06 Stockholm Day 2 and a bit of “OH DEAR”

Before I get started with Stockholm day 2 I have an observation. There are lots of the non-language specific signs around; the kind with the red circle and slash telling you not to do something. On the cruise ship the sign above the toilet, sorry head, had pictures of bottles, cans and a banana with a line through it. I thought banana? Well today in one of the bathrooms I went in had pieces of banana in the urinal. Who would have thunk it?

Day started out OK. I took my shirt down to the ironing board in the hall of the hotel – not in the room. We went down to a very nice breakfast where we learned that pancake is the Swedish word for crepes. They were good. We shared a table with a father and daughter from Nottingham, England which is very near Harlaxton.

We then went to train station to drop off our luggage in a locker. Then we walked along the water front to get a Royal Canal Tour. After the boat ride It was not clear what was royal about it. We did pass by the Palace, but other than that….? It was a very nice tour. Some of the memorable sights were Bjorn Borg’s house, a group of children sailing small sail boats. Most were about 7 I would guess. Penny pointed out that I watched most go by without taking pictures. Sometimes I forget.

We then walked back up the waterfront to near the train station where the City Hall is located. This is an impressive building. It is where the Nobel Prize Banquet is held. We took a guided tour. There were tours in 6 languages. I am constantly amazed and saddened by how much of the world speaks multiple languages except me. Tonight they were having a major award dinner there. Not the Nobel but rather the Swedish Water Award. This honor is given annual to a person who contributes to some aspect of improving some aspect of water conservation or management or the like. This year it is being award to an American from Stanford. We learned many things from our guide:
A. The main hall where the dinner is served will hold 1200 people. When the dinner begins the wait staff serves everyone within 3 minutes. That is a lot of hash slinging.
B. The main hall was built in such a way as to make it feel like it was clearly not a factory or industrial kind of job. It was built around 1900 and the feeling of many was very much anti-technology. The architect created this impression by
a. having the workmen pick at the front of each brick so that it did not look uniformed
b. building the main room in a non-rectangular shape
c. there are pairs of columns on one side and single columns on the other
C. On Saturdays from 2 to 4 anyone who has made a reservation can have a civil wedding performed in the wedding room. You can choose between the long ceremony which takes 3 minutes and the short ceremony which takes 1. It is free. Amy and Candace where did we go wrong?

After the City Hall I had another of my not so brilliant ideas. I suggested we walk to the nearby train station and catch the city bus to our next destination which was a bit too far to walk. Rick Steves (why do I trust this guy) said to take bus 47 from the station. Now that sounds easy but the station is about 2 large city blocks. Where do we go to catch this bus? We went in to ask and we had a very hard time finding anyone who knew. We went to 2 wrong information places before we found the one that could tell us; up the stairs and outside. We did this and as we got outside there was bus 47. I looked at the driver and he could tell I wanted on but he motioned to go around the corner – where the bus stop was. This took over an hour to ride the bus to Vasa Museum which would have take about 20 to 30 minutes to walk. But we conquered the city buses.

The Vasa Muesum was really fascinating. It was one of the largest sailing ships ever built. It sank 20 minutes into its maiden voyage in 1628 in the Stockholm bay. The raised the ship in 1961 (all dates are approximate). The ship and much of its contents and story are in the museum. We went to a very nice documentary film about the ship and the salvage. While sitting in the film a family with small kids were seated in the row behind us. At one point the 4 year old asked Mom. “why can’t they change it to the kids channel?”

After the Vasa we walked up the road to the Skansen living history museum. This was near 3:00 and we decided to eat lunch. The cafeteria was open and the food was good. We tried to sit outside but the birds and the bees chased us back inside – literally for one bee.

The museum was begun in the early 1800’s to preserve and protect the Swedish (and at that time that would include Finland) history. They moved and restored buildings from all over Sweden and Finland. There are homes of wealthy families and some from very modest means. There are homes as old as the 1600s. Most are from the 1800s. We watched and learned how flax is made into linen. It was labor intensive. There was a very nice old Lutheran Church. We saw people spinning yarn. It was a very pleasant day walking through old towns wooded areas and flower gardens.
This is where the story makes a plot twist. We sat down and Penny decided to pull out our train tickets to check the time or something. But alas there were no tickets in her purse. She thought they were there. She thought back and she had thrown out some material we did not want (tourist stuff) back at the church while she was waiting for me to take pictures (she does a lot of that). So we made our way back across the very large park to the church. The trash was still there in the can but alas no tickets. Where could they be? She remembered taking some more stuff we did not want out of her purse back at the hotel before we left and she put it on the desk and left it there. Were the tickets picked up in that material? We found a nice lady at the information area who helped us by calling the hotel and we asked if anyone found them. No. She then called the railway office and we were put on hold for 15 minutes so they said but we gave up and decided to go to the train station ourselves and see if they could reprint our tickets.

We went out to get back on bus 47 and found the bus right away. When we had taken the bus out our Stockholm Card was still valid and we just showed it and we sat down. I got on the bus and tried to buy a ticket and he nicely said “get off my bus. You have to buy a ticket first.” After a bit of wandering around trying to find where to buy a ticket I stopped at a small kiosk and asked where to go and she said here.

We made it back to the train station and the same nice lady was there. She remembered us but said she could not reprint the tickets, they were like cash. But she went to talk to her supervisor who came back with a computer printout with our ticket information which he had stamped and written a note on which read in Swedish, “please let these morons on the train because they can’t keep track of their stuff and we would very much like them out of the country” (my paraphrase).

New tickets in hand we had about 3 hours to kill so we wandered back down the waterfront where we ran into a bagpipe band near the city hall. We thought they might be going to perform at the Water Awards. But after they tuned there bagpipes (not something I would recommend listening to) they began walking the opposite directions. We followed at a discrete distance and they were going to the Annual Scottish something or other which had a big Velkommen sign over the portico where the guests were dining. I suspected that despite the sign we would not be welcomed because I am sure that the lost ticket information had spread quickly.
We wound up back at the park and festival and found a bargain dinner at a small café. Toasted open faced ham and cheese sandwich with salad and coffee. It was a beautiful evening. We walked back to the train station. We tried to find a free toilet but after some walking (did we tell you we do a lot of that) we gave up and paid the 85 cents to use the toilet. We then gathered our luggage from the locker and found our way to platform 11 (which we had scouted earlier). And waited for our train.

We discussed the fact that I had booked a second class sleeper and that we had bed numbers rather than a cabin number. I assured Penny that I had booked a room on the train for just the two of us. When the train arrived we found car 38 and got on and found the room with beds 13 and 14. It also had bed 15 but that was for when they sold it as a 3 person room. This was what I thought until Amar showed up with a ticket for the upper bed. It was a bit awkward. The room is tiny, we had bags and he had a large backpack. Neither Amar nor we knew what to do but Penny was a great sport and said we would work it out. We were beginning to settle in a bit and that was when the conductor came to check tickets. He saw the 50 somethings and Amar the 20 something. He came to our rescue and a very relieved Amar was assigned a different bed. We have our private room in a second class cabin and we are somewhere between Stockholm and Oslo. It is 12:50 and I am going to sleep. Maybe. The bed is moving and it is a bit noisy. Why was this a good idea? Sorry Penny.

Ray