Claire Does Scandanavia

Our bus from Amsterdam drove through the night, depositing us in Copenhagen at 5:45am on Tues 24 March. We drug ourselves into Sleep-In-Heaven Hostel, hopeful that it would live up to its name, around 6:30am. We couldn’t get access to our rooms until 1:00pm, so we did the next best thing: we slept like we were in heaven on the couches in the common room. Couches are much more comfortable than motor coaches. The first couple of hours went by smoothly and quietly, but when backpackers started getting up to eat their breakfast (served in the same room), I heard a few concerned comments about the two girls passed out on the couches. I didn’t stir. Too tired. Once we finally peeled our tired bodies off the common room furniture, we made our way into the city. We wandered a bit and strolled a bit more, stopping for a coffee and a Danish (because we were in Denmark…) at the Hans Christian Anderson pastry shop. We grabbed a kebab for dinner that night with Phoebe, a girl we met in our hostel. She’s from Washington, D.C., and she goes to school at Sarah Lawrence.

After a good night’s sleep, we set off to have a proper touristy day. The hostel’s breakfast was sorely disappointing after the banquet at The Shelter. The walk to the city center was just under 30 minutes, and we took our time, pausing for the ATM and the necessary picture with the larger-than-life Hans Christian Anderson statue. We then took the canal cruise tour. How can I put this nicely? I have been spoiled by the New Europe tour company. The cruise was ok. Our guide was boring (aside from saying every tidbit in 3 languages), but the boat was heated and the ride gave our tired legs a break. You also have to be physically in the canal to get a view of the city from the canal, so the cruise was worth it in the end. Plus the cruise took us by the Little Mermaid statue, saving us quite a long walk in the blistering cold. Some of the buildings are gorgeous! Exactly what you think of when you imagine European architecture. And then there are modern monstrosities only 15 or so years old, some actual extensions to the old beauties. My mom, who has been to Copenhagen, put it best: it is a big, modern city with some old buildings.

After the cruise, Anna and I strolled along Stroget, the longest pedestrian street in the world, according to our Lonely Planet travel guide. It’s a massive shopping street. We admired the expensive labels from afar, wandered into some of the cheaper shops, and purchased an even cheaper ice cream sundae from McDonald’s.

After an hour or so in the National Museum, we spent the remainder of the afternoon in a launderette, trying to make sense of the Danish instructions. A gentle soul felt pity on us, and he helped us figure out how to work the machines. We had a bit of trouble figuring out how to wash clothes in Paris as well, but no kind French person (are there any?) offered any assistance. I like to believe there is a special place in heaven for those who show mercy upon weary (and/or clueless) travelers. I wonder… in how many more languages will we have to conquer such instructions?

So far I have caught up to 25 March. There’s not much to report from the 26th. We spent the majority of the day on the bus traveling to Sweden. It was pretty crowded, so Anna and I didn’t have our own seats. Much harder to sleep that way… For the first bit of our journey, Anna sat next to an old man who kept farting, so she swapped to sit next to me at our first bathroom break. We made it to Stockholm in the late afternoon and found our hostel in record time!

The next morning, we set off to the tourist center. Once again, we were in a city with no New Europe tours, and Rick Steves didn’t have much to offer for Stockholm. The weather was absolutely Baltic! It was a piercing cold that makes your skin burn and your eardrums feel like they could explode. I would hate to be there in the dead of winter. In light of the chill, we figured being outside all day wasn’t the best idea. We bought tickets for a double-decker sight-seeing bus so that we would get to see parts of the city we wouldn’t be able to otherwise. After the tour, we braved the walk to Old Town and explored a bit. We saw the royal palace and cathedral and wandered down a pedestrian shopping street. Then the cold got to us again. We went back to the hostel when the snow started to fall. It wasn’t pretty, fluffy snow, but rather was wet snot that stings your face in the wind. We had scrambled eggs for supper and then ran to the 7-11 around the corner for a sweetie. In the couple of hours we were in the hostel, the grass became covered with the wintry mix, and the sidewalks were steadily turning to slush.

The next morning (we’re caught up to 28 March now), we were not in a hurry to brave the weather. We planned to go to a photography museum, but since it didn’t open until noon, we took our sweet time getting ready. The weather had warmed up a bit, and the wind had calmed down significantly. The photography museum turned out to be less of a museum and more of a single exhibit. It was not at all what we were expecting. The little advertisement in the tourist office made it seem like we would see Annie Lebovitz and the likes. The gallery was two small rooms, and the photographs were all of true murder/serial killer cases. The artist worked in the archives to do research and dig up material. She used copies of journal entries and original crime scene photos in her works, layering them to show the murderers’ psyches. The rooms’ lighting kept changing—from white lights to black lights to pitch black. The layering in the pieces appeared when the black lights came on. The exhibit was really interesting! There wasn’t much traffic, so the lady working had the time to devote to us her undivided attention, explaining each of the murder cases.

We met Rod Withers, a friend from Edinburgh, that night for dinner. Rod is a wonderful guy. He’s from Australia (though he hasn’t lived there in a while), and we helped him celebrate his 30th birthday in Edinburgh. He met us at our hostel, and we walked down the road to a pizza place. We were far enough away from the center of the city that the restaurant didn’t have any menus translated in English. I ordered the Hawaiin pizza (“Hawaii” is the same in Swedish!), but much to my surprise, it had BANANAS on it! I wasn’t expecting that! The hot, mushy bananas on my pineapple and ham pizza weren’t bad, but they weren’t good either. But it WAS funny. We had a great time with Rod. We shared funny travel stories and talked about the possibility of meeting up again. Maybe Rod will visit the South? Maybe we’ll take a trip to Australia?

Before Rod got to the hostel, I played on Facebook long enough to get rather homesick. I read updates on the Montreat website. One of my dearest friends has been dating a girl for months now, and I haven’t met her! I had suspicions that a PC friend and a Montreat friend were dating, but I’d heard nothing of it. People were wishing my sister good luck at something, and I didn’t know what she was doing to need luck wished her way! I snapped myself out of my momentary slump pretty quickly, reminding myself that my chances of having this opportunity again are slim to none. Wishing away my time traveling or even wishing it would pass quickly is not smart on my part, and is, quite frankly, the dismissal and abuse of a blessing. I’m having the time of my life. How many people can pinpoint a “time of their life”? Mine has been the past six months, leading up to these 6 weeks of travel.

And so ends my adventures in Scandanavia.