We’d arrived. After 12 hours of driving in a car built for one, the three of us made it to Stockholm.
Our first view of the city was a row of baroque houses fronting the river that divides the North part of the city from the Old Town, or Gamla Stan, which sits on its own island. There were local fishermen leaning against the walls of 400-year-old bridges, as tourists snapped pictures behind them.
After our first parking spot turned out to be for “diplomats only,” we took a chance on another one (note: Swedish parking signs are impossible to translate) and headed to Gamla Stan. Turan showed us his old stomping grounds, but the tour was cut short by a fast-approaching storm.
After finding our car ticketless, we left to have our last Scandinavian meal with Turan in the newly developing SoFo district. Amazingly, we found a cool restaurant that was equal parts affordable and delicious. We had a nice talk with a couple of Swedish hipsters about life in Stockholm. According to our limited sample, Stockholmers like hockey, don’t understand American football, like American films, but don’t care about the Oscars or Emmys, and like to wear Yankees hats. Also, our waitress was thrilled to meet Americans (or perhaps just one, named Turan). So thrilled that she spilled beer on herself and the table she was cleaning — twice.
After some light bar window-shopping, we drove just out of the city limits to our hostel in a gutted Boeing 747. Our plane-themed room, a full bed with a twin bunk on top, was a fun exercise in space efficiency and tolerating each other’s smells. We made it work, utilized the overhead bin and got some decent to good sleep.
We returned our friend, the Renault Clio, and saw our friend, Turan off at the airport. Then our first order of business was to find a place to sleep that night. So, a quick detour to the adventures of finding beds in Stockholm (read on for the sightseeing later).
What we didn’t realize was the Stockholm half marathon was just a couple days away, and as a result all lodging was either booked solid or had way inflated rates. One of the budget hotels in our guidebook was asking for a whopping $220 a night!
We checked into a reasonably priced hostel with availability in a 12-person dorm for one night, but nothing for the following days. On checking out, we asked if anything had opened up. The receptionist told David “only the laundry,” which David took as a sarcastic answer meaning that the only reservations available were for the washing machines. But Robin thought (for some reason) this was worth clarifying, and ended up booking them 2 mattresses in the laundry room. At $25 a person. We were told to come back at 10pm to check in, as guests were allowed to use the room until midnight.
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| Our laundry room. |
Robin asked at 11:30pm when the beds would be set up, to which the receptionist replied that there are mattresses against the wall and bedding on the shelf. We walked into a humming and humid room and pulled out our mattresses, wedged them into a nook below the drying racks, and broke a sweat making the bed in the nearly 90º room. We sadly noticed another bag as we set up, and were greeted with, “Damn,” by an almost friendly Italian man, who had also hoped to snag the “laundry special” for himself. Our new friend left at 6am, but the cleaning crew started using the room at 8:30am, and it was also already booked for the next day! The hunt continued.
Our thirst for novelty hostels not yet quenched, we booked ourselves a lovely stay on a hostel-boat for our last night in Stockholm. We had a bit of trouble getting our hostel legs, but more trouble with an extremely smelly roommate in an unventilated 24-bunk room.
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| David poses near our two of the 24 bunks in the boat's dorm. |
To add insult to injury, he doused himself in cologne, creating an ass stew. Our sleep was also interrupted by: 1am – chatty German girls arriving and setting up beds, 3am – drunken professions of “falling in love with Swedish girl” by the stinker, 5am – drunken entrance followed immediately by loud passed-out snoring, 6am – request for David to kill a yellow jacket, made by one of the German girls (see 1am).
But, oh, the sights!
Best Sights:
Storkyrken – Worth the entrance fee to see this ornate church (from 1306, what?!) and statue of St. George and Dragon…made with elk antlers for the dragon’s wings, and real horse hair for the mane and tail.
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| The statue had real horse hair tail from a 4 centuries ago |
Best Times:
Hanging out with the bartender at Gyldene Freden – a restaurant that has kept the same furnishings since it opened in 1722 http://www.gyldenefreden.se/ It’s owned by the Swedish Academy, the guys in charge of awarding the Nobel Prize for literature, and we were there the same night as their weekly get-together!
Watching the changing of the guards ceremony. If you see it on Saturday the navy band performs hilarious music.
Cheering on the final few runners of the half marathon with ABBA playing in the background.
Eavesdropping on a guy having a fight with his girlfriend for being on her phone too much, and him feeling like he was “walking with a ghost.” She didn’t reply. We think she may have been a ghost.
Best Eats:
Café Mix at the Music Museum – our most affordable meal in Scandanavia! Each entrée came with all you can eat fresh bread, salad bar, seafood miso soup with salmon and shrimp, and delicious cream of tomato soup. We ate there twice
Zum Franziskaner – The oldest consistently operating restaurant in Stockholm (although we were disappointed to hear they’ve had three locations in that time). We went for their “after work special” valid only from 2-5pm (?!) for a beer and fish and chips. For $22 USD (!) Actually a good deal in Scandinavia.
Delicious raspberries from a farmers market. They had lingonberries, too, of course.
Nalen Restaurant – Veal tartar and lox from Norway, and Swedish “green” cheese. And some fancy Swedish attitude and haircuts, to boot.
Best blog entry title ever written? I submit yes.
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