Kanelbulle - Swedish Cinnamon Roll

I miss Kanelbulle. They were everywhere in Stockholm - the smell of the fresh baked sweet bread with cinnamon and cardamon filled the supermarkets. The first one I tried was a bit of a surprise because of the cardamon - but I quickly became a convert!

Now the only way to get a Kanelbulle is to make them myself - so I had a bash at cooking them today using a recipe off the internet.

Kanelbulle

Rolls:                                          Filling: 

1 Envelope Yeast (1 Tbsp)           2 Tablespoons Butter

2 Tablespoons Butter, melted        3 Tablespoons Sugar

1 Cup Milk                                   2 Teaspoons Cinnamon

¼ Teaspoon Salt

¼ Cup Sugar                                Topping:

3 Cups of Flour                             Beaten Egg

1 Teaspoon Cardamon                 Pearl Sugar

Directions:

Combine milk & butter and heat until lukewarm and transfer to a large bowl. Sprinkle the yeast over milk mixture. Stir until dissolved and let rest. Sift together, flour, sugar, cardamon & salt. Add the dry ingredients, mixing until the dough is elastic and not sticky. Cover bowl with a towel or plastic wrap and place in a warm area to rise for 30 to 40 minutes

While dough is rising, prepare the filling. Soften the butter and add the cinnamon and sugar to make a thick, spreadable mixture.

When the dough has risen, knead for three minutes, and turn out on a lightly floured board. Roll it into a rectangle about 1/3-inch thick. Spread the filling over the whole top.

Roll up, starting at the widest end, into a long log and cut into 20 slices. (You may want to refrigerate the dough for 15 minutes to help firm it up before cutting.)

Put cupcake papers on a cookie sheet (or place on a greased cookie sheet) and place dough slice in each (see my picture above!). Preheat oven to 425ºF while you let your dough rise for 20 minutes. Brush with beaten egg mixture or milk and sprinkle with pearl sugar. Bake for 10 minutes (maybe less, watch during the last few minutes until golden.

Delicious. I couldn't get the pearl sugar so I had to use raw sugar, which isn't right. I will be adding more cardamon next time - you couldn't really taste it.

The Wrap Up - Part Four

Things that I found odd about hotels in Sweden / Scandanavia / Europe

- The beds! All of them were separate single beds pushed together, with 2 single doonas! It is not unheard of that in an Australian hotel you would have a queen bed made up of two singles pushed together - but they'd disguise it pretty thoroughly. Only a couple of the six places I stayed in even looked like a combined bed (on one frame with a mattress protector) and every single one of them had the two doonas. Some of them looked nothing like a double bed as there was a significant gap between the two mattresses. I could see the benefits - having a husband who twitches in his sleep can be very disturbing - and not once in the 4 weeks on this trip was I bothered by the twitch! I guess with the two doonas you remove the fight over them? But then why bother sleeping in the same bed?

- The alarm clocks - or rather, lack thereof! Nowhere we stayed had an alarm clock. I am not used to this - I see it as a standard issue thing in a hotel that I expect to see there. I really struggled without an alarm clock, as you couldn't use the light quality to determine the time of day. This meant that I wasted a bit of time lying in bed as I didn't realise what time it was. If I'd have known, I would have taken one with me - if I go back I will be packing one in the suitcase before anything else.

- No face washers! Anywhere! I was really surprised by this. I though face washers were European type things. I coped though - I had packed one for when I was traveling around and on the trains - but I ended up using it in Stockholm everyday. This is something you can manage without, but I wonder if the people in the hotels wondered how I got all the hand towels so wet....

Keeping the dream alive - Kraftskiva

One thing that was disappointing about Sweden was that we had to leave before Kraftskiva - the crayfish Party held in August to celebrate (commiserate?) the end of summer. However, with thanks to IKEA, we were able to have our own Kraftskiva on the other side of the world!

Our Kraftskiva was composed of:
- Kraftor (Swedish Crayfish)
- Sill (pickled herring)
- Hallakaka (arctic bread)
- parron dryka (pear drink)
plus salad, potatoes and cheese.

I had to guess how to serve it all as we haven't been to a Kraftskiva, but we thought it looked pretty good.

The moose serviette holder is a Swedish souvenir, as is the official Kraftskiva teatowel!

We finished off with the traditional Swedish dessert of glass med hjortron (ice cream with cloudberries).

Yum.

We might do this every year.

The Wrap Up - Part Three

Things I didn't like about Sweden.

Toilets!

Toilets cost money to use, even in shops. The cost varied but was usually about $1.50. Paying more for a toilet didn't guarantee cleanliness. I don't as such have a problme with paying for a loo, but if I pay I expect it to be good! A bigger problem that having to pay though, is that they just don't seem to have enough! Finding them was pretty good in Stockholm (in the touristy area) but really hard in Gothenburg. They put the handbasin in the cubicle with the toilet, so the cubicles themselves are large, so not many fit in.

Worst part - men get a free urinal, but no such luxury for the women!

Late Opening Hours

Stuff opened really late - the general opening hour was 10am - which tended to be the time they started opening up, not that they were ready for trade at 10am. Some places didn't bother opening until 11am. If you know me, you know that I am not a morning person, so for me to say that things opened up too late indicates just how late it seemed!

Salted Licorice & Lollies that taste worse than you can possibly imagine

The Swedes love all kinds of lollies. Unfortunately this includes salted licorice. Yuck! You get salt chocolate and even salted licorice ice cream. The food in general isn't salty, so maybe lollies is where the Swedes get their Sodium requirements.

Public Service Announcement.

If in Sweden (or nearby) and you see these lollies - STAY AWAY!

The taste of these defies description.

My theory is that the ghost shape is a warning - eating these could be deathly to your tastebuds! 

These are the kind of things you spit out and drink three glasses of water to try and get rid of the taste (it doesn't work). You will be cringing in remembrance hours after eating.

Hopefully you get the point and don't try one.

The Wrap Up - Part Two

More Questions answered!

Q: Is there IKEA stuff everywhere?

A: Yes! Lots of the cafes, bars and restaurants I went to used IKEA stuff. Commonly spotted - IKEA glasses, cutlery, chair pads and most of all - blankets (provided by each place that had outdoor seating so you could wrap up in the cold). It was strange being in the arctic circle and looking at the candle holder on the table and realising that I had the same design at home. I didn't make it into the local IKEA shop - although I did see an IKEA bus - if I hadn't been on my bike at the time I might have jumped on!

Q: Was it dark at all at night?

A: It may have been dark for a few hours in the middle of the night - but the sun didn't go below the horizon until about 10.30pm ish - and it was certainly back up and shining brightly at 4am. (Of course, when we were in the arctic circle it didn't get dark at all as we were there at the time of year of the famous 'midnight sun' - but we slept through it and didn't get up to check how it looked).

And if your next question would be "how hard was it to sleep?" - my answer would be "with difficulty and in a sleeping mask". The curtains were quite good blockouts and we shut them carefully each night, but I really struggle with light at night time - I occasionally use a sleeping mask even when the sun isn't up around the clock! I think Michael coped a lot better with the light - but then his problem with sleep is noise, which doesn't bother me so much.

The Wrap Up - Part One

Your Questions Answered!

Q: Are all Swedes blonde, blue-eyed, tall, thin & attractive?

A: No. It's like expecting all Australians to look like either "typical bronzed Aussie" or similar stereotyping. I would estimate that about 70% of Swedes are brunettes, and in general they didn't look tall to me. I did see some who would almost fit the stereotype, but even they were not jaw droppingly gorgeous like some would have you believe all Scandinavians are. I am told that all the people who do look like the stereotype are employed at the front of house for the top end hotels and restaurants - but I didn't go to these places. Outside of tourist places I would always be addressed in Swedish, so I wasn't obviously foreign - so physically I could  pass as a Swede (?). I am not blonde, blue-eyed, particularly tall or thin and while Dr M thinks I am the most beautiful woman in the world, I have not yet received any offers to start off my modeling career. In other words, I am an ordinary looking person as are the majority of Swedes.

Q: Wasn't it cold?

A: Nope. Some days were even too warm for comfort with Dr M ditching his bike ride to work in favour of the the cooler option of public transport. To be accurate, it was a bit unseasonable warm and rain free while I was there, but even a few degrees cooler and you wouldn't have been cold. It generally wasn't hot in the evening, but I needed sunscreen until about 7.30pm as the sun still had a lot of bite in it until that point, and with the sun not going below the horizon until about 10pm. It was cool after the sun went down if the wind was blowing - but a light jacket was sufficient for warmth. I had to buy an extra pair of lightweight pants as I thought that I would live in jeans while there and it was far to hot for them (I wore my jeans about three times - in England and the second day in the Arctic Circle and I think out to dinner one night). I was a bit cold the day we went down the mine in the Arctic Circle - the air was 8 degrees underground and about 5 ish degrees about that above ground - but rainy with a breeze, and I didn't help matters by slipping on the grass and ending up with wet pants which then made me very cold.

Q: Isn't Sweden really expensive?
A: Some things were, some things weren't. The Aussie dollar is pretty strong right now so the exchange rate was in our favour. I thought lunches were really good value. Dinner was a little less so (but dinners out tended to be at more expensive type places). Stuff in supermarkets was reasonable. Entry to museums/attractions  was dirt cheap. I don't think that anything material was cheap, but then I don't think anything was cheap in quality. I thought that both Denmark and London were more expensive - I thought London was heaps more expensive (and without the quality).

Swedish Furniture Design

This is a post I started while still in Sweden.... It didn't get finished as I decided I had to do a few more things before I left and then when I had 5 minutes we ran out of internet credit.

One thing I was looking forward to seeing in Sweden was the designs. I had hoped to pick up a few items of clothes with bright colours and bold designs, but it turns out that they prefer muted colours for their clothes (nothing in red in the shops - at all!). It would appear that they save all that design effort for furnishings!

The Swedish are known for being a bit out there with designs. It's for a reason people! Have a looky at these chairs. The ones on the left are probably not for everyday use (they are probably too expensive to sit on) but the ones on the right look like they might be considered as an everyday chair. You could see wacky chairs in most furniture shop display windows, so I assume  the average Swede likes a wacky chair.

Better than the chairs though, are the light fittings! Everywhere you go there are fabulous, out there light fittings. And not just in shops where you might wonder who would buy them - installed for use all over the place. There might be a law against having boring light fittings in public places.

Hej dä(goodbye)

In Stockholm airport about to board the flight home - I have a few more things to say about our time in sweden so this wont be that last entry....

I have Stockholm syndrome. I don't want to leave!

UPDATE: 
6.20am Bangkok - got upgraded to first class again on the Stockholm/Bangkok leg. Once again, I didn't do anything (and I thought I looked a bit shabby - it was a really hot humid morning so I presented at check in with sweat rolling down my face and wearing my grubby cargo pants). 

It's all about the Cider

One thing I love about Sweden is the paron (pear) cider. I knew that I would like it as I really like the (non-alcoholic) pear cider from Ikea. It's very different from the range of ciders readily available at home. You get lots of different brands with different flavours (left wih elderflower, above with berries, strawberry & lime, starfruit & raspberry & starfruit) - a lot of these are summer limited edition, I don't think you can get more than the standard in the cold, dark days of winter. In general they are very refreshing on a hot day (although the strawberry & lime was a bit sweet). You can't tell what is made here though - food lableing laws don't seem to require country of origin. The one to the left is one of my favourites, and I had assumed it was Swedish as all the info on the back is in Swedish with no other country mentioned - but it is actually English (I didn't see it anywhere in England though - I think it is made for export to Sweden in the swedish cider style as it is nothing like the other English ciders I have had). 

You can also get the ones up the top in a range of alcoholic contents - you can buy drinks with up to 2.5% alcohol in the supermarket, above that you have to go to the government owned bottle shops (system bolaget). The drinks up the top range from 4.5 % to 7.5% - but Dr M found some of the same flavours in the supermarket in cans with the lower alcohol reading. This means you have to be careful what you take from the fridge!

Drottingholm

Monday I visited Drottingholm Palace and surrounds. Drottingholm is the best example of an 18th century royal palace in Sweden - some of the buildings are considered to be of such importance that the site is on UNESCO's World Heritage List.

I took a tour through the palace (which is the official home of the Swedish Royal family) which was full of paintings, sculptures and interesting bits of furniture. This building dates from 1662 (the previous palace on the site having burnt to the ground) and the history of the dowager Queen who commissioned the building was fascinating.

Behind the palace is a huge public park and more interesting buildings. One of the buildings is the Chinese pavilion - one of the world's best-preserved rococo environments with Chinese elements. It was built at the time of Europe's fascination with China & Japan, when not much was known about the mysterious orient! The building was constructed for the royal family to experience family time away from the confines of the court. The Chinese Pavilion is compsed of five pavilions with one main  and four smaller single roomed pavilions all arranged symmetrically.

You can only enter the main pavilion (although you can peak into two of the small ones). It was a beautiful building, with fragile, faded hand painted wallpaper (on silk and on rice paper) and dramatically painted rooms of lovely proportions.

One of the rooms had Chinese like characters painted on the walls. Several people on the tour were of Asian heritage and were looking at the characters in a confused manner, until the guide explained that the characters were Swedish copies or interpretations of Chinese characters and that it is completely unreadable (at which point several faces looked less confused, nodded and laughingly agreed that you couldn't read it)!

In the Arctic Circle

We have just returned from a weekend up north, within the arctic circle. We boarded an overnight train on Friday afternoon, and were a little sorry that we weren't able to justify the additional expense for a private compartment as the dour Norwegians who were also seated in our compartment were not the ideal traveling companions (lots of trips to the bistro carriage to purchase beers & cheese 'n' onion chips which were then consumed in the carriage followed by mellifluous burping + they wanted to wait until midnight to turn the seats into beds - when Dr M had been up since 6am for work! + snoring which Dr M found impossible to sleep through). 

However the trip was still fun and the scenery that we could see out the windows (usually when the Norwegians were at the bar as they had the window seats) was very pretty and made me feel as though we were seeing a bit more of the real Sweden.

We disembarked at the Northernmost city of Sweden, Kiruna. It is a strange town, which depends on the local iron ore mine, and while it has tourist activities, they are not very many and of those some are shut on weekends! There are also no buses on weekends, so we ended up hiring a car as it was cheaper than catching a taxi to and from a single thing we were interested in. Dr M did an excellent job at his first time driving on the otherside of the road. I was excellent support.

Even though there is not much do do, you can cope as  the activities are quite unique and enjoyable! We started off with a visit a Sami traditional centre (Sami is the correct name for those you might know as Lapps from Lapland). We looked at traditional houses, crafts, learnt about the culture, attempted to feed the reindeer (but were rejected) and tried our hands at lassoing reindeer antlers (no longer connected to the reindeer). 

We then went to the site of the famous 'Icehotel' which is built each winter. We  learnt about how they construct the hotel and were able to inspect the harvested ice blocks (beautiful clear blocks weighing about 2T each cut from the river each March) waiting to be built into the hotel once it is cold enough, currently sitting in stacks in a large refrigerated warehouse. This was followed by a visit to the Icebar which contains more of the ice blocks, and some of the remaining furniture and sculptures from last years hotel.

It's quite amazing - it would be great to see the hotel built. It has been going now for 20 years and each year they push the boundaries a bit more to see what they can achieve.

That night we ate reindeer, elk, native fish and finished off with the swedish delicacy - cloudberries!

The next day we visited the Kiruna Church - a very famous church in Sweden. It had interesting gold statues outside on the roof, fabulous lights inside and a good looking set of organ pipes.

We then joined with a tour group to go down the local mine - the biggest single iron ore mine in the world! It is an unusual mine in that it produces magnetite - unlike Australian iron ore which is hematite. The mine is so profitable that they are about to start relocating the entire town so that they can continue mining the seam without worrying about the town falling to bits due to subsidence. It was a very interesting tour. At the end of the day we flew back to Stockholm for my last (part) week in Sweden.

(and for those wondering about the temperatures - I was probably warmer than you for most of the time. Saturday was about 20 degrees - I wandered around in bare legs and a t-shirt - I was a bit cold dressed like this looking at the ice blocks in the warehouse, but that was all. Sunday was colder and quite wet - but was easily about 10 degrees - the mine was cold at only 8 degrees. My thermals, beanie and extra jumpers will be coming home unworn.) 

Tradie Pants

No blog about Sweden would be complete without an entry about tradies' pants. "What are tradies' pants?" you may ask. Tradie Pants (as named by Dr M) are the pants worn by just about every industrial type worker in Stockholm.

They are like cargo pants, but extreme cargo pants. They have pockets all over them. What takes them to the next level beyond cargo pants are the outside pockets. They also have pockets in the knee so that you can slip you knee pads in them. they come in several lengths (long, 3/4, and shorts). They come in all different colours/fabrics - hi-vis, denim, white, blues, camo etc. There is even a matching vest (I've only seen one of them though - in white on a builder).

These pants are worn by so many people - gardeners, street cleaners, surveyors, construction workers, garbage collectors, builders, electricians, - really anyone in a job that involves some kind of tool or getting dirty. Females wear them too (there are a lot more female tradies in Sweden than at home). Apparently when you go to a hardware shop everyone checks out everyone else's pants to see how they utilise their many pockets. 

Even visiting engineering professionals wear them - yes, Dr M has a pair to wear to work.

Oxford

On Tuesday night I made my way to Oxford where I caught up with some friends from Uni days. While I had seen one of them about 4 years ago on a visit back to Australia, I hadn't seen her husband since before they left Australia about 6 years ago (and I hadn't met their second child)- so we had a great catch up at the local British Legion Club (reminiscent of a country RSL). It was even darts night.

On Wednesday they showed me around the town of Oxford, particularly Christchurch college - including the famous cathedral and dining hall (used for the dining hall in the Harry Potter films).  Our little group of four was given a personalised tour around the cathedral and even were taken out a door mrked 'private' to be shown a secluded courtyard not open to guests. 

We also climbed the cupola at the top of the Sheldonian Theatre from where we could gaze out at the 'dreaming spires' of Oxford. Other stops included the Divinity school of the Bodleian Library (AKA  the infirmary in Harry Potter) and the famous Turf Tavern (where Bill Clinton didn't inhale, Bob Hawke did drink a record breaking yard glass and where the fictitious Inspector Morse spent much time drinking). We also ate a delicious lunch in an old church vault and visited the science museum which included a blackboard that Einstein had drawn on during a guest lecture.

I was finally treated to both traditional English weather of heavy rain and the sight of green lawns (London was a brown, crispy grassed dustbowl!) before boarding the return flight to Stockholm.

Windsor & Eton

On Tuesday Ali took me to Windsor. To get there we had to change trains at Slough train station - which was rewarding for me as the train station was used in several episodes of my favourite tv series from my youth (Press Gang).

It's great being shown around the place by 'locals' - a standard tourist would probably only go to the main gate, and you'd have to pay to get in to get a good look. Ali took me around the back where you get a pretty respectable look at the castle.

We then wandered around the streets of Windsor, crossing the river to Eton and peering into the courtyard of the school, and strolled along the river inspecting the long boats and swans.

Lunch was at a pub - you can guess what we had to  drink. Then it was farewell to Ali.

London - Day Two

On Monday Ali & I headed into London again while our menfolk returned to work.  The day was another warm one but with frequent periods of overcast cloud and the occasional sprinkle. We started off with a cruise down the Thames, starting from Westminster, past the Tower of London, under the Tower bridge and docking at Greenwich. 

We posed for the obligatory photo at the Meridian marker before looking though the observatory museum (lots of navigational aids including the first portable accurate timepieces). 

We then re-boarded the boat and journeyed back up the Thames where we were rewarded with the unusual sight of the Tower bridge opening to let the HMS Richmond be towed out. 

We finished off the afternoon with a good old fashioned English high tea (with scones, clotted cream, victoria sponge, strawberry tart and of course, cucumber sandwiches with the crusts cut off). A quick visit to Fortnum & Mason and Harrods saw us through to Pimms O'clock (imbibed in the Little Venice area).

London - Day One

On Sunday Ali took us into London via the train. Our intro to the tube was uncomfortable due to the heat as once again the daily temp was around the 30 degree mark and the tube is not cooled in any way (they make health announcements and have signs up advising you to take water with you and not to ride the tube if you are unwell) - it's really quite revolting - and that's not even talking about the huge amounts of people around!

Ali took us on a short walking tour of several of the iconic London sights including Piccadilly Circus, Nelson's Column, Buckingham Palace, Westminster & the Bell Tower and the Thames. it happened to be the day of the London 10km fun run, so while there was no traffic (the roads were closed!) there were an awful lot of people as we arrived in town as people were finishing. 

Dr M left us then to go and meet up with an old friend of his own, so Ali and I went to Regents Park for a picnic under a weeping willow tree.

Following our lunch we headed to the Charles Dickens museum - which is housed in one of his former residences (where he wrote his most successful novel "Oliver Twist"). The museum contained items belonging to Dickens, rooms done up in the style of the period, and original issues of his novels (as his novels were written as serials then published in a book afterwards - the book is the first edition but the collected completed serials are referred to as issues and this is what CD collectors would be looking for). I touched his desk. Loved it, loved it, loved it.

We then entered the British Museum where I inspected the Rosetta Stone and a few other ancient Eygptian artifacts (before being thrown out by the security guard as it was closing time). I did a few more required touristy things like riding on a double decker bus and popping into a phone box on the way to St Paul's Cathedral. We walked accross the millenium bridge (locally known as the wibbly wobbly bridge) and sat in a pub with another jug of pimms and lemonade while we watched the sun set on the skyline of London.  Please be advised that navigating the stairs on the double decker bus after drinking more than your share of a jug of pimms is not for amateurs.

Leeds Castle

Friday night we hopped a British airways flight and flew into Heathrow. I can confirm that BA does not stand for best airways. Luckily we had been warned that the BA version of dinner (breakfast and lunch) is a sandwich (tuna mayonnaise - very soggy) and ate before we left Stockholm. We were met at the airport by my friend (from school days) Ali and her husband Paul (who I went to uni with). They quickly introduced us to the notorious English traffic on the motorways - both on the way back to their place and the next day when they drove us down to Leeds castle (which is nowhere near Leeds - it is south east of London in the Kent area).

We first visited a traditional English pub where I was introduced to a jug of pims and lemonade (we became firm friends immediately) and we had a standard lunch of fish & chips. We then entered the grounds of Leeds Castle.

It was a very warm day by English standards - at least 30 degrees - so inside the shady grounds and cool castle walls were a pretty good place to be. We looked through the castle which was home to many people during the ages (including Catherine of Aragon - Henry VIII's first wife) and admired the grounds which were full of bird life.

The castle was very well preserved as it has been in almost continuous occupation since it was built. It was situated beautifully, and was obviously built equally for looks and security. 

We would have liked to visit the aviary and hedge maze, but managed to get to them just as they shut (well, we did try to sneak into the maze from the exit end but were thrown out by the security guard). Next time!

 

Millesgarden (or Lost in Lidingo)

Friday I jumped on the bike to head for Millesgarden - the home and sculpture garden of the acclaimed Swedish artist Carl Milles. Millesgarden is on the island of Lidingo - and unfortunately I had a lot of trouble finding it! I made it to Lidingo in about 25 minutes - then spent an hour trying to get across/around major roads and railway lines.

When I finally made it, on of the first sculptures I saw illustrated how I felt while looking for the garden.

I did not know much about Carl Milles before, but having perused his work, I can confidently say that his main inspirations were nudity, angels, nudity, religion, nudity, greek mythology, nudity, christianity and nudity. Apparently many of his sculptures back in the day offended and many were 'modified' after completion (fig leaves, removal of offensively large male organs even though in scale with rest of sculture etc).

As well as walking around the sculture garden which had numerous statues and fountains, you could see inside his house including his studio. It was decorated through out with sculptures, mosaics, hand painted tiles and other artists work.

An unexpected bonus was being able to view his collection of ancient Roman marble carvings - some 2000 years old. Quite amazing.

It took 35 minutes to get home in the Fri arvo crazy traffic - in comparison to the 90 minutes it took for me to find it.

The Archipelago

Last night we went on an archipelago dinner cruise. The boat was a ferry for some of the islands, but with a nice restaurant on board. It's not marketed as a tourist tour so it was mainly locals on the way home to their islands.

Stockholm city is spread across 14 islands - but the greater archipelago consists of over 40,000 islands (there is disagreement over the total number - some say there are as many as 80,000 islands). Many of the islands are dotted with summer houses, while others are not much more than a pile of rocks with some vegetation. Some of the islands are quite large with castles, hotels and permanent residents.

For about 4 hours the boat threaded its way through many of the islands and we were able to look at the summer houses. All the summer houses are either red or yellow.

The red is the traditional colour - the paint is made from a byproduct of copper mining and has a natural preservative that protects the wood. It was favoured by poorer people as it was cheap and as it protected the wood so well they wouldn't have to repaint or make repairs that they could not afford. It works very well - some of the summer homes are hundreds of years old.

The yellow houses were for the rich. They could afford the more expensive paint (and the repairs).

It was a very relaxing evening, but it is difficult to get used to the idea of putting on sunscreen before a night out.

"The Skyview"

After all of my travels my feet needed a rest from walking (those cobblestones are murder!) so nothing of note happened on Wednesday, hence today's post is about something that we did last week.

This is "the skyview" - a ride in a glass gondola up the outside of the largest spherical building in the world. 

The building itself is "the globe" - a massive arena that hosts some of Stockholm's biggest concerts and events. The building is so important that the train station and adjacent shopping centre are name after it (Globen).

The ride takes you up the curve of the building right to the top which is 130m above ground level. You get to stop here for a bit and look around at the horizon.

It's a nice little ride that takes about 20 minutes. It's next to a sports stadium where there was a soccer game on the night we went - you could hear the fans quite clearly up where we were!

If it's Tuesday, this must be Gothenburg

I arrived at Gothenburg station and headed straight for my pre-booked accommodation. It wasn't too hard to find, being the tallest thing around that area.

Yep, I was sleeping on the "Barken Viking" - a retired 100 year old cargo ship. She is a four-masted barque - of which only 345 were ever built (with only 10 of those still existing today). My little single room was tucked up in the prow of the ship. It had two port holes and the floor was tilted from the front to the back!

I ate dinner up on the deck, where I had a 360 degree view of the sunset - I could see the sun dropping in the sky while I watched the colours across the sky change (it was about 10pm that the sun went below the horizon) while the seagulls flew around the masts.

I had a great nights sleep - the boat felt very steady - and in the morning I breakfasted in the saloon.

I then headed into town and visited the "Goteborgs Stads Museet". This is housed in a building that is 250 years old and it has been a museum for 150 years. I started with the viking exhibit, which showed viking relics such as nails, runes carved into stones, combs and ornaments, engravings and the remains of a boat. It was very interesting (and fortunately, the info cards were translated into English).

Each display in the museum represented a period of history of Gothenburg - from viking up to the modern age. Not all displays had an English translation, but most of the time I could tell what I was looking at.

Up on the top floor was a temporary exhibition celebrating the combined anniversaries of the Gothenburg theaters and opera. This was a display of costumes, scale models of stage sets, photos and sketches from plays, musicals and operas - with some costumes as old as 150 years! This unfortunately was not in English, but I could pick out some bits like "William Shakespeare", "Madame Butterfly", "Hamlet" etc and others that were easy translations like "en midsommar nätter dröm" - but the rest I was in the dark. However - it didn't matter as they were amazing! No photos from inside the museum unfortunately (and the gift shop didn't even have any postcards of the displays!)

In the afternoon I went for a ride on the Gothenburg "Circle of Excellence" (aka ferris wheel). From here I was able to look out over the town, and also get the photo of the ship which was at the start of this entry.

I thought it would be a short ride, but it turned out to be such good value that I went round and round so many times that I just missed my train (I had time to get my bags out of the lock up, but not enough to get the ticket and on the train). So I went back to town and looked at a few more things until the next train to Stockholm left.