With me still recovering from a cold I'd gotten shortly after arriving in Copenhagen and Jerry coming down with it pretty hard 2 days into our 4-day visit to Stockholm, we took a pretty subdued approach to our time here. Fortunately, we were staying in the heart of Old Town Stockholm, and we couldn't have asked for a more charming neighborhood. So even when we were feeling particularly puny, we could walk through narrow little passageways, see nearby sights, or walk to promenades along the water.
We traveled between Copenhagen and Stockholm by regional train. At Copenhagen Central Station, we had to take a number to wait for an international ticket agent. We activated our Eurail passes quite easily, and our agent was very helpful. He told us what track our train would be on and how to get to it. The track was not in the station, and it was a 15-minute walk out a different track number and then up stairs, across an overpass, then down the stairs. He also nicely told us to be there at least a half hour ahead because there would be a passport check before boarding. With his instructions, we were able to get to our train with minimal confusion and missteps. The trip was about 5 hours long.
At Stockholm Central Station, we bumped into a couple from Connecticut. First at an elevator--she was wearing a bag/backpack with the New Mexico state symbol on it, so I had to ask if they were from NM--then again at a cash machine, then yet again when we were both trying to find an information desk and figure out where to find taxis, there being several levels involved in all of this, making little easily determined. They, too, had just come in from Copenhagen on the same train; they, too, were going to be spending 4 nights in Stockholm and then take the train to Oslo (though on a different train than our own plans). Like us, they would then head to Bergen, where they would begin cruising the Norway coast. Here the similarities ended. They were taking a different route to Bergen, and they are cruising on Hurtigruten, while we will be on Viking. Still, it was a very small world kind of moment.
Being a late Friday afternoon when we arrived, traffic was pretty crazy. What should have been a short, easy taxi ride to our hotel turned out to be anything but. Nonetheless, before too long we were settled and out discovering the cobbled streets of Gamla Stan (Old Town). Our hotel receptionist hadn't offered any dining suggestions--just "It's Friday night and everything is full." Hmmm...not very helpful. So we wandered up and down what we thought were the most likely streets until we found a cute little place that looked cozy. It turned out to be a husband and wife venture, Madam the only person working the front of house and Mister cooking up a storm in the kitchen. It was simple food, but well done and made a nice finish to our day.
Our hotel was located just 100 feet or so from Storkyrkan, the medieval national cathedral, and a few hundred feet more to the Royal Palace. This gave us some very convenient and obvious sightseeing opportunities.
On Saturday morning, after some errands (like getting Swedish currency) and some rather general neighborhood exploration, we decided we might as well take in the changing of the guard. We had read enough about this to know we had to get there early. We managed to snag front row viewing posts, but one has to stand a long time in that spot! We got into position about a half hour before ETA, and the event itself lasted almost an hour. It began with a military band and involved two different sets of guardsmen--those present, in bright blue uniforms and silver Prussian-style helmets, and those coming to relieve them, in black and gold uniforms and black helmets. The guardsmen marched and goose stepped and even did an unusual prancing maneuver or two. Glad we got to see it. It's a bit long and slow, but the marching band livened things up.
We walked through the Old Town to visit the German Church. At one time, there was a large German community in Stockholm. Lutheranism took hold in Sweden before it was an accepted practice in Germany. Who knew? Pretty church, with its brick vaults and unusual black altarpiece.
We followed that with something else we knew we wanted to do while in Stockholm--see the city from the water. We walked up past the Royal Palace and down to the water on the other side of our little island. We crossed over to the next island, where the cruise tours depart. Enjoyed pretty views of the 18th century skyline.
We knew water was a part of Stockholm's identity, but we found we had the mistaken notion of this being a city with lots of canals. It turns out that the reason for all the water is that Stockholm is on 14 islands--some of the city being on the Baltic Sea and some of it on Lake Malaren. We opted for the 2-hour cruise called Under the Bridges of Stockholm. It was a wide-ranging, watery excursion on both the sea and the lake, with a lock providing the transition between the two. We came away with a very different sense of the city. Even though there is lots of water and there are many parks and green spaces, it is a very densely populated place. Lots and lots and lots of apartment buildings.
We had a bit of a misstep with our dinner reservations. We had requested the help of our hotel desk clerk before we set out for the day. Saturday night reservations proved to be a dear commodity. After several attempts and various recommendations, we snagged a table and received a confirmation email. Then we set out about our day, filled with palace guards and a boat trip. Both of us had it in our head that the reservation we got was at a waterfront French restaurant. We carefully looked up the rather complicated walking directions and set out in plenty of time. We arrived at the restaurant to find long lines and bouncers in black pea coats. There was pounding music and lots of dancing happening in the bar. This didn't remotely look like what we had in mind, but it was late (all we could get on short notice on a Saturday), so we inched our way up the line. I noticed a number of people being turned away, so I got out my phone so I could use the email confirmation if necessary. Oh no! Our confirmation was from a different restaurant. Eventually we remembered that this restaurant had no tables available and our hotel clerk had recommend a different place.
This was a very sinking feeling. We didn't recognize the street name of the restaurant and had no idea how far away we might be. We asked one of the bouncers, but he didn't know and suggested we flag down a taxi. We made our way to the nearest road and did just that. We were truly blessed in that we got a very nice young man who looked up the restaurant on his GPS and was able to tell us that it was just uphill from where we were standing. That was very nice of him. He lost a fare but gained a couple very grateful tourists. We were about 15 minutes late by the time we found our correct restaurant--to help matters, it had no street number or restaurant sign in evidence. But, to make up for all that stress and weirdness, Den Gyldene Freden will, I'm sure, be one of the highlights of our dining experiences in Scandinavia. It was a very old building. We ate in a vaulted room a couple floors below street level. The food was traditional Swedish, and we had perfect service.
The first stairway down to our dining room.
A view of the kitchen, hard at work.
A strange end to our busy day, but we were both thankful we hadn't ended up at the thrumming nightclub! About all we can do is claim to have been a bit addled by our colds or our running around or.....who knows what. We've never made such a silly mistake, but at least it had a very happy ending.
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