When I was doing my research about the city (and I always do my research) there were sooo many things worth a visit that came up and ended on my list.
I knew right away I won’t be able to visit most of them but I didn’t know how to make a choice.
When we finally came to Stockholm on our way back from Swedish Lapland, Kiruna my choice had immediately become clear to me.
The thing is, you see, it all depends on the weather…
In summer it might be all rosy with never-ending days and beautiful weather, but winter is a different story.
First of all, you only have a few hours of daylight. When we were there at the beginning of January the sun came up at around 11 am and went down at 2 pm. That’s really not a whole lot of time to enjoy the beautiful scenery outside, so hurry!
And then, of course, there is that snow, or rain, or snow, or rain. Brrr, you do have to plan for those hot wine or coffee stops.
So, here is what we ended up doing.
In the morning it was raining quite hard, so Vasa Museum had become our stop number one.
And it was a really good choice. We spent easily a couple of hours there and we haven’t been bored for a minute. It has really good reviews on Tripadvisor and I would second them in a heartbeat. I won’t go into the description of the museum, there is a lot of it on the Internet. My personal impression though – they did a very good job at making one sunken ship a whole museum. There are a lot of interactive areas, short but interesting films and stories. And the ship itself is truly magnificent. Too bad it never got to sail deep waters.
At the end of it, we wanted to have a bite in the museum’s restaurant but found it to be a bit pricey for a quick bite. Instead, we had delicious hot dogs at the outside kiosk.
So, now the rain is stopped and the sun is out. Well, maybe not the sun, but at least it’s light.
There is no public transportation from Vasa Museum, so we walked. All the way to Gamla Stan, which wasn’t all the far after all. And that’s when we got to see the city.
It is absolutely charming. Very European. Everywhere in the centre of the city, you will be surrounded by beautiful architecture, pedestrian streets, small and big churches, it’s really lovely. It reminded me quite a lot about St-Petersburg but on a smaller scale.
Gamla Stan is a whole new level of charming. With its narrow cobbled streets, Christmas lights, shops and restaurants it will give a really good dose of Europe in a compressed period of time.
We wondered for about an hour there and decided to come back in the evening, Especially because it was a walking distance from our “Frey’s hotel”.
But there were two more things I absolutely had to do: Stockholm metro and the Public library.
Stockholm underground system (subway) is famous for its art decorations. As many as 90 stations have been painted by their famous artists. Some are colourful, some are not, but they are all unique. We didn’t have time to visit all of them, but the ones I have chosen were really cool.
Why won’t you have a lot of time to visit them all. Well, that’s because trains come only every 7 minutes. If you buy a day pass, you will be able to visit more. But a single ticket gives you only 90 minutes, and before you know it you already have to buy another one.
That’s exactly what we did though. We bought our single passes thinking that we will just jump out of the train, look around and quickly jump into another one. But no… we didn’t know that every time we jumped out we would have to wait for 7 minutes.
So we ended up buying a second single pass which was still a bit cheaper than a day pass.
Here are my favourite stations:
- Stadion (red line)
- Bergsharma (red line)
- T-Centralen (all lines)
- Kungsträdgården (blue line)
- Hallonbergen (blue line)
- Solna Centrum (blue line)
- Fridhemsplan (green line)
- Thorildsplan (green line)
I LOVED LOVED LOVED Stockholm’s metro stations. I wish I could visit more. It is such a nice way to decorate the city where winters are so long and days are so short.
And I have seen beautiful metro in Moscow and St-Petersburg but I liked the modern spin on it in Stockholm. It wasn’t an immediate wow, more like a modern museum of arts kinda experience, slow but sure appreciation.
Another landmark absolutely worth a visit is Stockholm’s Public Library.
For a book lover like myself, it is heaven to see so many paper books in a row!
Out of all the books there, guess which one got our attention…
I was also quite impressed with how well-automated everything was. There are what looks like ATM machines everywhere that let you check in and check out your books without going to the counter. The best presentation of the old and the new wolds fusion.
By now, the best part of the day is gone and it’s pitch dark outside.
Now, it’s a good time to go back to Gamla Stan to see it lit up with thousands of lights, have a supper and a special Swedish desert in one of the many coffee shops.
We did that. Mniam. And took a walk back to the hotel across the bridge in the town centre towards the train station, where our hotel was situated.
On the way back we saw the skating rink.
Lights, lights and more lights.
Exhausted but satisfied I believe we made the most of it.
And even though I am not sure I would spend a whole lot of time in Stockholm, it is definitely worth a quick visit on the way in or out of Lapland.
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