the apartment until noon and then headed out to see if anything was open to get some food. The wind is blowing about 25 to 30 mph and the

rain/snow mix is grueling. We heard drums in the distance and found a small parade of soldiers and horses.

Watched them for awhile and then headed to a pub that we saw was open.

They had the most amazing selections of pizzas I have ever seen. The craziest was banana, chicken,

pineapple and curry (all on 1 pizza). Weird, huh!! We ordered 3 pretty common pizzas: cheese, mushroom, shrimp, etc and took 2 back to the girls who were still sleeping after another late night out. Since there is only 5 hours of sunlight, we call them the "vampire girls" - they sleep until 2 when it is starting to get dark again.

We spent our Christmas afternoon playing games and watching movies with Swedish subtitles but in English - yea!

OK, the bad part is that for our Christmas dinner the girls wanted Max's - which is a Swedish fast food restaurant like McDonalds only they have falafel burgers and really great fish sandwiches. So, Christmas 2009 will always be remembered as the day we ate pizza and fast food in Sweden. I will be so happy when the stores are open again tomorrow!!!!

Julafton - Christmas Eve

It is Christmas Eve in Sweden. This is when all Swedish families celebrate Christmas with traditional smorgasboards. This means that all restaurants, cafes and bars are closed and Jeannie did not get enough food yesterday to feed everyone until dinner. Oooops!

The girls were out until 5:30 this morning so we knew that they would sleep until 2 or 3 so Dan and Nick and I headed out to hunt down some food. I found 1 hotel that was still serving food in the bar (limited menu) with a limited yet expensive menu. So the 3 of us had lunch for around $80. They had no take away for the girls so they were out of luck.

Walked through Humelgaarden park - lots of fresh snow!! The kids were all sleighing and playing in the snow, what a lovely site!

Back at the apartment the girls were finally awake. They went back to the same hotel to get their food and Dan and Nick & I played games and watched movies. A wonderful Christmas treat!!

Tonight is kosher stew & more movies and games with everyone.

Hope all is well - we a lovely time here in Sweden!

Gamla Stan and Christmas festivals

Amanda and Lili arrived at 1:15 am this morning. We all waited up for them. Thank goodness they were able to get here. The weather across northern Europe has stranded many travelers and even closed the chunnel. Slept well last night.

Waited in the apartment until 1000 for our

luggage to come and it finally

arrived - what a

relief!!

We strolled around Normalm and crossed the bridge into Gamla Stan, which is the old town. The roads are very narrow and the

buildings are all shades of yellow, red and brown. Very quaint!! We found a cute little Christmas festival outside in the square in Gamla Stan and we bought some Swedish Grogg and flavored honeys, Saffron, Cloudberry and Wild Strawberry and Vanilla!! Yumm. While we were there it started snowing lightly!

Then we walked over to the Royal Palace where they were having the changing of the Guard. It sits up high in Gamla Stan and overlooks Stockholm harbor. I bet it is very beautiful in the summer months - winter has its beauty but today was very overcast, cold and windy near the harbor.

Next we headed to Ostermalm and Amanda found a Kosher grocery store - bought some Kosher beef for Christ

mas eve dinner - wanted lamb for my lamb tagine but had to settle for beef. On the same street was Saluhallen which is a gigantic inside market with restaurants and all different fresh food vendors. It was very busy and quite impressive. We boug

ht some fresh cod, vegetable, spices and mango chutney so I could make Cheryl's Seychelle fish (although she makes it with chicken). Had our afternoon capuccino's and people watched for a little while. We have found the Swede's to be helpful but not very friendly - and quite rude at times. But if you ask a question, they all speak very good English and are usually ready to help. It is great to have Nick with us, especially in the grocery store.

When we left the Saluhallen, Nick and the girls went to the fashion district, Dan headed back to the apartment and I headed to the grocers, which is an amazing market in the basement of a store similar to Nordstroms - strange but wonderful at the same time. It costs 5 sek to use a cart but unbeknownst to me, if you return the cart you get the coin back. Live and learn, it was only about 75 cents! Also, the bathrooms cost 10 sek to use in stores. So, it is a good idea to have lots of change when you go out here! I didn't have Nick with me this time so it was an experience being in the store and trying to figure out what I was buying. In France and Italy, it was so much easier because many of the words I either knew or could figure out but Swedish is so different.

It is wonderful having the apartment and being able to cook meals. The apartment is 4 bedrooms and 2 baths with a wonderful kitchen and dining area. So much better than being cramped in a hotel room and having to eat out every meal. :)

Well, dinner was great and we are very tired tonight. Dan and Nick and I are sacked out on the couch and the girls are going clubbing!! More power to them (they took naps before dinner!)

Tomorrow is Christmas Eve and everything closes here on Christmas eve because that is when the Swedes celebrate Christmas. So we will have a nice dinner here and play games! We have Yahtzee and Trivial Pursuit in Swedish (Nick will have to ask the questions!).

God Jule to All! More to come

Sweden with Nick but no Amanda

Arrived in Stockholm 2 hours late with no luggage and Amanda is stuck in London tonight and could not get a flight out until tomorrow - they have to go to Munich and then up to Stockholm. Copenhagen was snowed in pretty bad and they even had to close the chunnel due to heavy snow getting sucked into the tunnel.

It was so great seeing Nick when we came out of customs at the airport. We went to the grocery store tonight and stocked up on essentials. The apartment is lovely and the city is all decked out for the Holidays.

More to come when I am not so rummy!!!!!

Christmas in Sweden!

Off to Stockholm via Chicago and Copenhagen on Monday, Dec 21st. Will arrive on the 22nd and take the Arlanda Express into Stockholm, Centralstation. Rented a 3 BR apartment in Normalm city center. Nick will meet us at the airport and then Amanda and her friend, Lili, will meet us at the apartment later that night.