Eurotrip 2012 - Day 14 (6/28) - To Oslo

I left the hotel at 6:15, a little later than I wanted to but still too early to get their breakfast. I took the metro to T-Centralen, then the Arlanda Express to the airport. I had some trouble figuring out which terminal to go to, but I was through security in plenty of time (partially because the flight time had apparently been changed from 9 to 9:15 without my knowledge) to grab some yogurt with muesli and an apple juice as a reward for being up so early. While I was waiting around, a father from a family from Colorado that I ran into a couple days prior at the Royal Palace came over to say hello - they were headed to Rome. After boarding the plane I rewarded myself some more by passing out for most of the flight.

In Oslo I took the Flytoget express train from the airport toward the city. Unfortunately, there was some work being done on the train tracks so the train only took us part of the way (to Lillestrom), then we took buses the rest of the way to Oslo Central Station (but at least the price was reduced). The Thon Hotel Astoria was not very far from there, and I was able to find it on foot relatively quickly despite the location on Google Maps being off by a couple of blocks. After checking in and putting my things in the room, I headed back to Central Station and crossed the covered walkway over to the opera house (officially the Norwegian National Opera and Ballet). I found out that the next English guided tour was at 2, giving me 1.5 hours to kill. The building was free to walk on and inside the main foyer, but I decided to go check out the Oslo Cathedral.

I walked over to, and through, the cathedral, and then still had time to grab a quick lunch. I walked further down Karl Johans gate, the main road of sorts which is a pedestrian street for a long section, and came across a MAX Hamburger, a fast food burger joint that I had seen in the other Scandinavian countries, and decided to give it a shot. I ordered a small (apparently the burgers come in multiple sizes) in Cheese 'n' Bacon burger, some "chili cheese" nuggets (more jalapeño than chili) that came as a pack of 4, and a small drink. The total came out to 114 kroner, which is something like $19 USD! And they charge 10 kr (over $1.50) for drink refills - though I think that would be hard to monitor with the self-service. At least the burger was pretty good (it also had a thousand island like sauce) and they separated out their trash bins by type (which doesn't help too much with language-challenged tourists like me).

After eating I made it back to the opera house with over 15 to spare before the tour. The tour was pretty interesting and took us inside parts of the building that are normally inaccessible to the public. After the tour I went outside and climbed up to the top of the building, then enjoyed the great view and atmosphere for a while. Up there I encountered a Californian family that was visiting Norwegian relatives - they had some good Oslo advice for me, including notifying me that the ski tower was closed due to a concert at the venue (featuring Rihanna) the next day.

After leaving the opera house I headed to Akershus Castle. When I arrived at the information center around 4:10 there was a delayed (originally scheduled for 4) English guided tour soon to leave so I tagged along since the main castle building was closed. The tour lasted about an hour. After that I wandered about the city for a while, including stumbling upon city hall. I then took the metro (known as the T-bane there) one stop over and headed back to the hotel. I stayed in for the rest of the night, initially planning activities for the next day, except for a brief trip across the street to grab a kebab pita right before the Germany/Italy semifinal.

Observation of the day: I recently acquired a Capital One checking account and debit card especially to use on international trips since they do not charge an international transaction fee (or, it seems so far, an ATM fee). So far it has been a great call...except for the fact that the first few PIN code purchase transactions I attempted failed, even though I could use my PIN to get money from ATMs without problems. Since then (the second or third day in Moscow) I decided to sign for every purchase. It has worked well every time except for once at the hotel in Tallinn - I had to use a different card there (and accept the fee).

Bonus observation: The wifi availability has been pretty good on this trip. In addition to free (or perhaps better stated: included) wifi at all but the first hotel (though the hostel in Helsinki only had wifi on the ground floor, but ethernet in the rooms), the airports in Helsinki and Stockholm both had free wifi. And so did the airport express trains in Stockholm and Oslo.

Bonus observation 2: A single metro ride in Oslo cost NOK 30, or about $5. This was about the same as it was in Stockholm - SEK 36 (though I was told SEK 44 the first time). In contrast, it cost less than $1 per ride in both Moscow and St. Petersburg, and those metro systems were the most impressive.

Eurotrip 2012 - Day 13 (6/27) - Stockholm and Drottningholm

This morning began much like the day before - I had a similar breakfast and departed around 10. I took the metro to T-Centralen then walked over to Stadshuset (City Hall). I first inquired at the port next door about the boar to Drottningholm, and was told that they leave on the hour. It was 10:30, so I walked over to Stadshuset to look around. I bought a ticket for the 11:15 entrance to the tower, figuring that I could do the 35 minute tour (10 minutes to go up, 15 to look around, and 10 to go down) and still have 10 minutes to catch the noon boat. I took some more pictures of the impressive building and courtyard while waiting (and some Asian women took a picture with me), and then went into the tower at 11:15. They give you the option of taking an elevator halfway up, but encourage anyone who can to walk since the elevator is so small - it holds only 4 or 5 people, and they let 30 people up the tower at a time. I don't think anyone in our group took the elevator. The climb up was probably one of the most interesting that I've had (and I've climbed a few towers in my day) - first it was concrete steps, then a cool sculpture room, then brick steps, then a winding brick ramp, then wooden steps. I stopped so often for pictures that I began to worry whether I would have enough time at the top. The view at the top was equally impressive, and I completed a circuit of pictures quickly enough to head back down a little early.

I (perhaps unnecessarily) hustled over to the boat ticket counter and had a ticket for Drottningholm in hand by 11:50. I boarded the boat a bit after noon and sat through the hour long ride over. After arriving at Drottningholm, I walked over to the castle and bought an entry ticket. I found out that there was an English guided tour at 2, so I walked around the garden for a while then returned for the tour. As with the Royal Palace in Old Town, pictures were not allowed within. After the tour I headed to the boat dock, and was there barely in time for the boat at 3. However, I did not have a ticket, so I decided to go figure out where to buy a ticket for the boat (there was no ticket stand at the dock) at 4 and then perhaps grab some food while I waited. I felt a bit stupid when I found out at a nearby convenience store that I could buy a ticket on the boat...especially since I could still see the boat floating away. However, this turned out to be a blessing in disguise, as I remembered seeing that Drottningholm could be reached be bus from a metro station. With the help of a kind Swedish couple I got on the bus that went to the Brommaplan metro station. The man was the second person to suggest that I check out the Vasamuseet (a museum about a 17th century Swedish warship that had sunk on its maiden mission and was recovered 300 years later), so I decided to do that instead of one of the other items remaining on my list - it would be more unique to Stockholm than, say, the modern art museum. I didn't actually know where the Vasa museum was but after asking a couple more helpful Swedes I found out (and remembered) that it was next to the Nordic Museum, which I had walked by the day before. I took the metro to Karlaplan again and walked over to the museum, where I lucked into catching the 4:30 English guided tour, then watched the documentary film in the main theater at 5. After looking around a bit more, I left to go catch the same tram as the day before (only further down the line). After taking the tram to T-Centralen I, for some unknown reason (considering how full my big backpack was), went up to check out one of the seemingly 12 H&M stores in the area as well as an Intersport. After (thankfully) not buying anything I took the metro back to the hotel.

I asked a lady at the hotel reception where I could get a nice Swedish meal, and she suggested a restaurant. I walked over to the place, which wasn't exactly close, but found it a bit too expensive for my taste. It did happen to be close to a park where some soccer was being played, so I stopped by that. After watching for a bit I headed back to a restaurant I had initially passed by on the walk. The service was really slow, and when a waiter finally came to take my order he informed me that they were out of meatballs - I immediately left, a bit annoyed. I wandered around trying to find a place that looked like I would have some Swedish meatballs (there are apparently a lot of foreign restaurants in Stockholm), but eventually settled on a bar that had soccer on. When I tried to order the Swedish Hash, I was informed that they were out. Since I was too tired and hungry to leave by this time, I just ordered the lamb sausage instead (which turned out to be pretty good). I finally was able to eat again at 8:30, 10.5 hours after finishing breakfast, then I watched the first half of the Spain/Portugal semifinal match. At halftime I walked back to the hotel, where I watched the rest of the game before turning in.

Observation of the day: The Stockholm T-Bana may not quite match the metro in Moscow or St. Petersburg, but it is still a pretty good system. The trains seem to come pretty frequently (every 4 or 5 minutes) and the area covered seems pretty expansive (it got much closer to Drottningholm than SPb's metro did to Peterhof). The Helsinki metro is nowhere close to any of the others - its 1.5 lines are comparable to the St. Louis Metro link - but at least they have trams.

Bonus observarion: Speaking of trams, the buses in Stockholm sometimes drive in the tram lanes and share the same stops, especially close to the city center.

Bonus observation 2: While we're discussing transportation... Stockholm is a very bicycle friendly city - there are bike lanes pretty much everywhere. If I had more practice and confidence on a bike, it would have been a good idea to rent one and ride it around (as a lady on the flight over had suggested).

Eurotrip 2012 - Day 12 (6/26) - Stockholm

The breakfast buffet at the hotel was pretty varied and bountiful. In addition to some bacon, a couple of meatballs, and a small salami and cheese sandwich, I finally tried some yogurt with corn flakes (and some fruit) like I have seen people eating from time to time - I liked it. After eating, I left by 10. It was sprinkling a bit outside, and the rain was off and on through the afternoon.

I took the metro (a.k.a. T-Bana, I think for something like Tunnelbana, or Tunnel Road) to Gamla Stan (Old Town - apparently the name of both the metro stop and the island) and then walked to the Royal Palace. I bought a full ticket, then hit the Royal Apartments as my first of the 4 stops. Unfortunately, pictures were not allowed inside the palace.  I waited around for the English guided tour of the Royal Apartments at 11, and that lasted about 45 minutes. After walking through the apartments for a few more minutes on my own, I headed outside to catch the parade of the guards at 12:15 (which wasn't dampened by a brief sprinkle of rain). The band was still playing when I left at 12:30 to quickly walk through the nearby Storkyrkran (also known sometimes as the Stockholm Cathedral), which was a bit more impressive than I expected. I then hustled over to the Treasury (the second museum on my palace ticket) to join the 1:00 guided tour. I did not make it through the full 45 minutes (there aren't enough crown jewels for that, in my opinion) and left to check out the remaining 2 palace museums on my own. Gustav III's Museum of Antiquities had a bunch of Roman statues, so I enjoyed that more than expected. The True Kronor Museum showed the history of the castle that stood (then burned) before the palace, and I thought it was OK. I walked around the palace grounds for a little while then headed to the Nobel Museum.

The Nobel Museum is pretty small (they are going to build a bigger one to be opened in 2018) - if I had not joined the guided tour at 3 it would not have been worth it. The museum is on a square with some restaurants, so I went to one of them for a late lunch after I was done. I overlooked the rainbow flag in front of it until a guy who had been staring me down struck up a conversation with me and pointed it out. Despite being a little flustered, I needed somewhere to sit (the outdoor area was pretty full) so I joined him (Patrick) and ordered a broccoli and blue cheese pie (which wasn't that great). While I was eating the rain picked up pretty hard, but luckily it subsided before I was done.

Afterward I said goodbye to Patrick and walked over to Fjallgatan to take some pictures of the nice view. I then picked up an ice cream cone and walked to the Folkungagatan metro station. I initially planned on going to SkyView at the Ericsson Globe, but changed my mind after reasoning that I shouldn't pay money for a view that was probably less interesting (since it was farther from the city center) than the one that I had just seen for free. So instead I headed to Skansen, which is billed as the oldest and largest outdoor museum. They informed me that all the cultural buildings had closed at 5 (it was after 7), but I could still walk around and see the animals (and there would be a concert at 8). I still bought the ticket, and immediately headed for the Scandinavian animals. I didn't get to see all the animals I wanted to (some were in hiding), but I was reasonably satisfied (as much as could be expected for me in a place like that, at least) by the time I left. At the exit I was sick of walking so I bought a ticket for the tram, without realizing that I could have used my metro pass. I took the tram to Central Station (actually T-Centralen) then took the metro back to the hotel.

Observation of the day: According to one of the museum guides, this June in Stockholm had been the coldest and wettest in something like 100 years.

Bonus observation: Sunrise in Stockholm on this day was officially at 3:34 AM and sunset was at 10:09 PM, yielding 18 hours and 35 minutes of daylight.

Eurotrip 2012 - Day 11 (6/25) - To Stockholm

We had planned on going to the Olympic Stadium and maybe the nearby amusement park, but my laundry fiasco prevented either of those things from happening. I started the single load of washing without issue around 11 and then we checked out around 11:30, 30 minutes late. I then put my clothes in the dryer around noon. When I returned about 45 minutes later, though, they were not any drier. I thought this was because I had chosen too cool of a setting (I had uses the second warmest), so I chose the hottest setting and tried again. By the time I found out that this didn't work any better (the dryer was spinning without any heat), the other two driers were occupied, and more people were washing clothes. I basically had to wait around in the laundry room for another hour in order to snag a drier that worked, and then wait for the clothes to dry. Steffi eventually gave up on waiting around for me, and rightfully so, and took a taxi to go see the Olympic Stadium.

I wasn't done with my laundry until about 3:30, and by then it was just about time to head to the airport. Steffi met up with me after failing to get into the stadium - it was apparently closed for the European Athletics Championships. Since it was raining, we decided to take a taxi to the airport instead of walking to the train station and taking the Finnair bus. On the ride I realized that I forgot to return the laundry room key to the hostel front desk (and reclaim my €10 deposit) - I gave it to Steffi to send back to the hostel for me. At the airport we had time to grab sandwiches for a late lunch before Steffi had to board her plane a little after 6. After saying goodbye I walked 3 gates down to prepare to board my 6:55 flight.

After landing I took the Arlanda Express to Stockholm's Central Station, then took the metro to Radmansgatan. In the process, I bought a metro pass for 200 Swedish Kronor/crowns (~$28) which allowed up to 8 rides - so as low as 25 SEK per ride, vs. 44 SEK for a single ride. I had another flirt with fame when the lady at the metro ticket counter asked if I "played something" (music or sports), commenting that I looked like I did. In any case, I was able to find Hotel Birger Jarl fairly easily using my phone, and was checked in by 8:30. I stayed in for the rest of the night - I hung up my still mildly damp (from the nonfunctional dryers) clothes to fully dry and planned out some activities for the next day using guides that I had picked up from the airport tourist info center.

Eurotrip 2012 - Day 10 (6/24) - Helsinki

We woke up in time to get a quick breakfast at the hotel before taking a taxi to the Linda Lines terminal at the port. I also found out that the sole of my right shoe was coming off, but it thankfully was not too bad just yet. We took the 10 AM boat (the same catamaran) back to Helsinki. It was pretty cold (perhaps 50 °F) and windy out when we arrived, but we braved the weather to walk to the Uspenski Cathedral. After that we walked to the nearest metro station, with a stop at the Helsinki Cathedral so Steffi could go inside this time, and took that 2 stops to Kamppi before walking back to the hostel.

After freshening up in the room and eating Joe's leftover pizza that was in the fridge, Steffi and I asked at the front desk for a nearby shoemaker/cobbler and we were directed to Kamppi again. We walked over there and found the place (Kamppi Suutari), and the guy there was able to fix my shoe in about 20 minutes for only €11. We swung by the movie theater and decided to return in about an hour for the 5:15 showing of Prometheus in 3D. We went to the nearby frozen yogurt place (JoGo) and then walked up to the Rock Church, just like Joe and I had done a couple of days prior. After checking out the church, we wandered in search of (Sokos) Hotel Torni, which has a bar that afforded some great views of Helsinki. We couldn't find it, despite getting directions from a souvenir shop worker who seemed excited about the place. We eventually asked some police officers, who gave us directions again, but had to return to the theater for the movie (which was super expensive - €29 for both of us - and had assigned seating). After watching the movie we did eventually find the hotel, and we went up to the Ateljee Bar. We checked out the balcony view and then Steffi also checked out the women's restroom, which was hyped as having a similarly spectacular view.

The next order of business was finding dinner. We looked and asked around for a Finnish restaurant, but we couldn't find one that was open. So we settled on a Nepalese and Middle Easter restaurant - I went the Nepalese route with the butter chicken, a misleading name since the sauce is tomato based. After dinner we walked back to Elmo Bar,which was packed this time, to watch the England vs. Italy quarterfinal game despite their €3 cover charge. The match went to penalty kicks, with Italy triumphing, so we didn't get back to the hostel until after midnight.

Eurotrip 2012 - Day 9 (6/23) - Tallinn

Our activity for this day was motivated by 2 things. First, we had already knocked off a lot of the interesting Helsinki attractions the day before. Second, most things were closed in Helsinki that day due to the midsummer holiday and festivals. We asked the hostel worker at the desk for recommended day trips, and she mentioned Tallin (the capital of Estonia) and Porvoo (a medieval style town with old wooden buildings). We decided to walk to the bus terminal to check out the bus schedule for Porvoo, and to the boat terminal to check out the schedule for Tallin. The bus terminal at Kamppi was first - we found out that the Porvoo bus leaves every hour on the hour. We then walked to the Makasiiniterminaali to check on the Linda Line boats. The next boat to Tallinn was to leave at 12, but the last boat back that day was at 5 (due to the holiday). Since the ride takes 1.5 hours, that left us about 3 hours to explore the city. The boat schedule was to return to normal the next day, but the seats were all sold out in the directions we would want to go (to Tallinn early, and to Helsinki late). But then Steffi, in a typical stroke of brilliance, suggested that we take the 12:00 there that day and a morning boat (10:00) back the next day. Tickets were available for this, so that's exactly what we did.

We boarded the boat a little before 12 and arrived in Tallinn a bit late - closer to 2. It was raining fairly hard when we arrived, so we almost began regretting our decision (especially since it apparently had not yet begun raining in Helsinki). After taking a moment to gather ourselves and take shelter from the rain as much as we could, we took a taxi to the city center. I think this taxi driver also wanted to be a Hollywood stunt driver, but he eventually got us to the tourist info center in the middle of the city. We were glad that he took us to such a convenient place, but we later found (the next day after taking another cab back to the port) that he apparently took us the long route to squeeze an extra €4 or so out of us (~14 vs.~10). At the tourist center we found out that a bunch of things were also closed in Tallinn due to the holiday (though I'm not sure if it was the same holiday). We thought about changing tickets to head back to Helsinki that evening, but decided against it since the rain was about to hit Helsinki as well. Instead we headed for a nearby shopping mall which was open.

The mall had a Vapiano restaurant, which Steffi likes (and I had never been), so we ate there. After eating and drying off a little bit we went out to proposition a taxi driver to drive us around town for a flat fee, but he declined (or didn't understand what we were asking). So we went back into the mall and looked around a bit. We bought a dry shirt for Steffi and then started looking up some potential hotels for the night. By that time the rain had mostly subsided, so we headed out to check out some sites that Steffi had looked up on the tourist map. We walked through the Old Town past the Nilguliste Museum, then through the Town Square (next to Town Hall), then found St. Catherine's Passage, then went up and walked the longest remaining section of the town wall. From the wall we spotted the Baltic Hotel Vana Wiru, so we went to inquire there. Their price of €99 for a twin room for the night was better than we had been offered at another place (and than we had seen online for other nearby hotels), so we took it.

After checking out the room we went out again in search of some supplies. We found another mall that was even bigger and got a bit distracted by shopping. We eventually regained focus and found the supermarket in on the bottom level and bought some supplies (toothbrushes, etc.) for the the night as well as some food to snack on. We left the mall as they closed around 7 and walked back to the hotel to lounge around in the room for the rest of the night. The TV had some channels that were in English, so we watched part of a movie and ate some of the food we had bought. We also watched Spain beat France in the Euro quarterfinal match before going to bed.

Observation of the day: Both Helsinki and Tallinn have bus terminals beneath their main shopping malls. It's kind of a neat idea.

Eurotrip 2012 - Day 8 (6/22) - Hello, Steffi

Our room in the hostel was equipped with a mini kitchen and cooking/eating utensils. So we used the provider bowls, spoons, and glasses to have a breakfast of cereal and juice. We were feeling a bit lazy this morning, so we didn't get going until 11:45. We first walked to the Rock Church, which was free to enter. We then headed over to Senate Square and the Helsinki Cathedral. The cathedral was not terribly impressive, especially after seeing the Russian ones, but it was free to enter as well, so I have no complaints. After that we wandered back to the hostel around, arriving around 1:45, to wait for Steffi.

We met up with Steffi around 2:15 in the hostel lounge. After introducing Steffi and Joe, the three of us then went wandering around looking for food. We settled on an Asian buffet. We ate there until they kicked us out when they closed at 3:30, then went wandering some more. We went by the parliament building, then decided to go to Suomenlinna, an old sea fortress on a group of islands just southeast of Helsinki. We walked through Senate Square, with a stop for Steffi to buy us all ice cream, and then on to Market Square, where we took the ferry to Suomenlinna. We wandered around the islands for a couple of hours and then took the ferry back to the city. From Market Square we walked back to the hostel, arriving around 7:30.

We all met up again at 9 and walked to the nearby Elmo Bar to watch the Germany vs. Czech Republic game. Steffi "forced" Joe and I to wear some Germany t-shirts that she had brought us. The bar had a €3 cover charge, which was a bit ridiculous, but we paid it anyway. We got a table in the corner and ordered dinner (I had a burger) before the game started. The bar was pretty empty until about midway through the first half of the game, but then started to fill in a bit - though pretty much everyone was able to sit. We watched Germany administer a beatdown to the Czechs, then returned to the hostel to turn in for the night.

Observation of the day: Sunrise in Helsinki on this day was officially at 3:55 AM and sunset was at 10:51 PM, yielding 18 hours and 56 minutes of daylight.