Day 44

Another beautiful day in Stockholm today.  Temperature was hovering around zero but the sun was shining and the sky was a clear blue.  Got up around 10am, showered and headed out.  We walked down Östermalm (which took about 25 minutes) and stopped at this little café by the water along Strandvägen for breakfast.  I had a hot chocolate with whipped cream and a raspberry muffin.  We sat outside on these cute little chairs and soaked up the sun.  It was great just to sit there and watch the world go by for a bit.

Strandvägen Café

From there we headed on to the Vasa museum, home of the world famous sailing ship of the same name.  The ship had sunk in Stockholm harbour on its maiden voyage back in the 17th century.  It lay buried under the water for 333 years before being rediscovered and raised in 1961.  The less salty waters of these parts meant that it was almost perfectly preserved and was reconstructed over a period of many years before finally being put on display.

It really was an impressive sight - the photos don’t do it justice at all.  I’m not really a huge museum person, but this one was quite well done.  There were all sorts of different displays spread over the building’s five - multimedia presentations, a small theatre showing a 25 minute video, and awesome three dimensional exhibits.  They even had free MP3 ‘tours’ you could download to your mobile phone!

The Vasa (in the back) and a 1:10 scale replica

After spending a few hours in the museum we took a short walk around Djurgaden (the island on which the museum lives) then headed back in to town.  We walked all the way around to Södermalm – a ‘bohemian’ island to the south of central Stockholm.  Found a great bar right on the main plaza and spent an hour or two lounging in the sun with some beers.  To eat I had a baguette – shrimp, mayonnaise (I think), lettuce and tomato.  Very Swedish, very delicious.

We ate dinner at a little Thai restaurant near Serg’s apartment - I had the Pad Thai with beef – before heading out again to join Marcus and his friends for their weekly game of Innebandy (or Floorball).  It’s a type of indoor floor hockey played on a field that resembles an ice hockey rink.  There’s a half metre high barrier running around the field, the goals are much smaller (since there’s no goalie), the sticks are like smaller versions of ice hockey sticks and the ball is plastic with holes through it.  The game lasted for an hour and, with only one ‘extra’ player per team, I was absolutely buggered by the end.