Sweden

I've only seen a few parts of Sweden, mainly around the capital of Stockholm. Other things I'd like to see like Gotland Island will have to wait for another trip because the tour group I was with spent much of its time in the big cities.

Stockholm

This is an overview of the old part of Stockholm - the island of Gamla Stan. Stockholm is built on many islands on the coast of Sweden, and this island is where Stockholm began. About every European city has an old center, and in this case it's an island. You can see several bridges that link the island to the other parts of the city. This picture, by the way, is from the top of the city hall tower, a rather impressive city hall and site of the annual Nobel Prize banquet for all prizes except the peace prize (given in Oslo).

[Stortorget] This square is the Stortorget, the original center of Stockholm on the island of Gamla Stan. It's the site of the 1520 Stockholm bloodbath. Today there is a newer "main square" on Gamla Stan at the Kungliga Slottet, the original Royal Palace of Stockholm, remodeled many times since the year 1200 (today, Sweden's Royal Family lives at Drottningholm Palace, outside Stockholm). The square in front of Kungliga Slottet hosts (in summer) a daily ceremonial changing of the guard.

[Branda Tomten] [Kakbrinken at Pratgatan] Here's a couple more pictures on Gamla Stan... It's an old city layout with many narrow streets and alleys. At the corner on the right there's a cannon barrel set in the ground guarding the corner of the building... a corner foundation built of stone, one of which is a Rune Stone, a stone inscribed as a memorial stone. These stones were made anywhere from the 3rd century through Viking times, and while found throughout Scandinavia and regions visited by Vikings, the most are found in this area. Now regarded as important historical treasures, these were at times scavenged as building materials (and is how this one ended up in a foundation). I have a better Rune Stone picture coming up...

Stockholm's Attractions

The Vasa is a warship that was built in 1628. Bigger than any warship before it, it was built with 2 gun decks. However, it was too top-heavy and capsized and sunk just minutes into its maiden voyage. It lay on the bottom of Stockholm's harbor until 1962 when it was located, and in a project that took many years, raised, preserved, and placed on display in its own museum.

[Skansen] Skansen is a first of a kind open-air museum of Swedish (and Scandinavian) history and life. It's similar to others, for example Ballenberg in Switzerland, or the Welsh Folk Museum. This one is not as focused on its purpose as the others, besides many old buildings many of which were moved here from elsewhere, there are animals, such as the Reindeer shown. One other species I saw listed was "Pole Cats", although I didn't actually find where they had them (I wondered if their definition of Pole Cat was the same as mine). In addition to these things, there were some unrelated things like amusements, a stage (which had a Lawrence-Welk type stage show being broadcast on local TV during my visit) dancing and other amusement type attractions. Skansen is located in the city, just a bus ride (or long walk) from the center of town (there's also an old trolley that comes to the park from downtown).

[Millesgarden] Further from the center of town (by subway and bus; this is too far to walk unless you've got all day) is a museum featuring one artist - Carl Milles, who sculpted many unique statues in the early 20th century. This is called Millesgården. The collection of statues shown includes one known as the Hand of God.

Finally, here's the City Hall I mentioned above. This is the Golden Hall, completed in 1923. It's one of several grand rooms, all in different styles. The walls in this room are covered with a mosaic of millions of tiny gold tiles.

Outside Stockholm

This is Drottningholm Palace, today's home of Sweden's Royal family. It was built in the 17th century, and is known as the Swedish Versailles (a statue in front was stolen from Fredericksborg Palace in Denmark, a palace that I liken to the Danish Versailles).

Sigtuna
A bit north of Stockholm is the small town of Sigtuna. It contains no less than 3 old ruined churches, one of which is shown here. The town also has several Rune Stones, one of which is shown here. As I mentioned above, these are old memorial stones that commemorate either people or events (the language, not in our alphabet, is understood).
On the left is a Phone Booth in the Humlegården. This is an old style phone booth (I also saw at least one of these in Stockholm).

Created January 10, 1999
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Copyright © 1999 Gary Strait all rights reserved. garystrait@earthlink.net