The Sun Finally Makes An Appearance

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After 3 days in Stockholm with dreary and drizzly skies, we finally woke up to blue skies with the sun shining high above us. We had just a few more hours to explore here in Stockholm before having to head over to our overnight ferry to Helsinki. So with just a few hours to kill, we headed back to the Gamla Stan in order to have a look around at the Nobel Museum. This small museum is devoted to Alfred Nobel, the founder of the Nobel Prize and to all the prior recipients of the Nobel Prize. There wasn't a huge amount to see and it didn't take very long to explore everything. We were only here for about 30 minutes. We probably should have taken one of the guided tours as it would have been more meaningful. However, we were fine with just wandering and checking things out on our own pace. Afterwards, back in the Stortorget, we had an early lunch at one of the restaurants along the square. Although likely not the most authentic of meals, this was our first attempt at having anything Swedish. We tried some of the rock hard Swedish crisp breads and for my meal, I had Swedish meatballs with lingonberries.

After retreiving our bags that we had stored at our hotel, we caught the Metro to the nearby stop at Gardet and walked to the terminal to board our ferry, the Tallink Silja, for the overnight cruise to Helsinki. Checking in was a simple process and after boarding the ship, we went straight to our small and cramped room for the night. We had a few hours to spare before the ship departed so we explored the ship and eventually made it down to our 5pm smorgasbord style dinner. After a very dissapointing dinner, the 3 of us ventured up to the top deck to watch the island scenery pass us by. I had taken the recommendation from the Rick Steves guide to do the 5pm dinner and spend the evening up on the top deck. Although, it was windy, we were fortunate to have blue skies the entire time as we sailed through the Stockholm Archipelago.

We spent the remainder of the evening shopping in the duty free shops and watched a re-enactment of the musical, Grease before calling it a night. When we wake up, we will be sailing along the Finnish coastline.

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Photos

Storatorget
People enjoying a morning coffee

Cruising the Stockholm Archipelago
Sometime after midnight