Sweden 2019 — tacoworks

This post is a continuation of my entry on London, part of my trip to Europe in May 2019. Sweden was high on my list of destinations for a number of reasons. Sweden is renowned for its nature and beauty, and an ideal setting for hiking and photography. Its capital of Stockholm even inspired the art in one of the films from my childhood, Kiki’s Delivery Service. My furniture is simple and minimalist, and virtually all from IKEA. I also love how the Swedish language sounds. To recapitulate, my itinerary looked like this:

Day 4: LHR -> ARN -> Stockholm
Day 5: ARN -> KRN -> Abisko
Day 6: Abisko
Day 7: Abisko -> Kiruna
Day 8: KRN -> ARN -> Stockholm
Day 9: Stockholm
Day 10: Stockholm -> ARN -> LHR
Day 11: LHR -> BWI

Day 4: Gamla Stan

Mon. 20 May, 2019

I landed in Arlanda after a short flight from Heathrow. The airport is roughly twenty minutes from Stockholms Centralstation (or Stockholm C, which I later learned is not the same as T-Centralen, a metro station), but I chose to take the much cheaper Flygbussarna (50 minutes) to Cityterminalen instead. Since I was planning on flying out of Stockholm to Kiruna the next day, I decided to store my large suitcase in a locker at the bus terminal. I stayed in Hotel Gyllene Geten in Gamla Stan (Old Town). It was an old building near the Nobel Prize Museum. Its interior smells and feel were reminiscent of Baker Tower’s, one of the old Gothic style dormitories I used to live in at Cornell. The area was beautiful beyond what I imagined, even having seen countless photographs on the Internet and postcards. Gamla Stan is on an island (one of many; Stockholm is essentially part of Sweden’s largest archipelago) with cobblestone streets and beautiful historic buildings.

Iconic Stortorget, the oldest square in Stockholm.

On the northern side of the island is Kungliga slottet, the Royal Palace. It is an impressive building, with guards occasionally marching around in the center (they will bark at you if you get too close to the cannons!).

From the palace, you can see Riksdagshuset, the Parliament House.

A lot of stores were geared toward tourists like me. Up top you can see Moomin mugs.

I got to try a few Swedish beers with dinner. With the sun down and another flight coming up the next day, I passed out in my hotel room.

The blackout curtains were most definitely necessary, as the sun would rise very early in the morning.

Day 5: Abisko National Park - Njakajaure Trail

Tue. 21 May, 2019

After landing in Kiruna Airport, I drove my rental car 1.5 hours to Abisko. My tiny, windowless room at the Abisko Guesthouse would become my home base for the next three days. Abisko is a very isolated village of under 100 people. As far as I could tell, the nearest town was Kiruna, sixty miles away (don’t let the maps fool you; the other “villages” are really just ski resorts and camp sites). Abisko had a number of vacation homes and hostels, a school house, and a gas station. Although Google Maps shows some results when you search for restaurants in the area, almost all of them are seasonal or just bed and breakfasts. In short, the only food option I could find at the time was some frozen pizza from the gas station.

I got a free upgrade to a small SUV from Europcar.

It didn’t matter that my room had no windows, because the sky basically never got dark.

Importing frozen pizza must be a thing, because apparently they thought it worth mentioning that this pizza was baked in Sweden.

I chatted with a local named Chris (no idea how it’s actually spelled), who enthusiastically shared some advice on trails to check out, as well as photos of a moose carcass and droppings he’d found. After eating pizza and taking a stroll to the lake down the street, I began my hike to Njakajaure. The trail was mostly flat, running along a river with mountain views. It passes by the small lake of Njakajaure, before crossing mountain moors and permafrost back to the trail head.

Near the trail head. Mt. Nuolja is in the background.

This is my attempt at a long exposure of the river using a neutral density filter. Clearly I have much to learn.

By the end of my hike, the sun was hiding just on the edge of Nuolja, producing some dramatic lighting.

I ended up spending about three hours on the trail, which was mostly wet and covered in ice at times. There was hardly any wildlife, though I did catch a white animal running away out of the corner of my eye. I got home at around 11pm, but the sky never got much darker than pictured in the previous two photos. Such is life inside the Arctic Circle I guess.

Day 6: Abisko National Park - (mis)adventures and a beautiful sunset

Wed. 22 May, 2019

E10 is just as beautiful in Sweden as it is in Norway.

Desperate for some real food, I drove north along E10 to look for a restaurant. First I stopped at Björkliden, but there was nothing there. I’d found Restaurang Lappis on Google Maps, and it seemed like it would be open, so I drove forty minutes north to Riksgränsen. (At 68.4301° N, this beat my previous latitude record of 68.1465° N from when I visited Leknes, Norway.) Unfortunately, Restaurang Lappis was closed for the season. I backtracked five minutes south to Katterjokk, and finally I stumbled upon the one restaurant still operating in the area: Restaurang Ebbes kök!

After the amazing meal, I drove back to Abisko and began the Rihtonjira trail, which takes you up Nuolja. Of course, with half of the mountain covered in snow I did not expect to complete the trail. The hike was beautiful and fun regardless, and because the snow was patchy I got surprisingly far.

Couldn’t make it to the top… but I’m so close!

Eventually, the trail became impassable because of snow. The trail is closed during the winter due to risk of avalanche. While there was very little such risk when I was there, I was perhaps a couple weeks too early for this hike.

I’m guessing those trees were knocked down by an avalanche.

Even though I couldn’t finish the hike, the view was breathtaking and well worth it.

I was not even ten meters from the trail head on my way down when I slipped and fell into a shallow stream. Thinking nothing of it, I dried off and then changed once back in my room, until I realized that my camera was not working. And that my tripod was broken. I’d inadvertently disabled my camera due to water exposure before, and knew that it wasn’t necessarily the end of the world, so I left my camera to dry and checked out the Abiskojåkka Canyon and Torneträsk Lake trails. I was able to scout a few potential locations for sunset photos, in case my camera did come back to life. After another trip to Katterjokk for dinner, I returned to my room and found that my camera was working again! Here are some shots from when I retraced my steps toward the lake:

Probably my favorite shot from this trip. Beautiful frozen lake, with snow-covered mountaintops tearing through the low clouds.

Day 7: Abisko National Park, Kiruna

Thu. 23 May, 2019

My Friday afternoon flight from Kiruna to Stockholm was canceled, and I was re-booked on a 6am flight instead. I decided to book a room in Kiruna for Thursday night. This meant foregoing a longer hike, but it was worth avoiding the 3am drive.

I picked the Kårsafallen trail, which ended up taking about four hours. It takes you through marshland and up a hill, before dropping down to the rapids on the river Kårsajåkka. I honestly wasn’t expecting much, but this actually turned out to be my favorite hike. Though wet, the trail was really beautiful, with views of the mountains from the forest. Parts of the scenery reminded me a bit of Mumindalen from the latest Japanese anime rendition.

After the hike, I packed up and drove down to Kiruna for some exploring and dinner. Kiruna is a small mining town of fewer than 20,000 residents. Despite its small size, the town felt much busier than I would have expected. It is really an oasis of civilization in the otherwise isolated Swedish Lapland.

For some reason there were a lot of immigrants in Kiruna.

Day 8: Stockholm

Fri. 24 May, 2019

My 6am flight to Stockholm was packed, probably partly due to the canceled afternoon flight. The captain made a rambling speech in Swedish which, based on the other passengers’ reactions, I gathered was supposed to be funny. At the end he summarized his speech in English with “It’ll be about fifty minutes to Stockholm.”

I began my morning in Stockholm exploring the Norrmalm neighborhood, which is basically downtown Stockholm. A stroll along the waterfront on Strandvägen eventually led me to lunch at Sjöcafeet and then an afternoon at the Nordiska Museet.

Veronica Maggio is a famous Swedish singer.

EU elections were coming up so there were a lot of activists and posters on the streets. Someone apparently decided to add a personal touch to this one…

The tram is one way to get around in Stockholm.

The Nordiska Museet is a museum about the history of Swedish culture. The exhibits focused on the evolution of Swedish fashion and furniture. Reformers in the late 1800s designed more loose-fitting and colorful garments for women, which contrasted with the prevailing restrictive and oppressive French fashions. The “general Swedish national costume” pictured below was created shortly after.

They also had an exhibit on the Sami people, who are indigenous to present-day Sweden, Norway, Finland, and Russia. There are some 20,000 Sami people living in Sweden today.

I checked into my Airbnb near Stockholm C, and ended up talking with my host Roland for a couple hours. He was a Swiss guy studying in Stockholm. He had also gone to Abisko National Park, and actually hiked the Kungsleden trail, which is about 270 miles long. He explained that the Swedish side is very isolated, and that Norway is more populated up north because they have warmer weather, fishing, and oil. I asked for a stereotypical Swedish meal, and he recommended Nomad, which was amazing. I had köttbullar and a Swedish pilsner.

Since it was raining, I spent the evening at Fotografiska, a museum for modern photography. The first floor was an exhibit on Jesper Waldersten’s work. It was a bit abstract, but some of his work resonated with me. Next was an exhibit of portraits, many of famous people including Emma Watson. Then there was an exhibit by Scarlett Hooft Graafland, a Dutch artist who went to remote places to take weird photos, like of a pizza floating in a river in China. My favorite was a Swedish artist named Jessica Silversaga, whose work I didn’t really understand though it was nonetheless beautiful.

Photo by Jessica Silversaga. Totally my kind of portrait.

Day 9: Stockholm

Sat. 25 May, 2019

After a breakfast omelette at Cafe Avenyn, I walked around Stockholm toward Historiska Museet (the Swedish History Museum). On my way I saw Sergels Torg, which is the namesake of a song by Veronica Maggio.

At some point, as a change of pace I decided to start photographing the people of Stockholm.

There was a huge public yoga event going on at Kungsträdgården.

People in general were dressed really well.

The buildings around Historiska Museet were pretty too.

Historiska Museet told the history of Sweden, from prehistory to the Viking era, and how Sweden went from disjointed magnates to a unified kingdom. The Swedish monarchy owed its pillars of authority to the spread of Christianity in the 11th century, and “its network of parishes and bishoprics.” By the 13th century, a system of codified laws and taxation were introduced, and also a lot of German migrants brought new customs and skills to Sweden. “German was to medieval society what English is to our own - a language in which most people could at least make themselves understood.” Sweden really hit its stride in the 17th century, when it expanded across the Baltic and into northern Germany. Sweden, however, remained a poor agrarian society until well into the 20th century, when it urbanized and transformed into “one of the world’s wealthiest countries - a democracy, a welfare society, with an average life expectancy twice what has been historically normal.”

For another history lesson, I walked over to the Army Museum, which went into the military aspects of Swedish history.

The exhibits began with the Swedish victory over Russia at Narva in 1700. The Swedes plundered all sorts of riches from the Russians, including a golden two-headed eagle banner. They paraded it around Stockholm and had the Russian prisoners watch. However, not a decade later the Swedish army was obliterated at the Battle of Poltava. The Swedish metal band Sabaton even made a song about it. Then the plague hit, marking the beginning of the end of the Swedish Empire.

One of the stolen silk banners. You can’t tell from the photo, but these things are huge, probably taller than me.

I was pretty tired by now and sort of blanked out on much of the exhibits after, until the 20th century. In 1901 Sweden decided to introduce national conscription. This inspired people to demand universal suffrage, as the people felt that “a man who would die in war for his country should also have the right to influence its rule.” During World War II, Stockholm was one of the few neutral places where other countries could spy on each other, so of course Sweden spied on everyone, including the Germans. There were food shortages, so food was rationed, and many women worked in farms to replace the young men who were in the army. Over 9,000 Swedes volunteered to fight for Finland in the Winter War against the Soviets, but fewer volunteered when Finland joined Germany in their fight a year later. Over 70,000 Finnish children were evacuated to Sweden. Tragically for the parents, by the time the war was over many of the children had forgotten their homeland or did not want to return.

A meal at the museum to recharge afterwards.

I ended up taking the metro down to Skinnarviksberget, which has great views of the city of Stockholm.

I had dinner at Restaurang Kryp in Södermalm, where I had reindeer for the first time. It was… interesting. The smell was my least favorite part, and the meat was bit on the hard side, but it’s good that I tried it at least.

Day 10: Stockholm, back to London

Sun. 26 May, 2019

I took an early morning stroll to Cityterminalen and watched a couple of chess games.

I think these guys were here for some sort of conference.

After returning to my Airbnb to check out and another chat with Roland (who was an amazing host), I dropped my luggage off at Cityterminalen and took the train north to Kungliga Tekniska högskolan (KTH), the Royal Institute of Technology. I was curious to see what a college campus looks like in Sweden, and I was not disappointed to learn that even schools here aren’t immune to ugly buildings.

Apparently Cornell isn’t the only university with a building made out of rust.

The rest of my day was not really worth writing much about; I ate lunch, developed a terrible stomach ache, and limped my way back to London. It was quite a miserable end to this trip, but I eventually got some painkillers and woke up fresh the next morning for my flight back to Baltimore! I even caught a clip of the BBC interviewing some Brits regarding the results of the EU elections, and getting basically nothing but the verbal equivalent of blank stares and shrugs.