2006 Sweden and Norway Trip - Part 1

2006 Sweden and Norway Trip

The fun starts Saturday, March 25!

Jump to: Stockholm (below), Gothenburg, Norwegian Fjords

March 26, 11:38AM, Stockholm - No exciting pictures yet, though the Radisson SAS hotel is fantastic, as is SAS airlines. However, I only got about one hour of sleep on the plane, so by the end of today I'll have been awake for about 30 hours straight... oh joy... Should have some pics to share by the end of the day though... stay tuned...

March 27, 5AM, Stockholm - Yeah, woke up way too early... still adjusting to new time... anyway here are some pics of things we saw yesterday:

Here's a picture from the bridge between Gamla Stan and the main island of Stockholm:

We also saw a bunch of guys with guns near the houses of parliament and other Government buildings:

There was also a brass band... ooh shiney!

Then we went inside Storkyrkan, site of ancient coronation ceremonies for Swedish kings:

There was also a guy playing the really big organ there:

Here's the outside of the church:

Here's a shot of where the Swedish parliament works... it seems nobody there works weekends:

The narrow pedestrian streets of Gamla Stan:

The front of the Royal Palace:

The view from the Royal Palace:

March 27, 10:41 PM, Stockholm - Just got back from the Swedish Opera House - we saw Messian's "Werther". Pretty cool, even if I didn't understand much of the French dialogue or Swedish subtitles... anyway, today it was all sleet and snow and rain, so we did mostly indoors stuff...

First we went to Stockholm City Hall...

Here is the famous Room Of Gold or whatever they call it... all the shiny yellow stuff on the walls is real gold:

Another shot of a gold wall... no wonder this building cost 18 million SEK... in the 1920s...

Here's a shot from the floor of the banquet room where they all eat and party after a Nobel award is given out... up in the rafters there is a 10000+ pipe organ... nice:

Next we hiked over to the Vasa Museum...

This ship first set sail in the 1620s... and sank on it's maiden voyage... before it even left harbor...

Apparently, the king ordered them to build it one floor taller than usual, which caused it to tip over and sink... whoops...

The whole ship was painted very intricately... here they repainted a small portion in the original style, as spending 300+ years underwater tends to wash away the original paint:

March 28, 11:30PM, Stockholm - More lousy weather today, drizzly rain all day, so we did more indoor stuff mostly... We saw the Royal Palace and the various museums that are a part of that, and also the Art Museum... and neither of those places allowed photos to be taken... very sad. Anyway, here are a few exterior shots of the Royal Palace: