Ja, more herring. Takk!

We arrived in Stockholm yesterday morning and took the convenient high-speed train into the city. We checked into the lovely and hip Hotel Rival, located in Södermalm, a trendy and populated area of the city. The morning is a bit of a blur for me because we were so tired but, before our three hour nap, we managed to take a boat tour of the major sites of the city and walk around the Vasa Museum which we explored today. The waterfront everywhere is beautiful and clean. After our nap, we took a walk through Gamla Stan, the old city, through the cobblestone streets. We entered a fascinating cathedral with all sorts of bizarre things to it including a pulpit with Yud Heh Vuv Hey inscribed into the space above where the preacher's head would be. There was also a neat statue of a St. George slaying a dragon for Stockholm, whose residents promised to convert if he saved them. We had a good beer at a busy cafe on the street before dinner at "Five Small Houses," a restaurang designed to look like a castle. We sampled some herring and I ate reindeer, which is like a lean steak. After dinner I decided to entertain mom by eating Swedish licorice, which happens to be great for diabetics because it is absolutely revolting. I think one of the ones I tried was actually herring flavored. We walked a little more after dinner but soon collapsed into our beds.

Today we got a late start and explored the Vasa museum, located on the island Djurgården. It is a museum dedicated to a ship build by King Gustav Adolphus (II?) in 1628 during the war with Poland. He put a ton of resources into building this gigantic beauty of a boat, complete with statues of Roman emperors and gun holes adorned with lion sculptures. The ship is actually covered with silly lion images carved by people whose only experience with lions was looking at old sketches. It turned out that the money sunk (foreshadowing) into this project was a complete waste as the boat ended up at the bottom of the bay a kilometer away from where it began it's journey, with the King waiting impatiently in Poland. It wasn't seaworthy becaust the height of the masts wasn't properly balanced with the weight in the hull so a gust of wind blew it over. To make matters worse, the King had insisted that they keep the lower level of gun holes open to show off and so, when the boat tipped, the holes took in water that began to weigh the boat down. To even further complicate the situation, the builders had put tons of rocks at the bottom of the hull to prevent this very tipping problem but they put round stones in that moved as the boat tipped. It went down pretty quickly. The boat was completely forgotton for a long time until the 1960s when some guy accidentally found it and the current King Gustav, an avid archeologist, decided to salvage the wreck. It was found in relatively fantastic condition and all the pieces were treated to last and put back into place to display it at the museum we went to. They had to add some wood but 95% of the oak is from the original boat.

After the Vasa, we went to the Junibachen children's museum dedicated to the works of the woman who created Pipi Longstocking. We didn't have enough time to see the main attraction (we are going back tomorrow), but we did walk through the fantasy playground and up to Villa Villekulla, Pipi's house. We were surprised by an adorable sing-a-long with little blond children jumping up and down.

After the Junibacken, we went for lunch at Verandan, located in the Grand Hotel for their Smorgasbörd. I am still full despite having finished four hours ago. We ate a tremendous amount of pickled herring and salmon. They gave us a brochure explaining how to eat the 6 course meal.
1) Herring. Herring. More herring. Pickled and with... dill sauce, mustard, egg, sour cream. There was also a ton of bleak roe which I went for with gusto. It's also traditionally eaten with hot potatoes which, when eaten between bites, helps you to distinguish all of the flavors.
2) Swedish swiss cheese on crispy bread. A shot of Swedish aquavit and a Scandanavian beer to chase it. We also tried the cauliflower soup with cured pork.
3) Salmon- elderberry, cured, smoked, cooked
4) Salads and cold cuts. More herring in the salad. Veal sausage. Smoked leg of lamb. Ox carpaccio.
5) Hot dishes- swedish meatballs with lingonberries, char, veggies, potato thingy that wasn't good.
6) Chocolate cake with coconut crust, strawberry rhubarb compote, fresh fruits.
It was amazing, especially the raw fish, and we left feeling beyond satisfied. I should also mention that we sat at a lovely table with a view of the harbor and Gamla Stan.

After lunch, which went from 2-4:30, we had to move around. We took a very long walk through the city center which was covered in H&M stores. We walked along streets with lovely architecture to see churches, parks and squares. It was a very different area than where we had explored so far and felt a lot more like a city than a giant painting. When we were tired we hopped on the T-bana, the subway. The subway seats are fabric and cushioned. Imagine fabric seats on a NYC subway! Ew.

Also, everyone is blond, blue-eyed, tall and on a bike. And they all sound like the Swedish chef.