Trip Diary - Overview Part II

[mothwing]

Short version: walked, hiked, biked, and went on buses, taxis and trains. Met people from various countries and centuries, got sunburnt, fainted, went back home.

17.07.2013 - Rug Chapel, Llangollen, Valle Crucis Abbey

• A lovely lady with a strong Welsh accent at the Chapel's gift shop.


• Rug chapel is lovely, though the decorations are a bit much.


• Did not see as much of Llangollen as we had hoped because it was absolutely packed.


• Decided to go have a look at Valle Crucis Abbey instead to make best use of our Explorer Passes.

18.07.2013 - Heritage walk of hill forts

• the NHS warnings have been upped to level 2, asking people to stay indoors and regularly checking on aging relatives. It's 25°C, so this seems pretty ridiculous.


• Went on another heritage walk, this time on Offa's Dyke to see hillforts. Did see one hillfort.


• Unfortunately, it took longer than expected to find the starting point for this walk at Llangwyfan and therefore we only started at around 11am, having us gambolling about on the summits in the sun around noon.


• We lost our way and fought our way through waist-high bracken on our way back to the path, nearly had a heatstroke and decided that the NHS heat warnings have a point after all.

19.07.2013 - Travelling to Stockholm

• Had to drive up to Edinburgh in the morning to catch our flight, so we spend most of this day on the road.


• We both miss Scotland. A lot. Well, and now Wales, too.


• It was weird to leave "our" car behind. I got quite attached to it over this week.


• Norway looks unreal from above. No wonder Slartibartfast got that award.


• Stockholm Taxis are insanely expensive.

20.07.2013 - Exploring Stockholm

• Stockholm is lovely as any city close to the water is.


• Gamla Stan is as pretty as announced, as are the other islands.


• It seems to be mostly populated by German and American tourists, however. I don't think I heard a lot of Swedish while we were there because everybody seems to be speaking English or German.


• It has lovely shops and a Viking-themed restaurant and several Viking-themed gift shops.


• We spent a couple of hours at the bookshop and picked up several children's books for Crocky. Her reading age seems to be 9-12 based on her language proficiency. Mind you, Swedish doesn't seem that hard, so I'm somewhat tempted to do a course myself.


• Stockholm is really expensive.

21.07.2013 - By train to Malmö

• I am fascinated by how much more comfortable, clean and well-furnished Swedish trains are. There are electric sockets! And free wireless! And moderately clean toilets! What is wrong with German trains?


• Carrying around 30kg of luggage is about as fun as it sounds, especially since I don't have a nice backpacking rucksack rather than a large unwieldy bag. Curiously enough I've always rather enjoyed carrying heavy things around for longer amounts of time, so this was also a bit of a challenge to myself.


• Malmö at first sight is pretty, but my god, the people are so unfriendly! Our hostel manager didn't understand our name and then snapped at us for not making the booking correctly.


• Natives will switch to English as soon as they notice that you're from another country. Which is fun for me, whose pidgin-Swedish is non-existent, but frustrating for Crocky, who is actually here to improve her spoken Swedish.

22.07.2013 - Biking around Malmö

• St. Petri is one beautiful church. The stained glass windows are amazing, and the multilingual graves.


• Bike rental may just be my favourite aspect of this journey after car rental. We had a great time with these things.


• Malmö has a serious problem with geese. There are far too many of these birds in this town.


• It also has a surprising number of really beautiful parks.

23.07.2013 - Bus to Viking village near Höllviken

• Went to the viking village near Höllviken. There were Viking reenactors from various European countries there, but none seemed up for a chat, so I left them alone.


• Afterwards we decided to explore Höllviken a little and went on a walk around town. The blazing heat made it less than enjoyable and everything was closed, but there were still a lot of nice sights.


• What wasn't fun was the commute back on the packed and overheated bus.


• What also wasn't fun was fainting on it.


• The reactions people had were amazing, however. They instantly steered us to seats, gave really good first aid advice, and one incredible lady even performed some emergency Reiki on me. Not sure what did the trick, but I felt better instantly. Got off still feeling very shaky, but I think Crocky got worse of a shock than I did. Still. Not fun.

24.07.2013 - Concert in Malmö, travelling back home

• Saw a lunchtime concert at St. Petri's. The organist looked our age and played his JBS fuge so that you could have danced to it and his Hindemiths really well as well.


• The train ride back was unfortunately in a German train without any of the amenities offered by their Swedish and Danish counterparts. The toilets were really bad as well.


• We met a nice Australian backpacker on her way to Switzerland who's off to explore Southern Europe for the next couple of months. I'm somewhat jealous.


• Arrived in Hamburg at around 1am and brunched with my Mum the next day.