Stockholm Syndrome

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A country famous for blondes and Ikea, as well as spawning some great bands such as The Hives, Dungen and The Radio Dept (OK, so I admit they were also responsible for ABBA, Europe and Roxette as well), I was looking forward to a place full of beautiful people and a creative, liberal and progressive culture.

The train from Copenhagen to Stockholm was possibly the most scenic of the entire trip. Pity I didnt have a Swedish soundtrack to accompany it (if you haven't heard any of the bands I have mentioned above - I would really suggest you do).
With beautiful forests of autumn leaves and picturesque lakes of pristine water, the landscape was simply stunning and reminded me a lot of the landscape down in the South Island. All enjoyed in a comfortable, quiet, wood-panelled train, it was probably the best train ride of the trip.

Our hostel once again was about a 10 minute walk from the train station. And it didn't stop there - the hostel was excellent.
City Backpackers had friendly staff, 8 free internet stations that were readily available, a kitchen, laundry, a good common area, a free sauna - and free pasta! The free pasta is an excellent idea, as it doesn't cost much, and gives the hostel something unique.
It certainly made it easy to decide what to have for dinner that night in this horribly expensive city. It's true what they say - and it's worse than Denmark. Definitely the most expensive place we have been to so far. I had to buy a new tube of toothpaste in the wrong place as it set me back around 4€. My math has been getting worked overtime as well, as we had to change our Danish Kroners into Swedish Kroners (SEK).
It was a Monday night so it was pretty quiet - we decided to follow suit and have an early one. I think we can only afford to have one night out here...

The next day we thought we would hit the sights and a couple of museums. It was a late start again as we were catching up on sleep lost - one night out seriously takes you two nights to recover.
We got talking to an American guy at our hostel, Tommy who was really cool, so he came along with us on our sightseeing tour.
Stockholm is basically built on 14 different islands.
The modern centre is on Norrmalm, the biggest island and is where our hostel is situated.
We managed to get onto Stockholm's main shopping street, Drottingsgatan, which takes you all the way down to the Sophia Albertina Palace where you cross a bridge onto the tiny island of Helgeandsholmen. The bridge afforded a beautiful view of the unbelievably clean water and the island, on which sits the Riksdagshuset, Sweden's grand and stately looking parliament. We wanted to visit the Medeltidsmuseet (Medieval Museum), directly beneath the Rikdagshuset, but there was some sort of official ceremony going on outside the parliament, complete with brass band, and the police weren't letting anyone through.
We then took a pleasant stroll around the harbour to the green and attraction-filled island of Djugarden. On the way, we passed Kungliga Slottet, the royal palace. With 608 rooms, it is a huge structure and is in fact, the largest royal palace in the world.

Once at Djugarden we had a few choices - Skansen, the world's first open-air museum, the Nordic history museum, or Grona Lund Tivoli, an amusement park much like the one in Copenhagen of the same name.
We eventually though, settled on the acclaimed Vasamuseet, a museum dedicated to the Swedish warship "Vasa", which sank a mere 15 minutes into it's maiden voyage in 1628.
In the 1950s, the Vasa's shipwreck was located in Stockholm's harbour, and was then recovered in one of the greatest feats in marine archaeology in 1961. This brilliant achievement is plain to see as soon as you enter the museum, as the original and restored Vasa sits proudly as the centrepiece of the museum.
It was a very interesting museum as you got a glimpse into the lives of the sailors (which was unbelievably difficult and uncomfortable - most sailors died), viewed how colourful the many sculptures that adorned the ship were, and learnt the symbolism behind them, watched a video on how the Vasa was painstakingly recovered, and interacted with a computer simulation which explained how the ship sank. Just in case you were wondering, the ship did not have enough weight at the bottom of the ship (ballast) to counter the two decks of cannons at the top of it, and thus keeled over after hitting a strong gust of wind.

By the time we got out of the Vasamuseet, Skansen was closed, so we then headed back over to Gamla Stan, the small island from which Stockholm emerged. Like most old towns I have been to on this trip, the streets are pedestrian-only, cobblestoned and delightfully medieval. As the most beautiful part of Stockholm, it is unfortunately also overrun by tourists, with many a restaurant and tacky souvenier store packed into it's tiny streets.
We then went for a walk around the pretty and hilly streets of Sodermalm, where all the city's creative types hang out. I peeked into countless design offices here - and I have to say I'm a fan of Swedish interior design. Stylish and modern, yet simple and practical with good use of natural features.
By now we were all freezing our arses off, so it was back to the hostel to thaw out and eat some pasta.

While cooking dinner, we got talking to a Canadian guy, Cory, and an American girl, Marsha. Being our last night in Stockholm, we all decided to have a crack at the Tuesday nightlife here.
So of course we start out at an Irish bar - which has just changed ownership.
I liked the place too - they were showing Liverpool's Champion's League match against FC Porto, and then I heard The Exponents' "Why Does Love Do This To Me" for the first time since leaving New Zealand. And then it was Supergroove. And then Crowded House. Then Dragon. Then "Slice Of Heaven". Fancy hearing a totally New Zealand soundtrack in a pub in Stockholm!
I then got talking to the new owner, and he didn't know that any of these songs were in fact from New Zealand. He'd just put on a CD left by the last owner which was labelled "The Best CD Mix In The World" ;-) We had a good old chat, and he applauded our decision to go to Estonia. "The women are totally beautiful there", he told me.

Eh?!
What's wrong with the girls in Sweden? They're not exactly ugly! ;-)

He was a cool guy though, and not afraid to say what he thinks.
"Don't go to Stureplan, they're all snobby c*nts there", he told us, as well as saying the Djugarden football team and it's supporters were "a bunch of w*nkers", and not to go to the T-Centralen tube station, because "that's where all the murderers and crack-wh*res hang out". He gave us free popcorn all night which was cool and seemed quite keen to get us on our way to a cool bar called Kvanen, in Sodermalm.
"The Halmstad supporters hang out there, and they're fun", he told us, despite himself being an AIK Stockholm fan.
That was enough to tell us to trust his word, so it was onto the "tunnelbana" (metro/tube/subway/U-bahn, whatever you want to call it) to Sodermalm. We must have caught the last train, as the ticket officer let us on for free - sweet deal.
Finding Kvanen was no problem - but you HAVE to check in your jacket here for about 5€ - not such a sweet deal.

Inside was pretty cool and pretty big. It was pretty quiet though, being a Tuesday night, and it was certainly not like Vega in Copenhagen ;-)
We still all had a good old chat - all while sipping our 84SEK Bacardi & Cokes. That's about 9€ in case you were wondering (!).
Marsha and Tommy are both on holiday from university, while Cory works on an oil rig in Alberta - works every day for a month, and then two weeks off. At first it sounds good, but I'm not sure I could do it - however the money's good apparently.
We then got talking to a local girl, Paula, and she had a small tin of something in her hands.
"Oh, it's snuff", she said. "Wanna try some?"
I was a bit tipsy by now so I was game.
"You put it under your upper lip", she told me.
Nothing happened at first, and then suddenly it started to give me a burning sensation, so I kept moving it around under my upper lip. After I had spat it out, I reckoned it had the effect of making me drunker - it couldn't have been the Bacardi, because I only had enough money for one ;-) The whole experience was very interesting.

After Kvanen closed, we got talking to a Swedish couple who were on their way to a boat bar on the harbour. They were really friendly and like almost every other Swede, spoke perfect English. The Swedes all seem to be very friendly - I was asked a few times if I needed help when looking at my map in the streets which is the total opposite to New York!
Unfortunately for all of us, the boat bar was unexpectedly closed - so it was back along Drottingsgatan, past T-Centralen where there were no murderers or crack-wh*res, and back to the hostel where we satisified our munchies with you guessed it - free pasta.

The next day, Davies took off early to a museum, so I did my own walking tour through Kungstradgarden, the main public garden and chill out zone, before going over to Sodermalm for some great views of Gamla Stan from the island's northern cliffs.
Walking back to the hostel along Drottingsgatan, I couldn't help but notice the number of beautiful girls that suddenly came out of nowhere. It was like the club in Copenhagen, except this time it was streets full of girls rather than dancefloors. And contrary to popular belief, they are not all blonde - sure they have a few more, but only just enough more for you to notice. But the other stereotype still holds true - they are all pretty hot. I can only wonder what a Swedish nightclub on a weekend night would look like ;-)
I also saw the funniest thing along Drottingsgatan - a bald man playing the harmonica, while holding a small radio against his ear and with hips gyrating furiously. I gave him some money for giving everyone a good laugh. Scary thing though, was that he was really getting into it and seemed to take himself seriously ;-D

After eating some reasonably priced Lebanese food it was off to the ferry terminal to catch our ride to Helsinki.
On the way we discovered the real reason why we were let on the tunnelbana for free last night. We go up to the ticket officer and ask for two tickets, but he then directs us to a newspaper kiosk to buy tickets. Shouldn't he be selling tickets? There are no automatic ticket machines either. So Davies waits in line for awhile and then gets two tickets for 26SEK (3€). The officer then tells us that two tickets are only enough for one ride for one person. Eh? This is ridiculous. So I go and queue again for two more tickets, with us now being in danger of missing the boat - literally.
Getting out at our stop, we are in the middle of a leafy suburb with no water in sight. Lucky there are sign boards showing us where the ferry terminal is - hidden behind a park of trees so well, you wouldn't even know that there is a ferry terminal there. We come out of the trees and suddenly there is this massive cruise ship two blocks long and 14 stories high.
Inside is much more high rolling than the ferry I took from Split to Ancona. It has about 7 different restaurants, a casino, a midnight revue, a pub, a nightclub on the top deck called "Chill", a cafe, a duty free store (where I stocked up on 10 Lion bars, two Toblerones and 3kg of Haribo jellies for 12€) and a spa and hot-pool complex which was tempting considering how bloody cold it was. There was even an hourly trampoline show in the main "promenade". All this for just 2€ with our rail pass - very sweet deal indeed.
Despite the cold I stayed outside for awhile, taking snapshots of the sunset while the cruise ship sailed though the plethora of islands just outside Stockholm known as the Stockholm Archipelago. It was certainly worth braving the cold for, as the view was stunning - it was like cruising through the Milford Sound. All the cute cottages on the islands though, definitely ensured that you remembered that this was Scandinavia.
Like all cruise ships, it was full of old people. We thought that there might be some action in Chill, but the only people "chilling" were some old folks busting some moves on the dancefloor. The pub was showing Sporting Lisbon vs Manchester United though (a good 1-0 win to United), to which I enjoyed a Hoegaarden to before being rudely kicked off the big screen to the smaller one by a Spanish family who wanted to watch FC Barcelona vs Olympique Lyon.
I was pretty tired after the game - sleeping one and a half hours past check-out time today didn't help as much as I wanted it to - so I retired to my 4-bed cabin, which I was unfortunately sharing with two other men, unlike my ferry from Split to Ancona. Lucky we didn't have a fourth guy in there as there already wasn't enough room to store the three of us and our luggage. I was using the fourth bed for my huge-ass bag (which has caused me a bit of trouble on this trip).
Our cabins were the cheapest ones and were right at the bottom of the boat. Ironically, even the car deck was above us, which made us feel decidedly third class ;-D
I would go to sleep and in 8 or so hours I would be in Helsinki. Although it took a while to get used to the constant swaying of the boat I managed to sleep eventually. All-in-all the ferry was a great ride and was a nice change from the train.

Overall I think I liked Stockholm - but a combination of being only there two nights and being there during the week gives me the feeling that I have really only really scratched the surface here and that there's much more left to be discovered. So I am definitely keen to come back again and have a proper stay here.

But for now we are on our way to Helsinki - so hopefully y'all be looking forward to that!

Hej da!
Delek

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Photos

View Of Norrmalm From Soder Heights
Stockholm - beautiful water, beautiful city, beautiful people.

Karl Johan's Torg
Just before the bridge over to Sodermalm from Gamla Stan.

Kungliga Slottet
The Swedish royal palace.

The Vasa
This is the actual ship that sank more than 300 years ago, and was raised from the dead in 1961. That they managed to restore it to what it is today is an amazing feat.

Stortorget
The old main square in Gamla Stan.

Spot The Canadian
The crew from left; Tommy, Cory, me, Marsha and Davies.

Main Square Outside T-Centralen
A modern main square on Norrmalm.

Church At Kungstradgarden
There's a bit of baroque in Stockholm, with this being an example.

Swedish Supergyrator
I have a video of him in motion - it is available upon request.

Main Promenade Aboard The Ferry
With shops, restaurants and first class cabins on either side.

Chill
Nightclub aboard the ferry to Helsinki.

Sunset On The Swedish Archipalego
Worth the braving the cold for ;-)