One thing I haven’t mentioned about train travel in Europe, is how stressful it can be. Most of the times on our journey, we tried to get to the station at least 20 to 30 minutes before the train was due to leave, just in case. This didn’t always work out though. Especially when we had to walk about 25 minutes (like we did when leaving Copenhagen) just to get to the station and then we thought we’d arrived at the platform, only to realise it was another 15 minutes walk away. So, we ran and just made it in time. I wish I could say that this was the only time this happened to us, but unfortunately that was just not our luck.
So . . . in an effort to save money in one of the most expensive cities in the world, I decided to book our accommodation in a hostel. But not just any hostel, a hostel on a boat. Apparently it’s actually pretty common to have boat hostels or “boatels” as we later got to see in other countries, but to us it was something completely unique and unknown.
It definitely came with its pros and cons though. Pros were the fact that we got to stay in Sodermalm which is this trendy area right on the water which is actually surrounded by fine dining restaurants and bars. Another pro had to be the sunset view from the back of our boat. We spent both evenings eating our pre-packaged salads, cold meats and cheeses with the occasional Swedish meatball thrown in here and there, while watching the sun go down over Stockholm. We were also just outside of the bustling city centre, so didn’t have to listen to the busy streets or tourists making tons of noise outside.
Cons. Well, let’s just say that water in bathrooms never seems to flow right when it is on a boat. Add in the fact that hostels aren’t usually as well looked after as proper hotels and you get the idea. It’s always interesting trying to shower when there is no shelf to leave your clothes on, so they don’t get really wet on the floor. Needless to say, we took showering in turns and Luch held my clothes outside the shower stall while I quickly showered and then I returned the favour. Not such a big deal. That was until I went to the toilet the next morning and the water rose up to meet me. I started to panic. This had never happened to me before and I wasn’t entirely sure how to proceed. Luckily it just rose up to the top of the toilet bowl and then stopped. I couldn’t stop thinking about it all night though and avoided that toilet like the plague the next day. Oh the joys of staying in a hostel! 🙂
As it turns out, Stockholm also had a vicious history with fire. Pretty much exactly the same as Copenhagen and so many buildings on our free walking tour had been burnt down and rebuilt a lot. We did get to see a bit of the Old Town (Gamla Stan) on our walking tour though and that was great. Incredibly colourful and very different to the plain brown buildings that were actually the palace and parliament buildings. I think we were under the delusion before our trip that palaces are always grand and look magnificent and shiny from the outside. Definitely not the case in most of the cities we visited.
I did like that the Royal families in both Copenhagen and Stockholm are very down to earth and want to raise their children accordingly. It was also pretty funny to hear about the rivalry between Copenhagen and Stockholm. Apparently it has been going on for years and they always try to outdo each other.
On the food front, we managed to find a grocery store just up the road from our hostel called Willy’s. Not only was it a great budget friendly store, but we could also do a self checkout with our groceries which was good fun, since we don’t have anything like that back home in South Africa. Apparently people living in Sweden don’t really eat a lot of local Swedish food. They actually prefer pan-Asian cuisine, which we saw a lot of. All we really wanted to was try traditional food, but yet again were slightly disappointed. We at least bought some Swedish meatballs which were great! 🙂
On our free walking tour, we were told to visit the Vasa Museum and it was one of the sights that surprised us the most. We actually couldn’t believe the pure size of the ship that sank and what they managed to recover from the water was just incredible. I mean, the building it is housed in is actually seven stories tall and the ship goes all the way to the top. It was so interesting to find out about why the ship sank (too top heavy and too narrow basically) and the fact that it was only 1km into its maiden voyage. They also didn’t really test it before it set out, so that was a huge problem. So, basically a wind came up, cause the ship to sway from side to side and let in water.
After the Vasa Museum, we went to the Skansen Open-Air Museum. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but to say that we were both a little bit let down by this sight is an understatement. All it really was, was a bunch of old buildings that were meant for different things like a bakery, glass blowing etc. It was basically to show what life was like in Stockholm before the industrial era. It was interesting, but not really our thing. At least we got to see some cute animals in the small zoo section and we also had to taste some amazing pastries with jam running out the centre.
Before we left for our trip around Europe, I was told that the best thing to do in Stockholm is take an archipelago tour, so that is the only thing I really wanted to do. After all our walking around, we could think of nothing better than putting our feet up on a boat and just chilling for an hour. The only problem was, the archipelago tour was actually a 3 hour trip and we had missed the times they went at. So, instead we just decided to do an under the bridges tour of Stockholm. I thought it was excellent though because they actually have 50 bridges in Stockholm. Who knew right?
I was so sad that we had missed out on the only thing I had been told to do in Stockholm, but luckily for us we had booked a ferry out of Stockholm and into Tallinn, which we didn’t know at the time went past so many of the islands in the Archipelago. So we actually got to see it in the end and it was worth it.
As always though, the most unexpected things were the most wonderful. Like a statue of a famous Swedish actress named Margaret Krook which has a heating element inside and keeps people warm on cold days; or finding a traditional Swedish dessert which was lime green and deciding to eat the whole thing in one sitting. Or there is always watching the sunset over a busy Stockholm while enjoying your picnic dinner on a hostel boat. That also works. 🙂
