Stockholm

Sept 1st
Stockholm

Today was our overnight in Stockholm, so I was pretty excited for this port. I started out with a bicycle tour in the afternoon when we got in, which took us through Royal Djurgarden, the island originally set aside by the Royal Family for hunting. The Island is really just a giant park with some palaces and other houses scattered about. It was a nice ride and I got a lot of pics and video clips while riding. We stopped at a café type place in the park for snacks, and not having any krona, or whatever their currency is, didn’t buy anything. But, someone in the group was actually nice enough to buy me a pastry thing an a coke, which was really nice of her. I was just sitting down somewhere and she brought it over as a surprise, so that was great. We all made it back to the ship by taxi, I was in a car with an older couple and the tour guide, which was nice because we could continue learning stuff on the drive back. I came back to the ship, got some food, and then waiting around for a bit till I went out with some other guys from the orchestra for our night on the town. Well, our high hopes for finding something really fun to do weren’t entirely satisfied. After walking in for a bit in the direction my tour guide told me to go, the group got impatient and called a cab to take us to the other side of town where they knew something would be going on. So six of us piled into a cab for four, Peter and I in the back of the station wagon, and took it into old town. After walking through that area and running into some friends from the ship, we were unable to find exactly what we were looking for. So we kept walking to the next place someone though something would be going on. We did however wander down into a bar that had a Swedish blues group playing, but left in the hopes of finding something better…dumb mistake. So as we moved on, we came into a very trendy part of town, where I remembered seeing a Bentley dealership and Gucci store earlier. This also didn’t quite work as planned. We were looking for a bar that wasn’t too expensive and had a crowd that we thought looked fun. However, most fun crowds were in clubs or waiting in the gigantic lines outside the clubs, or paid there way into other nightlife areas. We were hesitant to pay for things because of the currency difference, which made a simple beer cost around $8 US. We didn’t want to pay 150 kronos (I think) to get into a place we weren’t sure of, because after the exchange, we would have been paying $20-25 just to get in the place. So after walking for 3 hours or so, we found ourselves at a McDonalds back towards the ship. This was, however, the hippest McDonalds I’ve ever been in. For whatever reason, I didn’t take pictures, but it had a really modern décor with hip tables and stools, and the crowd was unlike anything I’ve ever seen in the US. First, some of the girls walking around the city were just gorgeous, some really slutty looking as well, but I’ve never seen so many good looking blond girls in one place, and the McDonalds followed suit. I didn’t buy anything because they were out of receipts, making a credit card purchase a little more risky than I’d have liked. Then, a couple people from the group walked back to the ship, while a few others and myself took a long way back through a different part of town. This took us back through the area towards where we had originally started, and it was packed with people. As we got a little excited about actually maybe finding a place to get into, but quickly realize that everyone was on the streets because all the bars were closing down. This left us with only the nightclub option, whose lines just got longer. We eventually made it back to the boat as it began raining, and in trying to maintain good attitudes about our outing, congratulated each other on our ability to save money. It was a nice walk though, and we really got to feel out a large portion of the city, so it was well worth the walk. I’d love to come back sometime though, there’s so much going on here and the area is great. Also, many people speak English, so that’s helpful. Look up the city online if you get a chance, it’s a gorgeous area and probably my favorite city so far.