I arrived in Stockholm on Saturday evening, along with a lot of people who seemed to be talking a lot about Taylor Swift. A little slow on the uptake, I eventually realised that Taylor Swift was in town for three concerts, hence the near impossibility of getting accommodation. Strangely though, the hotel we chose ended up being only down the road from the Friends Arena where the concerts were held, which also meant that the hotel – along with the rest of Stockholm – was playing Swift songs on repeat…

Landing in Stockholm, I got to use my new Italian passport for the very first time so I joined the slowest EU passport processing line there was, but it was still faster than the “Other” lines. The rest of my arrival into Stockholm was a little bit more stressful. After collecting my luggage, I bought a ticket for the Arlanda Express, which is the express train that takes you from the airport (about half an hour out of the city) to Stockholm Central. I bought it because I thought the directions on Google Maps was showing me that I needed to take it to get to the hotel. So I paid the roughly AUD50 for the ticket and raced to catch the next train, which was leaving in five minutes.

On board, I then had a moment to think (despite having had about thirty waiting for luggage to check things properly) and realised that the Arlanda Express wasn’t going to take me to where I needed to go. Instead, on closer inspection, I saw that I was meant to take this train between terminals…which was a free ride, much like the between terminals trains at Heathrow. And then, when I got to the next terminal, I needed to take a Flixbus to the hotel.

Fortunately, I got off the train at the next terminal and found the bus stop, then bought a ticket online, also in time for the bus to arrive. I told the bus driver where I needed to go – there was no button to press to let the driver know when you wanted to get off – and took my seat. There were about three of us on the bus. I was still angry with myself for having bought an unnecessary and expensive train ticket and probably should have been paying greater attention to where I was. I did, however, see that I was about 10 minutes away from my stop but when I realised it had been more than ten minutes, we’d already gone past it. It was at that moment that the driver also realised he’d missed my stop and pulled up on the side of the freeway and said, “Will this be ok?” It would have to.

It was a 20-minute walk back up the side of the freeway – beside a cemetery too – to the hotel and I eventually arrived, stressed, frustrated and feeling like an idiot. As an end to the Arlanda Express story, I contacted the company and got a refund for the unused ticket – minus international transfer fees and more frustrations over file types not getting through secure connections – which was very nice of them and much better than a kick in the head.

Glen arrived about an hour or so later, his flights full of Swifties, and we went for dinner by the waterfront, then pretty much went home and went to bed. Wild Saturday night in Stockholm? Tick.

Gamla Stan, Vikings and ABBA

Sunday morning we had breakfast with a lot of people wearing Taylor Swift concert shirts then bought a 72-hour public transport card and headed into the city to start our sightseeing. We chose Gamla Stan first, the old town, and went into the royal palace to look at the Crown Jewels, principally, before looking at the state rooms and apartments and the old part of the castle.

I got museum fatigue pretty quickly, something about the endless rooms and the dim light, and I was happy to get out of there and walking again. We walked for a little way before being drawn into Café Schweizer thanks to its bags and crates of whole and used oranges. We had orange and pomegranate juice, carrot cake and chocolate bikvi. Bikvi have a sort of biscuit base, with a sort of chocolate mouse on top, which is then coated in melted chocolate. It’s delicious and I have had several across the trip.

After that, it was more walking through the tourist-focused areas of the old town, bought some lollies and headed to catch a ferry that wasn’t running on Sundays so walked some more. Up through Kungsträdgården, then off to Uniqlo as I was in desperate need of shorts as I hadn’t packed any suitable. Despite checking the weather forecast two weeks before leaving, Sweden and Norway seem to be going through a heatwave and I absolutely didn’t need to bring warm clothes. Sun, sun, sun for days. And heat!

After lunch, we walked some more, up Drottninggatan, a very long avenue rammed with people which was just awful (though the bollards dressed up as lions were cool) and deviated to the Paradox Museum but didn’t go in. Then to Brunkeberg Tunnel, a long pedestrian tunnel that has “tourist attraction” status. It was cool inside so nice for a moment out of the heat.

We emerged near Humlegården where lots of hot Swedes were sun baking in practically nothing so, in fact, they were hot, hot Swedes. Feeling bad about my body, we then went for Pain Perdu (fried dough covered in icing sugar) at a cafe around the corner. From there it was back down towards Djurgården for our 4:30 entry slot into the ABBA museum, but with about an hour to go before we were due to go in, we went to the Viking Museum first.

Interesting displays and some fun stuff for kids but SO MUCH TEXT, which I was done with. They had a ride though which takes you around in a little vehicle through a Viking story as told through the use of dioramas and audio. It was cute. So that took us about 45 minutes and we then joined the ABBA queue.

“Walk in, dance out” was the promise. We didn’t see anyone dancing out, and neither did we, but as far as being a museum, it is definitely a museum. Packed – densely packed – with everything you could possibly want or need to know about ABBA, the displays were bright and colourful and all well done, it’s just that, even with timed entry, I didn’t feel like I could take my time or soak things in because there were so many people around.

A while ago, my sister and I did an ABBA experience in London where the group sizes are limited and timed and you go with a guide through various rooms, getting information but also having the space to enjoy the experience. It was awesome and we loved it. The museum, in comparison, is not as engaging. We were in there about 35 minutes with a further 10 minutes in the gift shop.

Completely over sightseeing by that point, we decided to see another island in search of dinner. By this stage we were really hungry so tempers were fraying and we eventually settled on a Thai tapas restaurant called Pat’s Place, which did excellent Thai food. From there it was back to the hotel and a much longed-for lie down.

Ships and bicycles

Monday we caught public transport to Östermalms Food Hall, as recommended by a friend, but we arrived before opening so Glen had breakfast at one of the attached restaurants. When we did get in, it was a bit like St Lawrence Markets in Toronto, with a bunch of stalls selling their particular wares and a couple of restaurants inside. It was very early so not much of a buzz and the one thing I wanted was oysters and cava but they weren’t ready at 9:45am so we left. (I know how that must sound but it was just that I saw an offer advertised as “oysters and cava” and thought why not? Yes, I know this explanation doesn’t actually make that statement sound any better. Moving on.)

We then went for coffee and cake (plus I had a tuna melt) at a bakery just down the road, called Fabrique Humlegårdsgatan 9, which was excellent and, after being on our feet for about 15 minutes was a pleasant break.

From there it was down to the Vasa Museum, which housed a ship built in the 1600s that sank immediately after being launched. It’s a big boat and very cool. You can’t go on it, but you can go around it and see it from different angles and levels. The audio guide was excellent too and gave a not-too-long explanation of different aspects. (Often I find audio guides long winded with each track taking about 15 minutes, which is about half the amount of time I usually spend in an exhibition anyway.) There was also a temporary exhibition about shipwrecks made out of Lego and made by WA Museum. Very cool, bite-sized and fun.

From there we went to the Wreck Museum which was more text than object based but some of the interpretation was very good like a VR headset experience as you go diving for a wreck. They also had these glass discs setup that showed video of shipwreck objects, rather than the objects themselves, which was an interesting way of displaying these things that either aren’t in their collection or can’t be shown because they’d suffer from exposure.

We went for a walk through Djurgarden (the southern part) and saw actual, real life deer in the forest. Very cool. Highlight. Then back to the visitor information booth for lunch and bike hire. We cycled up to the northern Djurgarden (it’s divided into three parts), which we later found out was quite close to our hotel. We joined the throng of people also on their bikes cycling through the city, before deviating into the forested gardens and cycling around a bit. We saw geese and goslings, then cycled back, but with more time left on the clock, decided to extract every last minute by cycling around the southern Djurgarden.

After all that physical exertion, we were pretty exhausted so returned to the hotel, had dinner in the restaurant, and went for a walk around the cemetery afterwards.

Up to Uppsala

Tuesday we caught the train to Uppsala and we were blessed with another glorious day. It was about a half hour train ride, or an hour, I can’t remember but it was easy enough. We grabbed breakfast from a local cafe, devouring som delicious rolls as sustenance for the hour-and-a-half walk ahead of us.

We stopped into the cathedral for a look, beautiful ceilings, nice place to stop for a rest, then walked to Gamla Uppsala and the Viking mounds, which took us through some beautiful natural spaces. In one area of the park was something like a golf course expect instead of clubs and balls you use discs/frisbess and throw them into basketball hoop-type goals at the end of each course. Interesting idea. Even saw some people using them.

The walk took us up through the park and then around the base of the mounds (which you’re not meant to climb but people were) and around old churches and gravesites. Beautiful place, great for a walk, and felt miles from anywhere…which I guess it was.

After lunch, where we ordered what we thought was battered fish and chips, but turned out to be a sort of poached fish and boiled potatoes – still delicious – we caught the train back to town. Next stop was the botanic gardens with its tropical greenhouse (giant water lillies, pitcher plants, orchids, stunning) and orangery.

Our walk back to the station took us around the bottom of the castle/fortress/slott and passed a recently burned out car that the fire brigade were in the process of cleaning up. We bought more baked goods (Bikvi!) and caught the train back to our hotel. Dinner was an expensive but delicious Indonesian restaurant near to the hotel called Restaurant Jakarta. Highly recommended.

The next day, Wednesday, was a travel day. Stockholm, done.