Northern Europe

With the sun rising at 3.30am it is difficult to sleep in, although the teenager amongst us seems to be having no trouble. This morning we will collect our Stockholm pass and start seeing the sites further afield. Picking up our passes was a simple process, met a couple of Aussies from Vermont - Jeff and Peta - as we waited in line. First stop was The Royal Palace where we visited Tres Kronor Museum which gave us the history of the building of the palace, which suffered damage on multiple occasions due to fire. We then toured the Royal Apartments which were quite opulent but well preserved. We then toured the Livrustkammaren - where the Royal carriages are kept and we learnt of the love affair between Marie Antoinette, Queen of France and Swedish Count Hans Axel von Fersen. They met at a masked ball in Paris and then he made frequent trips to Versailles. They both suffered tragic
deaths during troubled times - she was beheaded and he was killed by a lynch mob during Crown Prince Carl August’s funeral in Stockholm. A fascinating exhibition aptly titled I Love You Madly.

Next we visited the Nobel Museum - quite small but some interesting exhibits - saw the Physics Prize 2017 that was awarded to Weiss, Barish and Thorne - for decisive contributions to the LIGO detector and the observation of gravitational waves, which researchers at CSIRO contributed to. We then wandered around the old town before stopping for lunch at a lovely restaurant called Cultur, where we had schnitzel and a glass of red. Finally we went on an Historical Canal Cruise around Stockholm. So far today we have walked over 11kms, well below the last few days where we clocked up over 20kms each day!

The weather has been a bit cooler today which suits us. Our apartment is right in the centre of the old town with restaurants and bars at every turn. We still haven’t had meatballs or rollmops but I am determined to before we leave next week.Lue lisää