Stockholm Part 1 Finally

Ok so here is the rest of the trip to Stockholm. We arrived at Arlanda Airport (45 km from the center of Stockholm) in the evening on Thursday. We got our stuff and took a taxi over to our hotel. It was in a good part of the city at the end of Drottninggatan which is a long pedestrian street filled with restaurants bars and shops that runs all the way through to Gamla Stan the small island with the palace. Stockholm is built on an Archipelago and the central part of the city is broken up onto about two dozen islands that touch the "mainland" where were staying. In fact the archipelago surrounding stockholm is comprised of over 30,000 islands. Therefore unlike Copenhagen, Stockholm was not covered in fortresses and not designed to have major military engagements in the city but rather on the islands out of the city. For instance the city of Vaxholm which is slightly north of  stockholm has a fortress designed to protect Stockholm from a northern attack. The taxi ride was weird especially for me because besides the fact that the signs were in Swedish  and the billboards were designed to look like metal trees, it felt just like a highway in the US. The roads in Denmark are filled with small "european" cars the dart down small roads along side bicycles. However in stockholm there were wide straight boulevards with bigger cars most common were large station wagons made by Volvo (of course), Saab (duh) and BMW. However there was also a huge presence of American cars mostly made by Ford which makes sense because they have had their fingers in with Saab and Volvo. However the small little Fiats, Pugeots, Renaults, Toyotas etc that cover the streets in Copenhagen were not as commonly occurring. Also Sweden is currently in a period of great economic growth (I know a little surprising huh....) and so there was a lot of development especially in high tech along the highway as we approached the city. Every major company imaginable was represented here, which was very different from the quaintness that Copenhagen has without the gigantic high tech buildings.  And boom we get off the highway and we are in the city and a few blocks later at the front of our hotel. We squeezed into our little room there and due to the bed complications from the last place I opted for the smaller but more comfortable cot that the room had. We then walked down Drottninggatan and found a restaurant to eat at which was expensive but had some classic Swedish dishes and we all ordered some type of fish to enjoy something different than the meat and potatoes from the previous nights.
 The next day we started our tour of the city by walking down Drottninggatan which would take us through parliament and then on to Gamla Stan which is where the old city was as well at the Royal Palace. It was another day of beautiful weather in the 60s and 70s and sunny. We made it down to the Palace just as the changing of the guard was wrapping up. Unlike the guards in Copenhagen with the giant hats similar to the ones they wear in England these guards wear small metal helmets that look like they get annoyingly hot in the summer. Unfortunately all the museums in the palace were closed on account that it was good friday so we decided to stroll around the old city. Below are some pictures of what we had seen until then.

This is the city hall for Stockholm which looks surprisingly almost exactly like the one in Copenhagen

Looking north on Drottninggatan and through the arches that are part of parliament

A small old french (Citroen) in Copenhagen

A little taste of a car in Sweden, American made Dodge Viper SRT 10 just compare this and its 500+ HP to the car above...

The Royal Guard of Sweden, note their far more spacious booths than the ones in Denmark or England despite not needing as much space because of there much "smaller" uniforms

Another interesting thing of note about the royal guards is like in Denmark they are almost all very young. I am not sure but I am guessing that also like in Denmark when boys turn 18 they must join the military in some fashion unless they can prove some disability or other thing to bar themselves from service. I know that many of the young Danes do not need to join up and go and serve in Iraq or Afghanistan instead they can be in the civil service, national guard or royal guard. Therefore I am guessing that like in Denmark most of these guys were 18. Later on we saw a bus full of what looked like "new recruits" and they looked about that age so I am betting I am correct in that guess. Also interestingly in Denmark the guards held American made Colt M16s with Bayonets but here in Sweden they are armed with British made SA 80s which probably makes their job easier since the SA 80 is lighter but they have a bayonet that looks more like a combat knife then a pocket knife. Ok back to the important stuff.
We looked on the map and say there were a bunch streets with narrow alleys and I thought they may be interesting to check out so we headed that way. We came across a plaza that has some famous cafes in some interestingly colored buildings and my mom remembered that her friend Annette had taken a picture in front of the cafe with the orange building with one of the green fleeces on while sipping a coffee. The Scandinavians love to be outside even when it is not so warm out. So their cafes often have tables outside with fleece blankets and heaters so that people can dine outside even in the cold months. It is kind of a traditional Scandinavian thing to do this, however due to the recent nice weather slightly unnecessary (although we learned from the taxi driver there was snow on the ground only a week before). The cafes were very full and busy so we decided to maybe come back later and for now do some walking and shopping.

The very old and famous cafes we later stopped by the skinny orange building in the center for a coffee

One of very many narrow roads and alleys in Gamla Stan the whole island pretty much looked like this

A larger more crowded road with some shops on it

This snows truly how close the buildings were to one another and that they get bigger as they go up almost to the point of forming a tunnel out of the alley

We walked though the entire island and finally came out to the southern most part of the island. I wanted to loop back around and check out a section we had missed as well as get a front view of the Palace and my family agreed so we set on that course. And good thing I chose to do this. First off we got some great views of the rest of the city as seen below. But secondly we got to witness a religous parade coming one way down the street to the church and then the royal guards on horseback going the other way and literally walking right past us.

We found this statue and it just made sense

The buildings on the southern end of Gamla Stan, you can see how narrow the roads are that run between them

An old ship on a neighboring island that we later found out was a cafe and a hotel

Looking across the water to the wealthy part of town where the nobles used to live

The Easter (good Friday) parade

The royal guards on horseback tromping through the city, however here we see them with the Royal Palace in the background and to the back and left you can see the church that the religious parade had traveled to for a sermon just minutes before.

I really just like this picture especially because both times are different and they are also both wrong...

Lindsay got a white hot chocolate at that cafe and was very much enjoying it

The oldest church and building in the city, although the spire that makes the steeple of the church is newer because of a fire that destroyed the old one in the 1800s

After this we returned to the plaza with the cafes and decided to do some more shopping and look for a place for lunch because it was around 2:00pm and we were a little hungry. We ended up at another Kebab shop because many of the restaurants closed for lunch after 2:00 and by the time we got to them it was past 2:30. However this was not a problem because after their experience from the day before my family really like Kebab shops and was telling me how they wished there was fast food this good in the US. Lunch was had on one of the small little alley ways on Gamla Stan which we meandered through for much of the afternoon before going to another island to look at a cool church which turned out to be the oldest building in Stockholm. Before doing that we returned to that iconic cafe for a coffee and hot chocolate stop. We finished the day by walking around more of the city near Drottninggatan and due to some tired feet decided we had enough walking so we took the T which is the subway in Stockholm back to our hotel.

However for me the day was not done. I had a whole group of my friends from Aalborg that were also visiting Stockholm. I met with them at their Hostel which happened to be on Gamla Stan. We went out to the cafe with the green facade two doors down from the one I had gone to earlier. You can see it in the picture above. We ordered some coffees and beers and just hung around for a while because they had an early morning the next day so they did not want to stay up late. We also planned for them to meet my family the next evening because my family really wanted to meet them.

Part two of the events in Stockholm will be coming shortly... (and I actually mean it this time)