I'm falling behind, I'm sorry! I'll have a lot of travelling time to post today's blog tomorrow so I'll be back on top of things then, I promise! But yesterday, oh yesterday!!! Man this was the coolest thing. So yesterday, I took a ferry to this island called Suomenlinna which I knew very little about... Something about a sea fortress, but that's all. However, it turns out that this island was absolutely 100% the coolest thing I've ever seen, I swear! Comprised of 6 different islands, and built in the 17th century, hundreds of tunnels and 8km of fortress walls make up this incredible place. It was like walking through time and a seriously awesome history in real life experience. There were still cannons mounted in every direction outwards towards the sea, and some tunnels open ... read more

Yesterday, as per Brayden and Johanna's advice, I grabbed the 11:11 train to Uppsala, a quick 40 minute ride north of Stockholm. I got there and it was just the crappiest day; raining on and off (it was like I was back in Iceland with all the weather changes) and I experienced probably the strongest wind I've ever been in! But, I toughed it out and walked around the very cute town for the afternoon. It felt very quaint and homey, somewhat like a downtown Bobcaygeon or Halliburton. There was a massive cathedral that revealed itself as I rounded a corner and of course I wandered in to check it out, after the service was over (and yes Shawn, I took off my hat!) Uppsala is home to a pretty impressive university campus, Uppsala University, that ... read more

Apparently Shawn leaving was reason for a gourmet, Stock-holmcooked (see what I did there ?) breakfast at the hostel. We pooled together our eggs and bacon with a side of toast and a banana, also alongside some orange juice and awful instant coffee ! That basically fillede up for the day, and on day 3 in Stockholm, I've still only bought $15 worth of groceries once... Go Nic ! We also said goodbye to a couple of British guys that we met (who had actually been to Peterborough, England... I asked if they knew where it was and they said it had a very nice church, and left it at that, aha). They were headed waaaay up north in Swedene to get the full snowy, Nordic experience. They told us about this department store on the ... read more

Stirred awake at 5:15 by our quiet friend who is apparently an early riser, I quickly fell back asleep to catch the last few minutes of sleep I could. However in a couple of hours, I find out that we couldn't slept in a whoooole bunch more. We get to the train station at 7, half an hour before the train is set to leave for Stockholm, and find the track proudly by ourselves by following the jumbotron. About 10 minutes before we're supposed to leave, an announcement comes on over the PA, and all I understand is the word Stockholm; then we look at the screen and there's an exclamation mark with 10:00 written next to it. Quickly confirmed by the NSB officials, our train has been delayed 2.5 hours, wooooo!! Having not yet checked ... read more

The night train arrived in Oslo at 6:25am, and after a surprisingly good sleep, Shawn and I headed towards our hostel to drop our big bags off in luggage storage. Unfortunately, and really inconveniently, we can't check in until 3pm! That means another 1st-day-in-Reykjavík-like day with years of walking! Trying first to find some food, because oh ya, it's easter MONDAY now and everything is also closed, we venture into the central part of the city. After grabbing some quick stuff from a 7-11 (sorry Peterboroughians, there's a ton of them over here!) we walk around the city because literally nothing is open! The first thing we came across was the old Akershus Fortress which was really cool to walk around. It's open always to the public and you're able to walk on top of the ... read more