Skansen

Skansen is a living museum for the Stockholm of the 1600's. Most of the buildings were moved from the main Stockholm area into this small, functional city.











Personnel wear authentic clothing and perform period jobs, like this hardware store owner. I couldn't resist taking a picture of the "early inventory system" as he called it. ;-)











My second errand was to get a pen holder for my coworker Mike from the handblown glass shop. I stopped to watch them make a few trinkets before buying myself a Christmas ornament as well.










We saw lots of thatched roofs in the cotswolds outside London, but this turf roof was a first for me! Yes, that's grass growing on the house!











Skansen is up on a huge hill, so I got some great views of downtown Stockholm!









































































This might be one of my favorite things in all of Skansen. It's an old observatory, but look at the walkway in front. The spheres and rectangular pillars (which have small gold spheres on them) represent the planets - and the concentric circles are their orbits! Neat!















This ampitheater has an original wood backing, but they added the curved roof and all the fancy sound equipment later of course. They've had some pretty famous concerts here, it's quite an attraction!

Obligatory nordic windmills.

Greenhouse with lovely yellow daffodills and some blue flower that looks kind of like a bluebonnet without the white.

Tree-lined walkway. I'm sure it's much less scary in the summer. ;-)

Mom, it could be worse - you could be teaching here! :-)

Where am I? Who am I? When am I?

Church building. The inside was too dark to get a good picture. :-/

Ooh, a piece of candy! Scratch that, LOTS of candy! :-)

Sheep! They had several breeds of native Scandanavian animals, but I didn't go to the kiddie zoo because it started raining and I wanted to leave myself enough time to see the Vasa!

Loom weaving. Someone should tell her knitting needles are much smaller. ;-)

I want one of these in my back yard! :-)















Skansen was lovely, I had a great time and highly recommend it if you ever find yourself in the area! :-)

Stockholm

I spent the weekend in Stockholm!

Here's my hotel - the Radisson Blu Strand. It's about a quarter mile from the nearest T-bahn (underground subway) station on an archipelago, right on the water.

I booked the least expensive room - the "Standard." But when I checked in, I found that I had been upgraded to a "Superior" room with a harbor view!

My view! This was taken a little after 9 pm, but it's still light outside. It would probably be more so if it weren't for all those clouds. Really weird!

One of my Stockholm errands was to get my brother-in-law a guitar pin for his Hard Rock Cafe collection. I had dinner there Friday night. Errand 1, check!

Here's the T-bahn station that was nearest the hotel. I love public transit!

Huuuuuge escalator down to the tube. Reminded me of London's system!

Sculptures... IN the tube station. Wow!

The forecast called for rain in the afternoon, so I decided to visit Skansen first (outside), then the Vasa Museum. I walked along the harbor and took a few pictures on my way!

Taken from the bridge linking downtown Stockholm to the next island.

Nordica Museet - I didn't go in but the building was beautiful!

Phone booth, random, I know :-P

The sights will be separate posts! Enjoy! :-)

Vasa Museum

The Vasa was a massive Swedish warship built in the 1600's that sank on its maiden voyage. Epic fail!

In the 1950's - more than 300 years later - it was rediscovered. Into the 1960's it was resurrected, preserved, and now has a museum built around it to tell the story.


These aren't the real masts of the ship, but it sure makes for a dramatic visual! By now it was raining, and the museum was dark (for obvious preservation reasons) so some of my pictures are kinda crummy. That just means you'll have to go see it for yourself!










Fact: The Vasa is ginormous.













It's only a model! ;-) No really, it is. This is how the Vasa would have looked on her maiden voyage - dressed to impress!

















Map of naval presence at the time the Vasa was commissioned. Looks like a game of Risk if I ever saw one. World Domination!

















There were 7 levels of the museum, and each had a different exhibits about life on the ship, artifacts found (including skeletal remains), and the science involved in preserving the wood and metal that compose the ship.
















And of course, lots of vantage points for neat pictures!



















Walk the plank, ye skallywag! Yaaarrrr! Ok so it wasn't a pirate ship, but that's all I can think about when I look at it. ;-)

Great story, great museum. Oh and if you do visit, eat at the in-house restaurant. Get the reindeer. It's delicious. :-)

Gammla Stan

Gammla Stan means "Old City" in Swedish. It's an area of buildings preserved when Stockholm started bulldozing their older strucures and modernizing.

I read one review on a travel site that said it was a shame that they stayed neutral in WWII and avoided the devastating bombing other European countries sustained, only to destroy their own history later. At least they kept this gem (relatively) untouched!

That being said, it is THE tourist shopping area in Stockholm. If it's got a Swedish flag on it, you'll find a shop full of it in Gammla Stan. :-P

Onward to history!

One noticable difference between the "Old City" and the "New City" was how narrow and winding the streets were. All the streets were cobblestone, and the old fits and finishes are all preserved by tight regulation.

I absolutely loved this restaurant's stools. Look closely - they look like wine corks! :-)

Now THAT'S what I call a moose collection!

Courtyard in the center of the city. This was really the only wide-open space apart from the edges of the island.

The Nobel Museum. I didn't bother asking why I hadn't gotten mine yet, they were closed anyway. ;-)

These neat historic doors were everywhere, all different patterns and edge adornments.

And that concludes my Stockholm trip! I flew back to Helsinki the next morning for another week of work, then back home! :-)

Helsinki - Week 1

I'm in Helsinki for two weeks on business! I'm going to Stockholm for the weekend, But I thought I'd post a few pictures from my first week. Enjoy!

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I Took an evening flight from DFW to Paris, then on to Helsinki. Usually these flights connect through London, but they were re-routed because of that pesky volcano in Iceland. That thing had better behave so I can get home next week!

I didn't get a wink of sleep, but i did get this cool picture of the moon hovering over some cloud cover over the Atlantic ocean! :-)

And this one of the sunrise just before we landed in Paris.

Here's my hotel room at the Radisson in Helsinki. It's small but nice!

Here's my "closet" - not much space!


There's a nice TV and desk setup, and the big window is great. Helsinki is so far north that even in early spring, it gets light at about 4 am, so thick curtains are a must!

Teeeeeny tiny bathroom. What is it with Europeans and bathtubs?

Here's the central train station that's right around the corner from my hotel. I think it looks so cool at night. During the day it's full of people!

This is the main platform for all of the long-haul trains. The commuter trains are a little furter up, only The glass ceiling over this area is so striking, I had to take a picture.

I take the train to the Nokia office in Espoo every day. It's about a 20-minute ride. This is the Kera station where I get off the train and walk about a mile to Nokia.

Here's a picture of the huge courtyard between my hotel and the train station. I walk across here every day to get on the train. It's a great place for people-watching!

This is the main throroughfare alongside the courtyard. There are lots of restaurants and shops in this area. There's even a "Texas" restaurant on the end that advertizes texmex cuisine. I don't even want to try it - can't beat the real deal back in the states! :-)

Another shot of the courtyard toward the train station. This was taken on the only sunny day so far - otherwise it's been very cloudy, cold and rainy!

Wednesday night we went to a team dinner at a Thai restaurant nearby. I navigated and I got myself and Paola there without getting lost! Here's a picture of one of the streets talked me down.

Here's a shot of the train courtyard from the train station toward the hotel at night. The Radisson is the thin, tall tower just a little to the left of cetner. I don't think I'd like to live in a big city like this, but it sure is fun to visit!