Stockholm Weekend (Day 2)

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Day number two started out fairly early. Somehow I didn't get woken up once during the night, despite being in a room with twelve other people most dudes who got back after I went to bed and right next to a loud road (not to mention the four o'clock sunrise). We set out to walk around Gamla Stan before the tourists showed up. None of the shops were open when we started, so there was little activity other than a couple of people milling around or getting their store ready.

Gamla Stan looks more cosy when it's not full of tourist groups, and besides the retracing some of the steps we took yesterday, we found some cool nook and crannies such as a statue of Saint George slaying the dragon, and Mårten Trotzigs Gränd - the narrowest street in Gamla Stan. We ended up near Kungliga Slottet again and checked out the Royal Guard. Let's just say if you wanted to attack Stockholm now might be a good time to do it. I know Buckingham Palace is a high standard to live up to but come on guys. These dudes were chatting and taking photos with tourists and looking around, all the stuff everybody knows the palace guards are not supposed to do. We even saw one guy go back to his car because he apparently left the plume to his hat in the trunk.

On another note, we were greeted by the Crown Princess Victoria as she was driven back to her residence. Unfortunately I was just putting my camera away when she turned the corner but that's her in the black car, I promise. She waved at me. One odd thing Laura and I noticed was that on all the postcards we found of the royal family they all looked very plastic and well, less than attractive. But I can vouch for Princess Victoria and say she is quite the looker.

Brunch was at another great little cafe, this time Chokladkoppen ("the chocolate cup"). I had a large chocolate muffin that was very good. I would also give this cafe the thumbs up. Once we had our snack we hurried off to get on a short boat tour around Stockholm. We got there just before it took off and unfortunately got stuck in the middle of the aisle which wouldn't have been a problem but the top windows were really scuffed and hard to see out of. Like most boat tours seem to be this one was a little weird, but we got to see a few neat things and pick up some strange facts about housing regulations in Stockholm.

Our next stop was the Stadshusset (City Hall), which besides being kind of a cool building has a tall tower that gives you a great view of the picture, and is definitely the source of many postcard views of Gamla Stan (the picture at the top of the post was taken from there). They only allow 30 people at a time to be in the tower so it took quite a while but if this is your kind of thing it is definitely worth it.

Once we got our fill of the view we meandered back to Gamla Stan and passed by the Royal Palace to witness yet another bizarre Royal Guard ceremony. It might have made more sense if I spoke Swedish but it involved cleaning the muzzle of their rifles in a pair of tubes that was being dragged around in something that looked like a Radio Flyer wagon. We took a tour of the Royal Apartments but didn't run into my girlfriend, Queen Victoria. The Royal Apartments were a little boring but I thought the Hall of State was pretty cool. We made a short stop at the Nobel Museum although I almost fell asleep watching some short videos about life at Cambridge and I think the Bern Institute of Immunology or something similar.

After picking up tickets for the bullet train (120+ mph) back to the airport we stopped in to the Absolut Icebar. Their reservation system is kind of strange so if you want to go I would either plan ahead and be prepared to get there early and start the line at least by 9:15. The Icebar itself was kind of cool, both literally and figuratively although -5 degrees Celsius isn't all that cold if there's no breeze. Like most things in the bar though the glasses are made of ice so the gloves come in handy though. Not much too it but if you don't have plans the novelty of it is worth a trip.

After spending a chilly forty five minutes or so we heady back to Gamla Stan for a little cheaper fare, and after being rained on again we stumbled into a cellar bar that served mead and had a number of servers who were dressed in medieval costumes. We met up with some locals (pictured here) and chatted them up for a while before retiring for the evening.