Time Stockholm

... br>
Not this time, unfortunately.

When I work up on Friday morning, I was looking for the truck that had run me over! I went downstairs, ate some fruit (I figured anything with Vitamin C was essential at that point) and asked Kicki if I could stay home. She was perfectly fine with that! I went back upstairs and slept.

Apparently around lunchtime, Kick's mom (she had arrived at the house the night before) had called Kicki to say hi. Kicki asked her mom how ...

... for cooking, sitting and sleeping. She explained to us that the houses were privately owned, hers being in the family for several generations. She told us that the owners came to their garden houses during the summer for relaxation and entertaining, and if one lived outside of the area, they would stay there and sleep.It was difficult to part as every time we tried to leave she started on another story, but finally we managed to leave ...

... out on the decks.  There are people here there and everywhere keeping themselves amused with playing cards, or board games or emailing or eating or gambling in the casino.  We had a huge brunch this morning so that will hold me over until dinner.  This is our last formal night on board.

Avis and I are very glad that we ...

... of the guard. We were really glad we had bikes, because we never would have made it otherwise. The changing of the guard was a really cool ceremony! They had a drum corps lead them in and did this very elaborate hand off thing. It was cool to watch! After watching the changing of the guard we dropped our Bikes back and hopped on our tour. It was about an hour and a half all over the city ...

... train left at 830 am so I had bought a ticket online. I would up at 730, which turned out to be 630 because I forgot to change time zones from helsinki to stockholm. I sat in the station for 2 hours, and then boarded. At the first city in Norway we had to transfer to a bus because new tracks were being laid to Oslo. You could easily tell the difference between the two countries, Norway being all nature, trees and rivers, Sweden being islands and buildings.

... in at the Sterling counter was the easiest I have even encountered! No one in the queue, no bags to check-in so it was over in about 2 minutes! The queue through customs was a different story and it took about 40 minutes before we finally got to the departure lounge and went straight to the bar. Seeing as we weren't going to arrive in Arlanda until 22:05 (2hr 15min flight) we decided we needed to hit the booze to catch up! After a pint of lager and a ...

My flight got into Stockholm at one in the afternoon and I was running on about two hours of sleep (during my layover in Iceland on an uncomfortable bench) for the last 36 hours. I found my big heavy back pack and walked out of the terminal to find Fredrik, my Swedish "Cousin", who I hadn't seen in 5 years. I recognized he in the back of the crowd outside of customs (Sweden didn't even give me a passport stamp those ...

... friendship by what you say, you have to earn it by what you do. I thought that I liked this culture because the attitude seems more exemplitory of a Christian attitude (I too gauge my trust giving on earning it, not by what you say) but I suppose the American way has wiped off the traditional way because I do want to interact with the locals by talking to them but how are we going to gain their "trust" from just a few nimutes of conversation?

... 1290, and played a key role in defending Oslo from invaders from the sea. It was never successfully captured by a foreign enemy. There were many people hanging out there, relaxing on the grass and enjoying the great views of the harbor and soaking up the sun. Waiting for my train at the Oslo central station, I tried out some of the chocolates from a store there. I really like the European chocolates, much better than Hershey's ...

Stockholm. This is the end of the first part of my trip, my last stop before going to Finland (which is the main reason I left Brazil). I had to take care of some practical things here, so my time with the city was really short. And my train from Oslo was already almost four hours late due to a power shortage. Then I had to find a place to do my laundry, find out how and when I could get to the Åland Islands ...