Stockholm Day 2

After a hard night's sleep, we woke up Thursday morning excited to explore Stockholm. We had breakfast on the hotel balcony and chatted with some tourists from Vancouver. The weather for the day was unusually perfect, at least according to the locals. The hotel manager suggested we visit the Vasa Museum, and so we set off to see what it was all about.

The Vasa Museum depicts the famous Vasa Viking ship that sunk in the Baltic Sea in 1628 just minutes into its maiden voyage. The ship was retrieved from the sea floor in the 1960s and went through several decades of restoration before being put on display for the public to see in 1990. For one museum being dedicated solely to a war ship that never even fought, it was fascinating to learn its history (see pic below).

After nearly 2 hours at the museum, we were ready for lunch. Just down the street we were able to get an outside table and sample some traditional Swedish dishes. Fried herring and Swedish meatballs...and not the ones you get from IKEA (see pic below).

Since we were able to see most of the sites by foot, we decided to end our day in the city by taking a touristy boat tour through the 14 islands that make up Stockholm. The two hour cruise offered unique views of many of the city sights, while giving our legs a rest before backpacking.

After ice cream in the park, we headed back to our hotel to make dinner and get ready for the Arctic Circle. And now for some quick stats pertaining to our trip so far...

# of modes of transportation: 9 (car, airplane, bus, subway, train, ferry, feet, bike, boat)

# of cities visited: 3

# of nights camped: 2

# of crossword puzzles completed: 33 and counting...

# of other Americans encountered: 0

# estimated miles walked: 25

Because our next destination takes us to a remote location, we do not know when we will be able to send updates again, but expect our next update to talk about our time spent on the Lofoten Islands in northern Norway.