Lyas Hotel Apartments Stockholm

... a large window with unreal scenery behind me. I can now see why a Scandinavian cruise would be worth it. This may sort of be a boring 12 hours but the views are great, there are tons of people, and soon I will be in Sweden. Oh also what was cool was that we stop at some island to let a bunch of people off, not sure the name of the island but it looked cool to explore for a day or two. I am serious that I am coming back to Scandinavia someday if not live here.

Woohoo!! After setting the alarm clock and then forgetting to turn it on right after, I woke up at 11 am... got ready and grabbed an apple. I have a date!! Yeap. I found a new friend yesterday at the BBQ and we have a date today. We're soul mates right off the bat... why you ask? Well, let's just say we both have small feet! Nothing brings 2 girls close faster than the topic of shoes!!

We met up and walked to the train station at the ...

... on the eye, and most of Stockholm is in great condition as they managed to remain neutral during the war so escaped the bombing raids. Nowadays the tourists do all the raiding and you see them in their droves ready to attack any defenseless old building with their endless clicking on cameras. Its noticeable that now back in a major European city we were back on the beaten track, and the unique experience of the Baltics were behind us. In Stockholm you see ...

... so the walls looked like caves.. but everything was painted really creatively. The stop near our hostel was underwater themed. And, unlike every other public transportation system I've been on, there wasn't a trace of graffiti anywhere. How do they do it? Anyway, so we got to the city center which was beautiful. Stockholm is made up of quite a few different islands that are all connected by bridges, so everything was surrounded by water... it was gorgeous. There were ...

... will have to go to the Arctic Circle together another time and I am sure that Charlie will make many opportunities for himself to do the same! The alternative plan now is to head to Göteborg for a couple of days (any sightseeing tips Steve?) and then to Mälmo for a night before rejoining our original schedule and heading on to Copenhagen. Once we had those plans sorted we set off to see Stockholm... first up the shopping district, but not for long. Then on to ...

Went to bed early last night and I think I got 11 hours sleep. Good. I really needed it. After realising my hair would absolutely not as I wanted it I was forced to have a shower despite desperately wanting to explore this amazing youth hostel. So I arrived late for breakfast and ate it with my family, Swedish style. There was lingonberry jam which I had to have as it's a Swedish speciality. It's very nice but tastes sweet with a very dry ...

... blocks away. I wondered in my head why he did not offer to take me himself. "Is this neighborhood pretty safe?", I asked. "It is not bad. It is usually ok. Of course, you are a very pretty girl". Oh, ok. Let me just go then. No problem. Nervously, and ready to kick some serious butt (with nothing but a few dance moves to protect me) if the need arose, I walked to the place which his directions indicated, but I couldn't ...

... an elevator that looks like a cage. It has two doors and you see from one floor to the other as you go up. The room does not have a WC (bathroom) so we have to go down the hall for the toalett (sink and toilet) and down a different hall to the "bod" (sink and shower). Breakfast is also included with the room. Besides the usual stuff, you can get all kinds of fruit, fish, caviar, meatballs, and other items common to the Swedish table. Now it is ...

... our part, but we tried to call our hostel and let them know that we would be arriving late. They had a check-in window between 3 and 6. Our flight came in to the airport at 4:45. We had a feeling that it would happen so we made a back-up plan of taking the night train back to Hamar and coming back to Stockholm one weekend in November. We weren't so lucky though, the night train to Oslo only runs on Thursdays and Saturdays. Which meant we couldn't leave ...

... kind of hair metal 80s band on board from London traveling with us complete with groupies and heroin needles. It was quite interesting. The highligh was one guy with ass length teased blonde hair running to the bathroom from the back of the plane about 5 minutes before the plane actually touched down. You should have seen the look on the stewards face, I thought he was going to explode, and yes, his name was Sven. They have this ...