Superspreader alert

Tallinn

We slept exceptionally well in our cute cabin, you could barely tell we were on a ship as it was so smooth. We wandered to one of the restaurants for a coffee and waited for the ship to reach Tallinn.

We were scheduled to disembark at 10.45am so we dutifully caught the lift to the exit point about 10 minutes before that, only to find that most of the other 2,300 guests on the ship had the same idea. We were all crammed together like sardines waiting for the single exit door to open, so we both decided masks would be needed here, even though none of the other participants in this potential super spreader event thought so.

Tallinn had a very quiet laidback vibe but this could be because it was Sunday afternoon. The prices were noticeably cheaper than we had experienced in Denmark and Sweden, so we took advantage of that to have a nice steak dinner. 

We had a modern apartment with balcony and a washing machine, always a bonus when travelling for long periods, so we took the opportunity to wash nearly every bit of clothing we had. 

Cruising?

Stockholm (Sweden) to Tallinn (Estonia)

At 5:30pm we were taking an overnight ferry to Estonia, meaning we still had almost a full day left in Stockholm, so we decided to have a second try at a walking tour of the old town (Gamla Stan). We were a little concerned that we'd hear some stories for the third time (for example, we'd already heard two versions of how the current princess had married her personal trainer), but we realised we hadn't really seen the old town properly and today was our last chance.

This tour was a marked improvement over the one we'd left yesterday, even though the good weather had disappeared and we were walking in the rain and cold for much of it. Our tour finished just as some sort of military horse procession was beginning, it was interesting but also seemed quite an antiquated tradition given how modern the rest of Sweden appeared to be.    

When it was time we took a train to the ferry port to board the Baltic Queen for our overnight trip to Tallinn, Estonia. We didn’t need to use maps to find our way, as once we left the train we just followed all the people with luggage to the ship.

Not being cruise people this was definitely the biggest ship we’ve been on, and were a little concerned it wasn't for us, however we justified it by saying this was a "ferry trip" and not a "cruise". We aren't fans at all of cruise ships and the way they flood towns with hordes of day trippers then suck them all back at the end of the day, getting in the way of "real" travellers like us!  

We had booked a nice cabin with a double bed and a port hole, we were about an hour early for the 5:30pm departure so we settled in on an outside deck with a drink while waiting to set sail. 

This trip was an unexpected delight. Sweden is made up of about 270,000 islands and we probably passed by hundreds of them on our way out to the Baltic Sea. The water was like glass and the weather had cleared, so we were enjoying a beautiful cruise on idyllic waters, passing by pretty islands with all types and sizes of houses on them. 

We checked out each floor (deck) of the ship, we really are cruise naïve as we were amazed by how big the ship was, all the different sections, how many restaurants, shops and people there were (we later learnt that there were 2,300 people on board, and that the ship wasn't full!).

We had a lovely dinner in one of the restaurants, watching the islands slip by. We were served by a friendly Estonian lady with fabulous English who said that she learnt it from watching television, with one of her favourite shows being "Home and Away". We of course said we had never watched it and she offered to sing the theme song for us!

Let's try that again, shall we?

Stockholm

The city of Stockholm is built upon 14 islands and has more than 50 bridges, quite different to our preconceived idea that it was just a city sitting on the coast of the mainland. 

The weather was better than we expected, it was a sunny day and heading for 30 degrees. We started with a walking tour of Gamla Stan, the Swedish name for the old town. Our tour guide was Russian with average English and it seemed her idea of leading a walking tour was to rattle off some information/history and then give you five minutes to take photos. It wasn't quite what we were expecting so we bailed, heading to the nearest metro station to get a train to the island of Södermalm.

From Södermalm we walked back along the water's edge and across a few bridges to the city centre to join another (and hopefully better) walking tour, this time of the new city.

Our second tour of the day was around the more modern areas near where we were staying. Thankfully this one was much more entertaining and interesting than the morning tour, we learnt all sorts of interesting trivia, like why floor coverings and rugs in Ikea are named after Danish towns, and the story behind the term "Stockholm Syndrome". 

Heaps of mounds

Örebro to Stockholm

Stockholm was our ultimate destination for our Swedish road trip, and we decided to detour via the city of Uppsala and use it to break up the drive. Uppsala is the furthest north we have been in the world (so far) although we expect it will only hold this status for another week or so. 

We visited Gamla Uppsala, an old Viking village where the buildings had been reconstructed to look as they would appear during Viking times, but there were also a number of authentic (and huge) burial mounds, similar to those we'd seen in Denmark.

We arrived into Stockholm mid-afternoon, and dropped off our hire car right next to the Central Station where we had also booked a hotel for two nights.

After checking in we did a little shopping, and K went to buy some wine from a Systembolaget, which is a government-owned chain of liquor stores that is the only retail store allowed to sell drinks containing more than 3.5% alcohol by volume. We were quite amused by the Australian wine selection, the names of the wines and the way they were packaged made them look like the kinds of drinks people should stay away from!

Don't miss the turnoff ... oops!

Gothenberg to Örebro

M missed a crucial turnoff on our drive to Örebro so we ended up on the "scenic" route, via a few back roads and through fields of countryside and crops, making it to Mariestad for lunch. Mariestad was underwhelming though, so we started to wonder whether this part of Sweden was a good use of our time. 

We arrived into Örebro about 3pm wondering how we were going to fill in our time, and found that it was a delightful town with an outdoor art exhibition and a castle with a moat bang slap in the middle of town. 

The weather was warm and sunny so we wandered the streets full of shops, bars, restaurants, flowers, bridges, waterways and art and were very pleased with our choice of overnight stay.

You call that a scroll?

Gothenberg / Marstrand Island

We drove an hour out of Gothenberg to Marstrand Island, crossing bridges to many other islands along the way, we hadn't realised until now just how Sweden is comprised of so many islands.

The ferry trip to Marstrand was pretty short, just a few minutes. We arrived there around 11:15am to find that much of the seaside tourist town was still closed. It turns out that most cafes and shops didn't open until 12pm.  

We walked along the cobbled water front past some closed shops and some really nice looking hotels, there were also quite a few people sunbaking and swimming in temperatures we'd consider a little on the cool side. 

It also looked like getting around in bath robes was a bit of a thing, there were a few people walking around who looked as if they hadn't quite finished getting dressed before leaving the house.

We've developed a liking for the local versions of the cinnamon scroll, the Danes call them kanelsnegle, the Swedes call them kanelbullar, so on our way back to Gothenberg we stopped in the oldest part of town called Haga to visit Café Husaren, famous for their version called hagabullar. Standard scrolls are about 5-10cm in diameter, but at this café they are 30cm, and supposedly made to be eaten by just one person. We bought one to share and didn't quite finish it, though we did try very hard!

Trip to the tropics

Malmö to Gothenburg

Time for another road trip, so we picked up a hire car and headed north. First stop was was Helsingborg, which is directly across the water from Helsingør in Denmark where we had visited Kronborg Castle (which we could easily see from the Swedish side).

We headed to the marina where there was a "tropical beach" - just a bit of sand a few potted palms, there were quite a few people sunbathing so as long as they believe it's a tropical beach then who are we to argue?

We then walked to the centre of town and climbed the hill to visit the 14th century tower called Kärnan, originally part of the former Danish fortress and the residence of Danish kings.

As we entered Gothenburg we had to deal with a lot of roadwork and bypasses, we made it to our hotel right above the central railway station without getting lost or taking a wrong turn, so we shudder to think how we would have made it without the magic of Google Maps!

Coastal trip

Malmö/Ystad

We headed to the station for our trip to Ystad, a town about an hour away on the coast. On the way we checked out the "Knotted Gun" statue and stopped for a flat white, our quest for a decent coffee is never ending and this time it wasn't too bad.

Arriving in Ystad we found the station was right next to the water, but instead of nice cafes and places to enjoy the view (as we'd hoped), it was just a working port which supported ferries to Poland, amongst other places, seemed like a wasted opportunity to us, especially in this weather.

We visited the tourist information centre to find out how we could get to Ales Stenar, a stone circle that was around 1400 years old, but we were told that Sunday buses no longer ran, so we had to settle for walking the streets of Ystad.

Ystad is a very quaint, pretty town with cute, well preserved brightly painted buildings. As it was Sunday many of the shops were closed, but there was enough open to keep us occupied for a couple of hours, before heading back to Malmö where the festival was in full swing on this 30 degree day.

Away from the crowds

Malmö

Google tells us that an "extreme heat warning" has been issued for the Malmö area .... geez guys, it's only going to be 28!

We did our usual walking tour, not one of the better ones but we still managed to learn a bit about Malmö and Sweden, and cover the main sights in town, including many we'd have missed if we wandered around on our own.

We have really developed a taste for Scandinavian cinnamon scrolls, they make an easy cheap lunch, and it's also important we keep across the types of cakes and other snacks as we go from country to country.

After lunch we caught the train to Lund, a small picturesque university town not far from Malmö. It was good to get away from the holiday and festival crowds in town to somewhere a little more laid back. We had dinner in Lund, and once back in Malmö M went to check out the local metal bands on the festival stage. He said "Void Commander" were pretty good so do yourself a favour and check them out!

Rock on Sweden!

Svendborg (Denmark) to Malmö (Sweden)

We drove back to Copenhagen Airport to return our rental car, stopping along the way to visit Egeskov Castle. 

From Copenhagen airport we bought train tickets to Malmö in Sweden, just 25 minutes away. The train was delayed and the people were building up on the platform, so as we had a lot of luggage we decided that we'd be “smart” and wait for the next train. Of course that train was also delayed so the numbers just grew again. 

When a train finally arrived we hopped on, but strangely very few others did. While we were discussing with other confused passengers what was going on, the train started moving - no turning back now. We learnt that we were only supposed to board if we had a reservation (which we didn't). When the conductor came by we owned up to our error, she agreed that we'd made a mistake, shrugged her shoulders and said "there's nothing we can do about it now", and walked on. So in retrospect, it wasn't really a mistake from our perspective!

We relaxed for the rest of the short trip, as we had a comfortable, uncrowded ride across the famous Denmark-Sweden bridge that had featured in the show “The Bridge" that we had really enjoyed.

After checking in to our hotel in Malmö we went for a walk and discovered that we were staying in town during the Malmö Festival. The streets were packed, there were carnival rides and hordes of teenagers wandering around. 

Not ideal as far as K was concerned, but M was very pleased to see that there was a stage set up where some quite interesting Swedish rock bands were playing, this festival might not be so bad after all!