Today was another Icelandic jumper day. Happily, I had mine with me, so got another day’s wear out of it.
We spent the entire day at Skansen, although a good chunk of the morning was spent walking over to Djurgården, which entailed waiting for Eloïse as she climbed on pretty much every bench and other obstacle along the way.
The weather was glorious sunshine again, with just a few wisps of cloud overhead. Beautiful.
Skansen is the original open air museum, i.e. the one that put the word skansen in the English language. Being the first, it’s naturally also the oldest open air museum in the world.
Various buildings from different ages and parts of Sweden have been moved intact to this museum, so that we, today, may gain a better understanding of how our Swedish predecessors lived.
It’s not just a collection of old buildings, though; Skansen is also home to a zoo, which includes ponies that the children can ride. Eloïse confidently climbed onto a pony and was led around the paths for several minutes, while Papa scurried to take photos. I think that was probably the high point of the day for all of us.
By the end of the day, we were pretty knackered, so instead of walking home, we took the ferry from Allmänna grand back to Slussen.
Dinner was at the excellent Fyra Knop crêperie. Twice before, we’d tried to get in there, but it had been fully booked. Today, we had the presence of mind to call it from Skansen and make a reservation. We weren’t disappointed. The place is already packed out by 18:00 every day of the week, so be sure to reserve if you want to eat there. I highly recommend it.
It’s with quite some sadness that we leave Stockholm behind us tomorrow. We could fill another day here with no trouble, but we’ve done most of what we set out to and, in any case, feel sure we’ll return. We want to spend time in the archipelago and then head north to see some more of this huge country. And then there’s the ABBA museum opening next year, too.
So, tomorrow we drive to Göteborg. We’re not sure yet whether we’ll take the obvious route or a slightly longer one, which avoids retracing our steps along the E4 to Jönköping. Let’s see what time we can get out of here tomorrow.
I’m not sure if we’ll have any Internet access at the next hotel, so this could well be the last entry until we get home on Sunday.
We spend Thursday and Friday night in Göteborg, then have a very long drive on Saturday through Denmark to Hamburg in Germany. That will involve us taking the Rødby to Puttgarden ferry once more.
Then, on Sunday, we’ll drive the final leg of our journey from Hamburg back to Amsterdam.
So, that’s a lot of driving over the next four days; about 1450 km’ worth. The same distance on the outward journey was driven in two days out of twelve, which was a much nicer pace. Still, as long as the roads aren’t congested, it’ll be a largely enjoyable drive.