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.