Halmstad

  Halmstad, West Coast, Sweden
Sunday, June 27, 2004

We said goodbye to Norway and started retracing our steps to western Sweden on E6. We got to Halmstad late in the afternoon and decided to spend the night there.

We checked into the Continental Hotel

Room at the Scandic Hallandial Hotel

and then headed down towards the square looking for a place to have supper. There were a number of restaurants on the same street as the hotel just past the square. We walked the entire length and then came back and picked one. It turned out to be quite good. Marilyn had the fish on a cedar plank that she was said was as delicious as it looked.

Halmstad - fish on a plank

Early the next morning, we took a walk along the hearby Nissan River. There were two beautiful sailing vessels tied up on the quay alongside the Royal Palace. Neither ship was open for boarding due to the early hour.

The first one was the Najaden.

SV Najaden

1-SV Najaden

She was originally commissioned at the Karlskrona Naval Base in 1897 as a training ship. She and the Cutty Sark in London are the only remaining ships built of p[ine with steel frames. She is also one of the smallest full-riggers that were ever built. She is 160 feet long and gross displacement is 350 tons. She stayed in service as a training ship until 1938.

Tied up directly behind her was the Tre Hjardan, a smaller though elegant two-master.

Tre Hjartan

1-Tre Hjartan

We headed back towards the hotel to pack up and get on our way to see more of Sweden before our vacation ended. We stopped at the old Halmstad Castle

Halmstad castle

which was directly across the street from the hotel. We walked around the courtyard but the structure was simple compared to some of the other castles we have seen in Europe. The castle was built in 1615 by the Danes when this part of Sweden was Danish territory. It is currently used by the county government.

We headed east across Sweden heading for Öland.