So what did I get up to? Well, I'll tell you. But first, here's a map to help provide some context to things.
Day 0 - London to Stockholm
We arrived 10mins ahead of schedule, at 12.20am local time (an hour faster than the UK) which suited me fine as I had booked my transfer into central Stockholm on the fast airport train and the last one of them was 1.05am - I had been thinking the connection was going to be tight and if the plane was late I might miss it, so the extra time was welcome. As expected, it didn't take too long to pass through border formalities (for the first time, I was asked to provide proof that I had a flight back out of the country - did they think I was going to stay longer than the 90 days permitted?), a short walk through the terminal and then I was out into the main area and had 20 minutes before that last train left so easy peasy. One thing I did notice in the concourse was a convenience store of sorts, and one thing I definitely wanted was a conveniently sized bottle of water to have with me and refill throughout the trip. Heathrow hadn't had any, and I didn't know when I might next find one so I found a suitable bottle with all the writing in Swedish (so I didn't understand any of it!), and used my first Krona. Down on the platform waiting for the train, I opened the bottle only to hear the dreaded carbonated sound - fizzy water, which I'm not fond of at all! Not that it mattered as although I was a bit thirsty (the back of my throat had been hurting all afternoon, like I was coming down with something) the water tasted a bit like some kind of fruits (I couldn't tell what, maybe a hint of watermelon and all sorts of others?) and would be replaced with tap water before long anyway. The train was a fairly flash and comfortable train, which ran at over 200km/h non-stop between the airport and Stockholm Central station where we arrived 20min after leaving. It wasn't the cheapest option - there were normal commuter trains I could have caught (which take 45mins with stops) or airport buses (at least 50mins with no stops) but it was definitely the quickest and would allow me more time for sleep once I got to my accommodation - and buying a return ticket on it was not much more than a one-way trip anyway. Once at the station, I had a 15 minute walk towards my accommodation in the Gamla Stan ("Old City").
Day 1 - Venturing Around, in and around Trains
Day 2 - Cruising, Vikings and Getting High
Day 3 - The Djurgarden and back to London
By the time I was finished at the Vasa museum, it was about 3pm - not really much time to do anything else, as I had to be at the main station in an hour and it would take me 30mins to walk there. So I headed slowly towards the station, caught the high-speed Arlanda Express back to the airport and checked in for my British Airlines flight. There was about 3 flights I could have chosen from that would have been a convenient time to fly out that evening, all about the same price but two things swung it in BA's favour - the first was it was a "full service" airline while the others weren't, meaning I'd get some form of drink and snack onboard; and that the plane would be a 767, rather than a 737 or A320. I have a fondness for the 767, and I'm not entirely sure why - but I think the 2-3-2 seat layout has something to do with it, making it far more roomy than any other plane in general. Checking in at the airport, I got myself a window seat as the 767 is the smallest kind of plane I can comfortably sit in a window seat for flights longer than an hour and the sun would be up for the entire flight. Except, I discovered my flight was delayed by two hours - instead of leaving at 6.10pm, it would now leave after 8pm. An extra two hours at the airport - well that would suck, but what can you do? After going through security I went and sat down and made use of the free wifi, since I didn't have a book with me. I was getting thirsty and it was a bit warm after a while too, and with a Starbucks nearby an iced chocolate drink seeming like just the cure - I wondered how long I might be able to hold out spending any more of my Krona's (I had about half of what I brought over left, and the Currency Exchange said they'd buy back any money not used so there was an incentive not to use any more up). About half an hour later, there was an announcement for passengers on my flight to go to Gate 66. It sounded ominous - it wasn't the gate our plane was due to leave from, so why would we go to that gate? were they going to tell us our flight was cancelled? turns out we were being given a complimentary food & drink voucher, for 70 Kroner to spend in the airport. This was enough to get a small drink and some food, but I decided to go to the Starbucks and get the biggest, most expensive Iced Chocolate they had for 67 Kroner. When the price was rung up though, there was some kind of discount on and I was able to get some shortbread biscuits as well - so holding out spending money as long as I did paid off, as I got what I probably would have got for free!
We did board the plane and take off at the appointed delayed time, and we flew over a lot of Sweden on our journey home - it was a bit cloudy but in the clear spots you could see that there was a lot of small lakes around, covering the landscape. At some point I remember looking out and seeing the coastline and the sea, and then not too long after there was another coastline and land again - the gap between the coastline's didn't seem anywhere big enough, but surely this new bit of land wasn't Sweden? we can't be far enough north for it to be Norway, was it Denmark? I have since established it was Denmark, and the first coastline was actually Denmark too - the coast of an Island between Sweden and Denmark, but the cloud hid the Swedish coastline and the rest of the detail. As for the onboard service, the snack was a small ham and cheese roll (which honestly looked like it used 'slider' hamburger buns) and a lemon-iced bun the same size as the roll. BA offer complimentary alcohol too, so a Tiger beer was got - which I later managed to spill a bit on my lap when we hit a solitary air pocket! After landing, I hopped off the plane and headed for the border formalities and joined the "All Passports" queue which was actually quite large. The EU queues were also large, but they seemed to move through fairly quickly unlike my queue. It actually took 30mins from joining the queue to getting to see an official - that's the longest wait I've had yet entering Britain, by far. I was worried for a while that the wait and late time might mean that the tube stops running before I fully got home, meaning an even longer trek using the night buses for part of the journey but I managed to get on the tube about 11pm and got in the door at home around midnight, the ungodly hour I'd tried to avoid when I'd booked the flight but I did manage to ride on the tube the whole way. Needless to say, it wasn't long before I was in bed as I had work the next morning.
Summing Up
Perhaps the biggest unknown was going to the country not knowing the language at all, not even key words or phrases - I'd been fairly reliably informed that almost all Swedes speak English too, and since I had no inclination to learn Swedish I decided to rely on that and hope it might be somewhat similar to German of which I did know a teeny bit. As it turned out, everyone I spoke to not only spoke English, but they spoke perfect English - and they understood me completely fine too. There was one point where I had to ask one of the train guards at Gavle a question, and I'd just seen him speak in Swedish to a group of people. I went up to him and said "Excuse me, do you speak English" - only to be very surprised when he turned round and said "Very well, in fact" in a British accent - turns out I'd approached the one volunteer who was from the UK! So the language wasn't an issue at all.
As always though there was good stuff and bad stuff, so I'll make note of what was what:
The Bad Parts:
- Getting a tad sunburnt - on most of my previous trips, this hasn't been much of a concern as its been winter or the sun hasn't had the strength although I did get a little bit of colour the first day or two in Germany the last trip I did. Even in the UK, I don't seem to have to worry about getting burnt the same as I guess the thick layer of UK smog high up helps? However being a bit further north, much cleaner and clearer air probably had some bearing on it and I knew it might - but never finding a supermarket meant I never managed to get any, and its not like I could have taken some with me very easily as you aren't allowed liquids over 100ml in your carry-on (which was all I had, no checked bag). I was glad the 3rd day was a bit more overcast and cooler so I didn't get any worse, but I knew by the end of the 2nd day I was looking a bit red.
- Some things were expensive - I had been told many times that Sweden (and the other Scandinavian countries, particularly Norway) were quite expensive. My flights were cheap, my accommodation cheap, my train tickets about normal and so I expected all the day-to-day stuff to be pricey as. On the whole, most things seemed about price comparable with the UK - but there were some things which were most definitely not. Not the least of which of these, were the Dala horse souvenirs - little painted wooden horses which are a symbol of Sweden, and looked quite neat. They come in different sizes, but I was shocked to see that the smallest of them, no longer than your thumb in length was 195 SEK - that's about £15, or NZ$30 for a tiny little wooden horse. Food and drink was a tad on the pricey side too, but not hugely out of the ballpark I felt - a pint of beer from a cafe or restaurant was about 40-65 SEK, or roughly £3.5-£5 which is roughly NZ$7-10 so sort of comparable, the Swedish meatballs I had from the fancy riverside restaurant was 150 SEK, which is about £12 or NZ$24 - for a fancy meal, that's not unreasonable I thought and I had proper Pancakes from the Skansen Cafe for lunch at 79 SEK, which is £6 or NZ$12 - again, not unreasonable. But the Dala horses and other souvenirs - wow.
- Heathrow - Heathrow wasn't bad, but it was annoying. For the biggest airport with new facilities, particularly the terminals I used in both arriving and departing, it did leave a lot to be desired. There seemed to be not enough security x-ray machines and so the queue for security took a little while; once through into the terminal area, the shops were few and far between and quite pricey for what they were; being on a plane that's lining up in a queue for the runway for 30 minutes isn't much fun; and the wait for border formalities upon arrival back, took forever. I've only been to Heathrow once before, when I arrived and the wait for border formalities was not anywhere that long last time but it seems they only had 4 staff on and an influx of passengers wanting the All Passports queue. Usually, I'm used to the multiple EU lines moving more slowly than the All Passports queue - and I don't think I've ever waited more than 10 minutes before. The whole thing wants to make me avoid Heathrow actually, as its not necessarily so easy to get to either - the tube takes ages (and although there are fast direct trains there, they cost a lot). Gatwick is definitely my preferred London Airport at this stage as the departure and arrival process there is a lot less painful, although I don't have any problem with Stanstead or Luton either and I have yet to use London City or London South End.
Again, I should qualify this part - the whole trip was good, but these were the bits which stood out:
- Staying on a Cruise Ship - It might have been old and wasn't exactly like your typical modern day cruise ship, but staying in the Birger Jarl was a bit of a coup as far as I am concerned. Not only was it conveniently located in the central city, but it was very well priced and I have no doubt the standard of accommodation was far better than if I'd stayed in a normal hostel-type place paying the same price. Besides that, it was a fairly decent sized ship - slightly larger than a large Cook Strait ferry, and allowed me a glimpse into what it would have been like to cruise 40+ years ago - in fact, if I was doing my OE 40-50 years ago I'd most likely be travelling by ship rather than plane, and the ships were probably not unsimilar in standard to the Birger Jarl . Interestingly enough, it moves to a different spot in Stockholm in June so if I were to stay there again, I'd have a completely different view out the porthole window!
- The Train Festival - it was only a day, there wasn't a huge amount on in the grand scheme of things and I could have made the trip more train-oriented if I'd wanted to (at the expense of other activities) but I chose not to, and for that I am glad but I was definitely glad to see what I did at the festival. I have probably never seen such a large collection of older steam locomotives in steam in my life, and I might be hard pressed to do so again. Particularly of note for me was the green Beyer-Peacock 0-4-2 tender engine which gave me a very good idea of what an NZR Canterbury J would have looked like, and the Single-driver 2-2-2 engine which looked rather odd with inside valve gear so there was no rods or anything on the outside of the main driving wheel to turn it!
- The Vasa - a real ship from the time when Pirates roamed the high seas, in an unbelievably intact and original state. More than just being a shipwreck, the Vasa is truly a cultural treasure. It honestly looks like someone built it, put it in the museum 350 years ago and its been there ever since. That's how good its condition it is - and there will probably never ever be another shipwreck find like this ever. Ever. Not even close.
- Uppsala - I want to bestow upon this town the title "Pretty of Pretties". Stockholm was wonderfully nice and scenic, but Uppsala was something else again. I probably went there at the right time on the right day, but it certainly left a huge impression on me for the little time that I was there. It was just so nice, relaxing and oh-so beautiful looking.
- Sweden itself - Sweden is a Scandinavian country, and for some reason because its not in the middle hub of Europe although I expected it to be safe, clean and fairly pristine, which it was, I expected that it might be a little staid or sterile and it wouldn't have the same cultural vibe or not quite be so full of the same "flavour" a bunch of other countries would - perhaps saying the country has personality is the best way to describe it. But I came away feeling like Sweden is almost your stereotypical European country from storybooks or imagination. Stockholm was what I expected Belgium to have been like (but wasn't), and Uppsala relative to Stockholm was what I was hoping Leuven would be like relative to Brussels. The whole country comes across as having their act together, and almost like some kind of paradise or utopia.
Would I go back to Sweden? Yes, I'd like to. Will I? I'd like to think so - but I do realise I may not, and if this is my only visit to Sweden then I'd be happy with what I've seen and done. One thing high on my list to try and achieve while I'm over here is the Aurora Borealis, or Northern Lights - Northern Norway and Sweden is looking more and more like the best place to try and see them from, and the railway in Northern Norway is actually the Swedish railway so I could well imagine that Sweden could be revisited as part of doing that. Of course, that would be winter, when its freezing cold - mind you I'd like to see a snow-covered Stockholm, and see Lake Malaren when its all frozen over with thick ice - that would be quite different!
As a footnote, I've seen pictures from the Three Cunard Queen's on the Mersey - had I gone, although I would have seen the spectacle I doubt very much whether I would have been able to get any good photos from a decent vantage point - the place was jam packed to say the least and the photo angles limited! I think I made the right call for sure :)