After a sound sleep, thanks largely to a desk fan -- oh glorious white noise -- and black-out shades built into the window panes (because, well, they need them here. It was actually a little too much and made getting up harder to do because, although it was about 0845, it felt like the middle of the night), we made our way down to the smörgåsbord. The hotel’s lobby had been transformed into an enormous restaurant, where literally hundreds of people were enjoying the extensive buffet. Having visited Europe before, I was prepared for the cultural differences with respect to breakfast, but Scandinavian breakfast takes things to another level. The usual suspects are always represented: boiled eggs, various bread and rolls, sliced meats and cheeses, yogurt and granola or other cereals, and of course coffee, tea, and juices. Sweden, and indeed all of Scandinavia, expands on these staples with smoked salmon, pickled herring in various preparations, sliced tomatoes and cucumbers, various pickles and sometimes beets, plus scrambled eggs, sausages and/or bacon!
Following the indulgent breakfast, we ventured out to see more of Stockholm. Objective: Djurgården. Since Djurgården and Skeppsholmen are islands, there were undoubtedly small boats in our future. I had done pretty well with the cruise ships because, well, they didn't FEEL like boats, but the ferries in the harbor were likely to be a different story. Also, the weather was less than perfect with gray, drizzly skies and a not insignificant breeze, so the harbor was likely to be on the choppy side. We took the T-bana to the Kungsträdgården station (which was one of the cooler T stations we went through, with faux ruins and a beautiful ceiling) and walked up to Nybroplan for the Hop-On Hop-Off Sightseeing boats. I already love our Stockholm Cards or, as I like to call them, our “Everything's Fucking Free Cards,” because we just flashed the cards at the ferry crew and they directed us on board. The boat itself looked small but was actually fairly sizeable on the inside, and the trip across the harbor was so short that I never had time to get seasick.
We had hoped to go directly to the Vasa Museum stop on Djurgården and start our tour there, but the boat took us directly to Skeppsholmen. We later found out that all ferry service to that dock had been temporarily suspended for—you guessed it—the Royal Wedding. Skeppsholmen had been on our to-do list anyway, so we went ahead and headed toward the Moderna Museet (Museum of Modern Art), which was far more interesting than Helsinki’s Kiasma. We walked around Skeppsholmen for a while, postulating on what its purpose had been based on the buildings. Given its attachment to Kastellholmen and the utilitarian look of the buildings, we figure it must have either been barracks for the Kastellet fortification or some kind of government outpost.
The collection at Moderna Museet included truly contemporary works, as well as pieces from the twentieth century. The collection was more extensive than Kiasma, and since it wasn’t solely contemporary art, it wasn’t nearly as full of bullshit. I honestly didn't last long there because many of the exhibits mirrored pieces we had recently seen at home in the National Gallery's East Wing, most notably the Matisse cut-outs. I figured we should see things that we could only find here, so we only did about half of the museum. One piece I particularly enjoyed was a massive dark blue half sphere, open on one side and hollow like a little cave or a nest. Standing directly in front of the piece, the back of the cave was lost in darkness, and the sculpture seemed very cosy and inviting, like you could curl up there and take a nap. I was very proud when I discovered the piece was indeed titled Mother as a Void, by Anish Kapoor, the same artist behind the ginormous reflective kidney bean (actual title: Cloud Gate) in Chicago’s Millennium Park.
We boarded the ferry yet again and traveled to the more southern port on Djurgården at Gröna Lund, the Tivoli amusement park. It definitely had a Kings Dominion-esque feel to it and, although our EFF Cards would have gotten us in free (because that's what they do!), we wanted to see more history. The museums on Djurgården were now uphill from us and we disagreed briefly over whether to walk or take the tram, a discussion ultimately rendered moot; we discovered that the historic tram line that still operates only on Djurgården was down for track maintenance. It also seemed that they were extending the T-bana onto the island, so the tram will probably be relegated to museum status by the end of the summer. That left one option: walking. We schlepped up the hill past the Vasa Museum and the small medicinal garden behind it (which contained hops!!) to the Nordiska Museet.
We hit the Nordic first and had lunch there. The café was situated in the great hall of the museum, which was a treat in and of itself, and the food was good, too: I had a Rostbiffsalat, which had sliced roast beef, olives, pickles, and potatoes in addition to the usual salad components. The museum itself is a massive Neo-Gothic hall with round skylights in the ceiling, and would be very impressive for its architecture if nothing else. The highlight of the museum was an exhibit on plastic, featuring something like 3,000 pieces of Tupperware and the like that was owned by a single collector. They had the impressive array set up in clear plastic cases (of course) in the hall of the museum and organized by color group, so it had the overall effect of a large plastic rainbow. The plastic exhibit also included other objects, but the rainbow of objects was a stand-out favorite.
Who'd have thought an exhibit on plastic would be so interesting? Their collection featured more than 3000 pieces of historic plastic-ware through the 20th century, from celluloid film to Bakelite on up to more modern plastics like ABS, including one of my personal favorites, LEGO bricks. It also explored the ecological and environmental impacts of plastic and its proliferation and was quite fascinating, despite outward appearance. Another very interesting exhibit in the museum was the Sami culture of Arctic Sweden (Lapland) and how the Swedes have treated them much as we Americans have treated the Native Americans. It was rather tragic how the Sami culture has been systematically expunged from Sweden through bureaucratic means, but heartening to see how they've still thrived in the barren north despite the prejudice. Progress is being made in preserving the culture, but it stands much as the civil rights movement did in the late 60s here. Fascinating as all of this was, the building was the real feature of the museum; it was very grand with a large statue of Gustav Vasa in the entry hall and the Tre Kronor directly under the tower.
Next we hit the Vasa ship museum, a fantastic structure built to house the Vasa, a ship who sank on her maiden voyage on August 10, 1628 and was found and raised in the late 1950s. The ship itself was amazing – felt like we were in Goonies! She was meant to have been a warship, so she is a massive ship, and something about the salinity of the water in Stockholm harbor preserved the wood in such a way that 90% of the display is from the wreckage; my guess is that the other 10% was the rigging, which did not fare as well as the wood under water for 300 years. They actually had pieces of the rope and the sails on display under glass, and I do not envy the person whose job it was to reconstruct the jigsaw puzzle of ridiculously thin 300 year old cloth.
What a ship it was—pity she didn't make it out of the harbor on her maiden voyage. The story goes that, due to a tragic design flaw, the ship didn't carry enough ballast and when a sudden squall had the ship listing, she took water through the gun ports and sank just off the island of Becksholmen, still in Stockholm harbor. She was salvaged and brought to dry-dock at Djurgården, where a building was erected around her for preservation and as a museum. Both the ship and the building were magnificent. I guess I had always known, in abstract, that the old warships were big, but now I know just how big and it was mind-blowing. The Vasa was at the same time awe-inspiring, tragic, and funny—what a design flaw!
We headed back to Gröna Lund to catch the ferry again (the last ferry, as it turned out). I had the idea that, rather than wandering aimlessly around Kungsholmen (a rather suburban bit of Stockholm) seeking dinner like last night, we should see what we could find on Gamla Stan, since the ferry was headed there anyway; there seemed to be hundreds of restaurants nestled into those narrow streets. We could then catch the T-bana back to the hotel and not have to worry that the ferries had stopped for the day. After a rather scenic ride, we circled around the southern end of the island and headed up a random street, looking at menus as we went, but it was our noses that made the selection. The wafting aroma of köttbullar (Swedish meatballs) ensnared us. We headed down some steps and ended up in a cellar with some of the best food we'd had yet on the trip. I had a mixed salad, then poached cod with egg and parsley sauce and new potatoes with dill. The sauce might be illegal in some of the more conservative states back home! I still can't remember the name of the place (I've since learned it's called von der Lindeska Valvet), so I made Liz take a picture.
I had the full Swedish culinary experience. I had an appetizer of reindeer mousse with caviar on a dense bread, then meatballs with gravy, potatoes, and lingonberries, all of which was delicious. We decided to continue the awesome with ice cream in freshly made waffle cones. The ice cream vendors cleverly positioned their waffle irons next to open windows along Västerlånggatan, so the heavenly scents would bring people in despite the cool weather. It started out a bit drizzly, but culminated in pretty significant winds, which made us look a little ridiculous holding ice cream cones, but we didn’t care. I enjoyed a scoop of apple cinnamon and a scoop of marzipan chocolate, and mine was a swirl of vanilla, pear, and strawberry. Yeah.
Since most of the shops on Gamla Stan had already closed, we made our way back down to the T-bana. There's a grocery INSIDE the station! I had seen that there was some kind of shop down there on previous trips through, but I guess I figured it was some sort of newsstand or convenience store, but it's a full grocery. We went in and looked around for things that were uniquely Swedish (namely some sort of horrific preserved fish in some strange sauce for Liz's dad), and it didn't take long. I thought it had just been a Think Geek April Fools' Day joke, but I'll be damned if they didn't have squeeze bacon in a tube! Fortunately, we were able to get a picture of it. The T-bana is full of surprises: in the Rådhuset station, there's an Eritrean restaurant. Try to imagine for a moment putting a three- or four-star restaurant in one of the subterranean Metro stations here.
We both loved Stockholm, despite our exhaustion and squabbles, and in spite of the mercurial and unfriendly weather. I can only imagine what it would be like to visit Stockholm on a day like our second day in Helsinki. Thankfully, tomorrow’s adventure will require far less walking, and be less affected by the weather, as we have a six hour train ride to København. København (Köpenhamn, to the Swedes) has me a bit apprehensive, but I've been proven wrong several times already on this trip.
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