Stockholm, Sweden Day 14

We don't trust any one or anything especially on trips where evil locals give false or misleading information to helpless tourists. After another huge delicious breakfast, I departed exactly at 8 am to check how long the airport trip took. The directions from the information booth yesterday seemed extremely simple. Use the Stockholm Card, take public transportation to Marsta and bus 583 to the airport. On my public transportation map it appeared I took the metro. At the metro station the attendant said, "No, you take the train." I walked a quarter mile to the train station, looked at the departure board, and located the Marsta train on track #3. Another quarter mile got me to the platform with 1 minute to spare. As I walked past the conductor I flashed the Stockholm Card and asked if that worked. "No, this is an express. You have to take the local, tracks 14-17." Another quarter mile returned me to the departure board and no Marsta listed. I walked 50 meters to tracks 14-17. There was Marsta listed. I checked with the agent who pointed up to 15 where I went and got on a train sitting there. Just for the record I asked a lady if the train traveled to Marsta. "No." Well, shit. I got off and asked a different agent who knew nothing. I walked to the information booth 50 yards away and picked a number for service. "Where is the local train to Marsta?" "It's on track 15 in 5 minutes." Fifty yards back to track 15 I trotted and on the board on the track it listed Marsta as the last stop. I jumped on the train and again double checked the final destination - yes Marsta. By now I had wasted 35 minutes which tomorrow might have caused a coronary. The train stopped at Ostra, Solna, Ulriksdal, Helenelund, Sollentuna, Haggvik, Norrviken, Rotebro, Uplands Vasby, Rosersberg, and finally Marsta. Bus 583 along with 5 others waited for the passengers to get on. Naturally, I checked to make sure this one went to Arlanda Airport and which terminal Blue 1 used. We got to terminal 2, Blue 1's, after stopping at terminal 5. What the heck, I'll just check on the flight times while I'm here. I saw no Blue 1 or information counter, but there was a counter of another airline. "Can you direct me to Blue 1?" "Yes, it is in terminal 5, a half mile straight ahead or you can take the shuttle bus." Fifteen minutes later I arrived at terminal 5 on the shuttle. No Blue 1 counter existed. I went to SAS and the lady tried to look up my reservation which said Blue 1 did not fly to Helsinki tomorrow. A more powerful computer was needed to sort all this out, so I went to another lady. "Oh, there you are, yes, you have a reservation which changed to SAS at 2 pm instead of the original Blue 1, 11:35 am. You should have received an email." I did actually check my emails for the trip prior to leaving, but with over 40 I messed up and didn't see this one. With the knowledge that our Stockholm Card expired at 9 am tomorrow we had to get going by 8 to arrive by 9 and spend almost 5 hours sitting in the airport - CRAP. I retraced my route and returned to Lee with the awful news at 11:45, 3 and 3/4 hours after starting the fiasco.
To make my life more miserable we took a bus to Gamla Stan/Old Town/Souvenir Rip Off Stores and bought 3 Swedish, traditional, painted, wooden horses that cost more than a live horse. We got some more books, and continued to look for the "free" ferry which must have been placed in dry dock for the winter. Off on another public bus tour we stopped at a park with a passel of pre-schoolers, passed the brick Stockholm Stadium, through an industrial area, up into a residential area, back down town, switched busses, and landed at the Radisson. The TV had a replay of the Bears - Greenbay game with no commercials or time outs and half time deleted. Why can't we have that in the U.S.? Our gourmet supper at McD's with 2 junior McFeasts, 1 fry, 1 Coke, and a strawberry vanilla pie ran 82 SEK/$13. Tomorrow we will leave. Wonderful Stockholm needs public transportation information agents who volunteer essential information. They did not go out of their way to help.

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