After 3 days in Copenhagen, I met up with my brother, who had been in Denmark for a conference, and we headed to Stockholm, Sweden. After a smooth, relaxing train ride there, my life decided things were going a little too well, and I forgot my camera and passport under my seat. Almost as if to torture me, I realized just in time to make it back to the train, but also just late enough to watch it drive away, and I was overcome by a flood of emotions (panic mainly, but also kind of hopefulness that I'd be stuck in Sweden for the rest of my life). We spent the day running around the city: first to the Canadian Embassy, then to get new passport photos taken (let me tell you: the best way to see the most of a city is to lose your passport.), and just as I’d come to terms with the fact that I’d have to have all my stuff shipped over and learn Swedish, the train company informed us that they had found my stuff (*bittersweet cheering*).
I really wanted to make the most of being in another country, and made an effort to order as culturally accurate meals as possible. For dinner, we ate at a restaurant called Slingerbulten, where we had Swedish meatballs (note: way better than Ikea’s), pike-perch with a chanterelle sauce, and a delicious Swedish IPA called Brutal Bulldog.
The next day, we went on a self-guided hike around the Stockholm archipelagoes. We booked the hike through an excursion company who provided us with a map, a compass, and a backpack filled with lunch, snacks, and water. To be honest, the route the company had given us was pretty boring, so we took matters into our own hands and started climbing the tallest rocks we could find to get the widest view of the water.
When we got back to the city, we wandered over to the Gamla Stan, attempted to visit the Nobel Museum (sadly, it was closed), and had dinner at a restaurant called The Flying Elk. We hated our meal; it made us both feel nauseous, and we were so disappointed, so to make ourselves feel better, we got some delicious Belgian waffles and chilled in the old streets.
On our third day in Sweden, we took a train over to Gothenburg, the country’s second largest city. We visited an amusement park more so for the cotton candy and pictures than to go on rides. I’m a busy-city girl, so I wasn’t a huge fan of Gothenburg, but the seafood: omg. We ate at a restaurant called Sjöbaren, and our meal was indescribable. We learned from the couple we shared a table with that most seafood restaurants aren’t open on Sundays because there is no fishing on Saturday, so of course, they don’t want to serve old fish. Sjöbaren however, does fish on Saturday, so we got so lucky that they were open.
From Gothenburg, we took a ferry to Frederikshavn, and then took another train to Aarhus, Denmark, where we had 5 hours to kill before catching our last train back to Copenhagen. In all honesty, I didn't enjoy Aarhus very much, either because it's another very small town or because I was exhausted from the whole trip and kind of just wanted to get home. The ARoS museum is beautiful though, and I was pretty upset they were closed and that I was only able to get the below picture.
All in all I had a great trip, and learned a lot about solo traveling and the Nordic lifestyle. Iceland is definitely a country to visit for more than 3 days and if you are an adventurous person. The Nordic countries are very slow paced, very eco-friendly, and very happy. It is completely understandable why they're some of the safest and happiest countries in the world, and I think that either the rest of the world should follow suite, or we should all pack our bags and start learning Swedish (or Danish, or Icelandic).