SWEDEN

July 5-10, 2024

Betsey and I always had the Norwegian Fjords on our bucket list, but the best time to go is summer (when we hate to leave Shippan Point) and it’s best done on a cruise (which we are not all that enthusiastic about doing). So we always said we’d do it when we were old. Well, we’re old, so off we go. Our friends, Esta and Jay Feinsod, signed on to join us and Esta didn’t let an emergency appendectomy a week before stop her.

Our first stop is Stockholm which I had visited on business years ago and loved, and it’s the first time for the rest of the group. Our flights (we and the Feinsod’s flew separately for frequent flyer reasons) arrived a bit early and we drove about 40 minutes to the hotel Ett

Hem, a charming combination of two 1910’s townhouses with a lovely garden in between.

We had a very fresh, tasty and homemade breakfast as our host went over our plans for our stay with appropriate commentary. While waiting for our rooms to be ready we walked the neighborhood which featured majestic pastel concrete and brick apartment houses, yet it was eerily quiet for a Saturday morning at 11am.

Once we were in our rooms I went down and took a very relaxing sauna (“when in ….) and then we set out by Uber for the Vasa Museum. However, we ended up at the Nordic Museum instead when our driver pointed us in the wrong direction in the parks that hold several museums. It wasn’t a waste since they had an excellent, very creatively mounted exhibit about Nordic History, dating from the 1500’s with all sorts of artifices from each century. The museum area is also near an amusement park, and we finally saw lots of people despite a light drizzle. Dinner was at Slip En, plain but good with excellent garlic bread.

We were up bright and early next day, not by choice but by the time change. After breakfast we met Stefan, our Tours by Locals guide, for a walking tour of the old city. Our hotel is in a “new” upscale section of the city dating from the 1900’s so we took a short walk to the very spotless Metro for a ten minute ride to the old city.  Stockholm is a city of 2million people, but it has a quaint smallness about it. It’s a city of islands on the Baltic Sea and there’s also a large lake the circles part of the city. Because Stockholm was never bombed (the Swedes played neutral during WWII although they let the Germans cross the country to attack Norway) and didn’t suffer major fires like London did for example, its buildings are centuries old and there is a homogeneity about it without the intrusion of “modern” architecture.  It’s not unusual to walk by a 1300’s palace that looks in great shape. The architectural style is a mix of Italian, French, German, and it feels a lot like Vienna on the water. Most of the old city is a pedestrian zone, so it’s comfortable to wander. We saw the typical sites- cathedrals (the country was once Catholic but in 1527 the King decided that church services should be shorter, with shorter sermons, and in the native tongue.. So the king told the Catholics they were going to be Protestant and the Catholic Cathedrals became Protestant). At that time he expelled the Jews and other religions who weren’t let back in until the 1700’s.

We took a ferry (there are lots of them taking short trips to the various islands that is the City ) to the island of Museums which we had visited yesterday by Uber. This time we went to the right museum—the Vasa museum which is devoted to the strange tale of the ill-fated ship—Vasa. It seems this ship was constructed as a major war ship to be posted at the entrance to the harbor to warn would-be attackers that Stockholm was secure. Unfortunately, on its maiden voyage it barely left the harbor before it started listing badly and sank. This was in 1628. Apparently the ship was poorly designed, didn’t have enough ballast and was too narrow. 30 people drowned and the ship remained under water for some 333 years. In 1961 a team of marine archeologists worked to recover the ship. They tunneled  holes under the ship, sent steel cables through, and gradually lifted the ship, almost intact up to the surface. It was towed to a dock, and eventually a museum was built over the ship to tell this pretty incredible story. The ship looms large and has been refitted as it was, and it’s very cool to see what was a very large ship for its day up close and personal. There are many exhibits telling the story, including the fact that the skeletons of several people who drowned were recovered and recent DNA testing has enabled scientists to describe the people in great detail, including their health at the time of their death, whether they had cavities, and what they looked like. Life masks of some of these people are on display, and it’s fascinating how they have been reincarnated so to speak.

Pretty wiped out by then we headed back to our hotel for R&R, which included another sauna for me. We were so tired that we grabbed a taxi at the museum instead of waiting for an Uber and ended up being ripped off (as the hotel manager had warned us) and paying more than twice what the Uber would have cost. Only in Sweden do the taxis cost more than the Ubers.

Make no mistake, we are taking Ubers from now on. And, let me just say that Western countries have to be grateful for immigrants. We have not had a Swede yet driving us. We’ve had Lebanese Khazakstanies, Pakistanis, and tonight a Somalian Trumper. It’s a wonder. Tonight we drove through a newer section of Stockholm which had more shopping and old, proud buildings mixed in mid-century modern mediocrity. I must say in summer the city is very green—lots of well-pruned, tree-lined streets, and large pots of flowers everywhere.. We rode out to the old meat-packing district to a very hip restaurant, Solen. A good meal with a very nice Italian waitress.

It’s Monday morning and there still doesn’t seem to really be a rush hour here. That may be a reason why so many immigrants were once welcomed here, although today not so much. Today we had Iranian, Ethiopian, and an East African Uber drivers and one sullen Swede. There are 350,000 Iranians here and about 100,000 Ethiopians. So when you think of Sweden today, it’s not all blond blue eyed Nordics.

Anyway, I digress. Today was about a boat journey around the Stockholm archipelago which means lots of islands—about 30,000 of them in all shapes and sizes , but only about 1800 are inhabited. Our first boat was supposed to leave at 10am but had engine trouble and was cancelled right after we boarded. We quickly made arrangements for what was a longer tour at 2pm. So we walked the neighborhood which had one street lined with every luxury clothing brand you can think of and a few more. No purchases were made although we spent time in a Swedish design store that had some cool stuff. Then it was lunch at Angbatsbryggan (can you imagine answering their phone?) This was a barge on the harbor and we had a delightful and leisurely meal. I had my first Swedish meatballs and mashed potatoes, but skipped the Lingenberries (as you would expect from me). They tasted like normal meatballs. Afterwards, we lined up at the dock and made it on board and out to sea without incident. The tour was 2 1/2 hours long and could have been at least an hour shorter. We did see lots of islands, many of which had large summer houses (for one month?) as well as year-round residences. Some dated to the early 1900’s and have been nicely restored. I must admit that all of us at one time or another dozed off.

I finally made it to the gym on our return and tired to mimic my Peloton experience on the hotel’s knock-off bike. But their controls were complicated, and I found it a challenge to get into the groove of it. At least I burned a few calories.  Dinner tonight was at Gondolen, a pretty spectacular restaurant that literally is suspended high in the sky, anchored by an elevator shaft that goes to the street on one side and a building on the other. It has a great view overlooking the harbor. A good meal all around, but no one is raving about the Swedish cuisine. Basically good and nicely presented but nothing over the top, at least where we’ve dined.

Our last full day in Stockholm was the best weather. The wind that blew in cold over the last few days calmed, and the sun shined brightly. After a breakfast of Swedish pancakes, It was a perfect day for an excursion outside of town to Drottningholm, the summer castle of the royal family. It was a one hour ferry ride so we got to see the 1900’s stately apartment houses along the river (looking a bit like Amsterdam houses) turn into modern apartment blocks as we moved out of town and then houses and summer cottages, and islands with lush pine forests.In 1981 the royal family moved out of the 600-room royal palace in the old town to Drottningholm because the King wanted his children to have grass. There is plenty of that and a quite beautiful yellow plastered palace with Italian and French architectural accents. We were able to tour much of the palace except for the wing where the royal family actually live. The rooms are very rococo in style with lots of faux marble, elaborate ceilings with allegorical murals, and many many paintings of historic kings and queens, generals, and the like. Outside are elaborate and extensive Versailles-like formal gardens.

We Ubered back to our hotel to pack up and rest a bit. Our last dinner in Stockholm was our very best. We dined at our hotel which has a coterie of excellent chefs and tonight we had a five-course dinner where every plate was clean as a whistle. I’ll mention one special dish—a beignet filled with Halibut. Also pasta with chanterelle mushrooms, a grilled chicken with cocoa beans. And homemade ice cream. Delicious. In between courses we did “Bests & Worsts of Stockholm. We had to take a walk of several blocks afterwards to recoup.It was 9pm and still sunny out.

Wednesday morning, after an ample poached egg breakfast, we headed to the train station for the first leg of our journey to Norway. We are taking a fast train towards Oslo with one change of train along the way. The Stockholm train station was a bit confusing as no one seemed to know which direction the train would head. This was important since we had reserved seats in car #1, and there were lots of people on the platform with suitcases. Since we had one large suitcase each it was important to position ourselves well to be able to get the suitcases on board and in the minimal storage space in each car. Finally, someone pointed us in the right direction, and we were able to heave the cases on board and on the shelves. Whew.

The train is comfortable and fast. We raced through large pine forests which gradually gave way to rolling hills, lush green plains, large farms, at least one logging camp, and stands of tall, thin birch trees. The train made a few stops at smallish towns. We lunched on chicken sandwiches with delicious sourdough bread that the hotel had prepared for us. Then, all of a sudden, what had all along been a day of warmth and sunshine became a raging rain storm. Then someone translated the conductor’s long Swedish speech which essentially said the rain would mean a 45 minute delay to our stop. Of course, our connection time was 45 minutes. Time will tell what happens.What happened is that they held our next train, but just a few minutes. We raced with our heavy suitcases to the next track, flung the suitcases on board and then the doors closed. Whew! Not so fast. That train broke down ten minutes out and we had to wait a couple of hours for another train to attach itself and pull our train on to Oslo. What happened to the vaunted train service in Europe?

At 5:55pm, seven hours after our initial departure, our train entered Norway with still 2 hours to go! Dense pine forests all along the tracks and lakes. We passed farms and a port on the North Sea. Finally, at 8:02 pm we arrived in Oslo, had a bit of confusion getting out of the terminal but jumped in a cab and got to our hotel—The Thief. We had been traveling for 10 1/2 hours and accomplished very little. But we are here.