Sweden Part 2 Stockholm, Nora, and Trollhattan

The drive to the ferry dock is only 168 km and since the ship boards at 10 pm we had the whole day. We got on the road at noon and headed southwest to Saldus and then to Vetsilpis for 288 km. On the way south there was again construction, but the lights were better coordinated. And guess who…we rode past the Swiss biker again. He actually caught up and pasted us at one point where we had to wait so long at the stoplight. From here we again rode on the secondary roads to Vetsilpis.

We checked in and then got in line where we met a boisterous group of Latvians headed to Norway. They had their cabin near ours and invited us in for some home- made Vodka (very good) and venison burgers. Then we settled in for the night and the 10 am arrival to Nynashamn Sweden.

Arriving in Sweden we had a short 58 km to Stockholm, but we took the small road instead of the highway for most of the way.

Stockholm may be one of Europe’s most beautifully situated cities. We took the metro the 20 minutes into town from the camping. We got of in the Old town or Gamla Stan and wandered around the very narrow cobbled streets. Other highlights were the changing of the guard at the royal palace, the waterfront, and the Vasa museum.

The Palace

The Vasa museum displays the only almost fully intact 17th century ship that has ever been salvaged, the 64-gun warship sank on her maiden voyage in 1628. The ship itself is stunning and the displays are really interesting. They have done analysis of the wood to find out exactly what color the boat was and what was used to paint it. They have restored many of the sculptures. The king ordered this ship built his way, which is why it sank in a light breeze because it was top-heavy and very unstable. 60% of the price of the boat was for the excessive decoration.

From Stockholm we are headed back to Trollhattan, but we are taking it slow over two days and only using the smallest roads most of the time.

We did this and by chance ended up in Nora, which is quite a famous town here in Sweden, being one of the 3 towns with the best-preserved wooden houses. There are several very old businesses here including the ice-cream shop that was stared in 1920 and the kitchen shop, where Frederick is the 5 th generation proprietor.

We left Nora again on the small road following the route suggested by our Swedish friend Orvar to Skoyde, where he met us and then toured us thru all the back back roads to Trollhattan.

We passed some of the private villas in the countryside.

Orvar had to pull out the spare gas 8 km from home!

Here in Trollhattan we were again hosted by our friends Orvar and Anne. There was the international Nordic-ski competition (48 km of hell by the looks of it).