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If you ever want to visit Sweden, go in June or July. The sunlight almost all day and night is remarkable. The month of May can be cool but beautiful and August can be very warm and still on the tail end of the summer light. September is fall. This September was not fall and many newspapers said it was the warmest and nicest in 100 years. We liked it and enjoyed mild days and abundant sunshine most days.
Speaking of visits, if you do go to Gothenburg, Sweden’s west coast “capital” (Stockholm is the real one), this post from theLocal.se has a good review of things to do. I agree with most of them.
Some things they don’t cover that are good to know. Taxi’s. There are competing companies and some charge more than others. You can ask for a fixed price to and from the airport and it should run 300-400 SEK or about 45-60 USD at today’s exchange rate. Don’t let them charge you more for bags. One of the cheapest ones in town, but not always available, is the mini-tax that is a good sized car and holds a ton of luggage. They are RED and say mini-taxi. Their local number is 140140 and options are in English if you need them.
You can take a tram, bus or train just about anywhere. You can get a day or multi day pass and ride all you want but not outside the local area where you may have to pay an upcharge. During the daytime trams come often, many times some share some stops for quick on-off and at night you can have long waits so be aware. You can also walk most of the city. Bring good shoes and if you don’t mind say a 15-30min stroll between sights you can just walk from place to place (just watch out for bicycles as they fly)!
[youtube width=”300″ height=”250″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4InCOYv6ANA
Rather than fill this post up with lots of city photos, I just made a quick video if you want to see some of the sights of the city. It really is a beautiful city with so much history and neat architecture.
So how did I spend my time? With mom! She is actually doing much better and I am treasuring each day. The Swedish medical system, while slow and can be frustrating as a socialized system, did get it right (it just took 8 months to find the issue). Anyway, so on to daily life!
Time out and about shopping, visits to my mom’s favorite café for treats and a few dinners out.
Lots of help around the flat and such was not just fun but provided so many warm moments for me. As I have said 100 times, this is why I collect points.
Lisa & I did make time to have lunch with blog reader David who lives in Gothenburg. As always it was very enjoyable to see you David and thank you for your tips for Rome – they were very helpful!
Then it was time to go home via Rome since routing via FCO works as a Skyteam partner. But we had to connect via Amsterdam since there are no direct flights.
[youtube width=”300″ height=”250″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1pJ31nNmln0
The trip down was nice. We were on a city hopper ERJ-190 that is 2+2 and is tight and really not much better than a CJR100/200 but seems bigger and leg room is better.
There was only 1 other passenger in the business class cabin so Lisa & I both got two seats for ourselves. Not bad but still not as good as any Delta business class seat on any bird they fly.
But even a short hop to Amsterdam we got a nice little snack on the way down to our connecting city.
It was such a nice day to fly, that and the fact that we were on the way to Rome, made leaving Sweden almost OK!
Upon landing we headed over to the domestic side KLM crown lounge as we did have almost 4 hours to kill before our connecting flight.
That was time enough for a snack and it was quite nummy. From soup to snacks, KLM does a good job (I just wish they had the teriyaki chicken wings out)!
Then time for Rome. We were on a 737 with a blocked middle seat and as you can see I had a ton of leg room thanks to row one seat C.
On a less than 2 hour flight a nice dinner service was presented. I would call this on par with the shorter Delta dinner service but nothing as good as a Delta transcon one!
Also interesting was just before Departure a president of an African country boarded the flight (I did not get which one) with his entourage. He and his security man were seated in the row across from us and one more official in business. The rest, including some military official with lots of bling was back in coach. Upon deplaning they had everyone stay in place while they all got off first. They then proceeded to block the departure area with lots of people meeting them at the gate. Flying is always an adventure.
So that wraps up the outbound trip and part two of my adventure to and from Sweden. I will breakout the review of the Sheraton later today as a separate post as well as a final post Monday about my tips for a visit to Rome as well as my Alitalia Magnifica trip back home. – René
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Maybe you flew with the King of Zamunda?(old Eddie Murphy ‘Coming to America’ reference).
Nice to hear that your mother is doing better.
@LarsErik – very very kind of you to say. My thanks! – Rene
Looks gorgeous, and while in gothenburg, you can pick out a peachy new Volvo and have them ship it home to you (says the mourning Saab-driver trying to imagine his conversion). Also, to echo Lars, happy you are able to spend time with your mother and that she’s feeling better.