A few days in Sweden

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FRIDAY 28 AUGUST 2009 - STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN

After breakfast this morning we all piled onto bus. Matt (the bus driver) tried to start the engine to discover that this morning it was completely cactus basically. Boys got out and started pushing again in an attempt to push start it like we did yesterday several times; but this time the bus was having none of that and simply refused to start, and then started smoking. When it started smoking we pretty much gave up all hope of getting on the bus again this morning.

After a few frantic phone calls by Matt (driver) and Heather (tour leader) we all started the walk (bus driver and cook excluded) to the nearest metro station. Heather bought us all one way tickets without too much trouble and we got onto the metro. A while later, we arrived into central station and started walking down towards the City hall where just over half the group had decided to take a tour. I was one of those people who decided not to do the tour, so once I had established exactly where City Hall was I headed to do some souvenir shopping as my first priority. Then it was a long wander to City Hall past the Palace and Parliament House along the waterfront. Also ended up spending a bit of time in the gardens around City Hall as despite the overcast weather it was quite pleasant.

Once the rest of the group had finished the City Hall tour we all headed over to the Palace, where we were given some free time and Heather told us a bit about the city. Changing of the Guards was about to start so I ended up staying and watching that (the Royal Naval Band Cadets actually played Abba’s Dancing Queen!!!) which went for about 45 minutes. I then decided to head into the Palace complex and have a look around as it looked quite large. The combined ticket got me admission to four different sections of the Palace- the state apartments; the Royal Treasury, the Royal Chapel; Museum Tre Kronor, the Museum of Antiquities. The Royal Palace is the largest in the world - with 608 rooms (obviously not all open to the public though!!). The Chapel was free to get into, the Treasury had what I can only assume were incredibly valuable crowns and royal jewels and the Tre Kronor Museum is in the basement and has the 13th century defensive walls and exhibits from the medieval castle. I ended up spending a few hours there going through each of the rooms.

Then it was a quick bite to eat (packed lunch of gnocchi today courtesy of Top Deck and Timmy), before I set off for a bit of a wander. First stop was Parliament House as I had noticed that they were running free tours at certain times throughout the day. It was quite interesting actually - they only have one house (ie/ not two houses like Australia and the UK and many other countries) and the PM is chosen by the elected members in the Parliament and may or may not be the head of the political party which is actually in power. The Royal family has no political power; but that is much the same as anywhere else I guess. We did have an American on the tour though who didn’t quite understand how Sweden could be in the EU but not use the euro as a currency - I think he was going to blame to tour guide for that (as the Parliament rep) until he was put back in his box by a British couple and by the tour guide who told him that it was the people of Sweden who had voted against switching to the euro!!

From there I went to Storkykan which is the Royal Cathedral of Sweden and which is known for its life-sized sculpture of St George and the Dragon. Also headed to another Cathedral called Riddarholmskyrkan which was full of coats of arms and quite different from many churches because of that.

Since everything was by now starting to close I headed briefly into Gamla Sans for a walk before heading back to City Hall where our bus was fixed and waiting to take us back to the camp site.

Dinner tonight was a not-at-all-spicy chicken curry which was still quite pleasant. We were joined by two Swedish girls that Timmy and Matty had met in Thailand a while ago. A little while after the dishes were done it started raining so everyone pretty much had an early night (with the exception of our crew who preceded to get completely drunk; sing very loudly and eventually pass out I expect!).

SATURDAY 29 AUGUST 2009 - STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN

After breakfast we all made our way to the train station where the debacle on buying a large number of day passes began. Heather (tour guide) could only get 13 day passes. So then she had to get these other passes and buy each on her credit card individually on a single machine. Some time later… we all made our way onto the train and headed into the city. Everyone else was dithering about what to do so I headed off on my own; initially to find the post office. Didn’t have much luck though; but did manage to find a forex which would FINALLY let me change my Serbian currency!! Yay for forex in Sweden. So I got some Norwegian money and some Russian too.

Then it was onto Skansen Park which is a really old outdoor air museum and which was massive and one of the older open air museums. Spent a few hours there wandering through ‘Sweden in miniature’ looking at the old style houses. Also spent quite a bit of time looking at the Scandinavian animals - mostly reindeer, elk and grey seals.

From there it was onto the History Museum because I thought it was free. When I discovered it wasn’t I decided instead to make the use of my day travel pass to head to Katarinahissen which has a large lift that gives great views over the city. I didn’t like the looks of it from below so got a bus to the top of a nearby hill to see almost the exact same view. By then it was quite late in the afternoon so I headed back to the camping ground where I had some dinner and a nap and chilled for a little while, and also repacked my bags in preparation for the next day.

When everyone else started to arrive back at around 8pm or so (just when it was getting dark) I headed back into the city and wandered around the old town (Gamla Stan) getting some photos of the city at night, etc. Got back to the campsite before 11pm and discovered everyone was tucked up in bed sound asleep!! So I headed to bed too.

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