Day 7 - Sep. 8th.

Though we'd enjoyed Sweden, we were ready for a change of pace.  We gave the house a final cleaning and as we were getting packed, I realized I'd neglected to take any pics beforehand, so I got a few before we left.

The main entryway, living room/dining room, washroom, and kitchen downstairs

The living room, and comfy chaise

The back patio

Second floor, master bedroom on the left (with my crap on the bed), bathroom on the right

Staircase leading to third floor loft area

We probably left the place cleaner than we'd found it.  And we left Magnus a linen fee--it was the first we've ever seen an AirBnB place charging a linen fee, but whatever, it was still a pretty good setup.  He also wanted to charge us for any food that we used, so we made sure to leave exactly four eggs like we found, and hard boiled the rest to take with us. We left some ice cream, he better have enjoyed it.

Though we'd known about Magnus' penny-pinching ways prior to departure, it still left a sour taste in our mouths (especially when the guy was able to afford two residences in Sweden, and left his Audi parked in the reserved spot).  It turned out to set the tone for the morning, and I think it's safe to say that it was the beginning of the low point in the trip for me.

We packed up the car and headed to Gothenburg's central station.  Fortunately, there was a Hertz rental car agency there, and unfortunately, we were only able to find one gas station nearby.  Again, it was the choice of diesel, premium, or the tantalizing-yet-unusable E85.  Actually, there was an option for V-Power too--I don't know what that is, but don't want to ask.

Quick American math, that's about $50 for a little over 6.5 gallons, or about $7.50/gal

I knew it was going to be pricey, but still the reality of it was still a tough pill to swallow.  But hey, it's probably still better than what the charge would have been for them to fill it up.

We went into the train station and had a little time to kill, so looked into renting a locker so we could leave the luggage and wander around the city for a little bit.  I expected it to be a reasonably extortionate fee, something like $8 or so, but I was silly and naive.  It would have cost around $20.  There are times I think it's OK to splurge, but spending $20 on a locker for a couple hours wasn't one of them.  So, we decided to hang out in the station.  Fine, it was a nice enough station and we'd be headed out soon anyway.  Therry needed to use the bathroom, but of course, nothing is free in Sweden.  $2 to pee.  That was the final straw for me.

Sweden truly had some great things going on, but the charging for every little stinking thing, and then having the audacity to charge extortionate prices for each thing--it just struck me as petty and relentlessly aggravating.

I didn't want to bring Therry's spirits down with me, but I think she was a little sick of it too.  She left me to stew with my book, while she wandered around the station and got some feel-good pastries.  (I didn't ask how much they were, and that was probably a good idea).

The lipstick building making another appearance

Nutella, take me away

We had some cash left to spend before leaving the country, so spent entirely too much for some touristy trinkets.  I got some postcards to send back to folks back home and did my best to not convey my aggravation in the text.

Soon enough we were on the train, and on our way to Copenhagen.  As is usually the case with trains, it was very roomy and comfortable, and in this instance, nearly empty.  I've always enjoyed my trips on American trains, but it's safe to say that the Swedes do it better.  If nothing else, they go a lot faster.

That's about 105 mph, and it went faster

Grumpin' can be tiring

We had a stopover in Malmo, and Therry insisted I take a stroll around the city by myself, just to take in some sights.  I was still grumpy, but didn't have any compelling reason for not heeding her advice, so I struck out for a little walk.

The main town square

I wandered into this old church

They had a nave that was off limits with some 400 year old paintings

I can't quite make it out, but I'm confident that it's old

Obligatory organ pic

I was still grumpy when I got back to the station, but did feel better for having gotten fresh air and a modicum of exercise.  We soon were due to board our train to Copenhagen, with some confusion as to which train was actually ours.  Fortunately the train station employees werre friendly and fluent in English, and assured us that we were indeed boarding the correct train.

Soon we were on our way to Denmark, and got to cross the famous Oresund Bridge.

Not the easiest picture to capture at high speed with shitty camera

Scandinavians and their renewable energy, psh.

If you look closely, there's a huge windfarm out in the middle of the water. Pretty cool.

It was a short ride from Malmo to Copenhagen, and we were soon in the heart of Copenhagen.  We were going to be staying with Gelo (pronounced like Jell-O), Therry's long time friend from the Phillipines,  Gelo lived in the middle of downtown Copenhagen.  Whereas in our previous stays, we were technically in the cities we were visiting, we were more accurately in more suburban regions.  Not the case with Gelo's place, everything here was old, and very active.

We had a good little walk to get to Gelo's, probably a little over a mile.  It wasn't a bad walk, but Copenhagen is a very pedestrian friendly city, and we had to do our best to navigate the crowds while rolling our luggage over cobblestones.  Eventually we got there though.

An interesting facet to our visit to Gelo's was that he was actually in the process of moving out, and had to be out of the apartment on the same day that we were flying back to the US.  Naturally, we didn't want to be an imposition, but he insisted we stay, so we figured we'd help him pack and clean as a way of saying thanks.

Gelo wasn't home when we got there, and we were a bit surprised to see that almost nothing was packed.  In fact, it didn't really look like it had been cleaned since Therry's last visit a little under a year ago.  I didn't care though, it was generous of him to offer us a place to stay, and the location was sublime.

We hung out and relaxed for a bit, until we decided it was time for dinner.  We wandered around Copenhagen's maze of streets and stumbled upon a Mediterranean buffet.  It was somewhat pricey, but not unreasonable, about $16 per person.  I also had a large beer, which in retrospect was a mistake.  It was 750 mL, which was nice, but the beer was just generic European lager, and of course, expensive.  The food was good though, and we stuffed ourselves.  Besides one somewhat creepy Dane who stared at us and left shortly after we arrived, the restaurant was empty.

We went back to Gelo's and he showed up soon after.  We were introduced, and he brought us up to speed on his most recent exploits.  He'd just taken a trip to Iceland for a gathering called "Bears on Ice," and he was in love with both Iceland and an Icelander that he met there.  To make things just a little awkward, I apparently bear an uncanny resemblance to the guy.

Nonetheless, Gelo was very welcoming, and we hit the hay soon thereafter.  A consequence of living in such a prime location, I quickly realized, is that the city doesn't quiet down for you when you're ready for bed.

Day 6 - Sept. 7th

Therry and I weren't sure what we wanted to do, but we had another day of the rental car, so figured we'd make use of it somehow.  We mulled around and had coffee.

The essence of energy

I didn't have anything in particular I wanted to see, but I did kind of have an itch to play some more disc golf.  I floated the idea by Therry, and she didn't need much prodding.  We decided to check out the other course that was nearby, Slottsskogen.  The course was in a city park of the same name, which was huge, about 340 acres and the disc golf course was but a small portion of it.  And like other big city parks, like Central, Stanley, Golden Gate, etc., it was definitely a popular place to be on a Sunday.

We got to the park easily with the SatNav, but the one parking lot we tried was chaotic--like a shopping mall on Christmas Eve.  We got out of there as quickly as we could and drove around the perimeter of the park and eventually found street parking.  We couldn't really understand what the parking rules were, they seemed to differ from block to block, and saw that someone in front of us had been ticketed.  We just fed the meter for 3 hours and hoped for the best.

We had a bit of a walk to get to the course, probably the better part of a mile.  Of course, when we got there, I saw that there was a huge parking lot a couple hundred meters from where the course was.  Oh well.  This course, like Järva was pay to play, but unlike Järva, it was busy and the pro shop (or booth, in this case) was occupied, It was 35 SEK, which is $5 more or less. Usually, if a course is pay to play, I expect it to be a pretty special experience.  This was a special experience for us, of course, but objectively speaking, the course wasn't all that and a bag of potato chips.

It was fun, and had good natural terrain to work with, but the holes were all pretty short, close together, and it was crowded. And naturally, it had a pretty worn in feel to it. But, it was still indeed fun.

The basket is up over that hill somewhere.

More or less in that direction

Why not?

Being that it was the first crowded course we'd experienced, it was fitting that we got to see our first Swedish disc golf douchery.  Our first encounter was a guy unloading his bag on one of the few open holes.  He was about halfway through his bag when we approached the tee, he looked over at us, and continued to throw disc after disc at the basket.  To his credit, he did wave us through when he was walking around trying to find all his discs.  I felt a little smug as I parked the hole with my first (and only!) shot.

Then a few holes later, we encountered what I could only surmise as the "local pros."  Unlike most Swedish disc golfers I'd seen, these guys had full on backpack bags with 20+ discs, and they walked around like they owned the place.  They were obviously playing some sort of safari (made up) layout, and took their time playing through the middle of a couple other fairways.  One of the dudes just stood in the middle of the fairway and carried on a conversation while people on multiple holes just waited on him.  He was either oblivious or just didn't give a shit.  I'm betting on the latter. We ended up playing behind them for much of the round, and had to wait on them taking multiple shots more than a few times.  Douches.  But, we've certainly got them in the states too.

Should've taken more pictures, but at least I remembered on the 18th hole.

We finished the round, and could have played more, but the skies were looking progressively ominous, and we were concerned about the parking situation.  Before we left though, we had to check out this big hill next to the course.  It looked like there was a ski jump there.

Is that...?

Sure looks like it...

Yup, I do believe they've got a ski jump in this here park

It was indeed a ski jump.  A little research uncovered that it's over 100 years old, and no longer used for ski jumping (obviously).  People do apparently still sled down it though.  Props to them, is all I can say.

A better sense of proportion

I feel I look exceptionally Nordic here

We made our way back to the car following some of the inner trails of the park, and were relieved to see that there was no ticket waiting for us.  We got in the car and headed towards downtown Gothenburg to explore.  There was an area that was supposed to be the kind of grungy-bohemian part of town, where I guess the hipsters and artists hang out.  We drove through there, but didn't see the galleries and sex shops like we had read about.  It seemed to be popular no doubt, and kind of trendy, but it didn't strike me as all that remarkable.

 As we were driving around, we were sampling the big bag of candy we'd bought the night before.  The Ika had a huge bulk candy section, and we'd taken samples of the European candy we weren't familiar with, and what looked good.  There was a good amount of licorice in there, and that was pretty good, as well as the Haribo of course.  But one thing that we got--I don't know what it was supposed to be--but it tasted like cat litter.  Used cat litter.  It was extremely tart and had an ammonia overtone to it.  It was nassssssssty.  But, what can you expect from a culture that eats fermented fish?

This is known as the lipstick building.  Can't figure that one out.

As you can see in the pictures, the weather wasn't great this day.   It was the first day of our trip that wasn't filled with sunshine, and soon enough it started raining.  One of the sights Therry read about in her guidebook was a water tower that you could go up in and have a great view of the city.  Granted it wasn't the best day for scenery, but it was actually something in Sweden that was free.  That in itself was worth a gander.

We took a winding road to the top of a hill and found the tower awaiting us.  In a kind of surreal experience, you could just drive around underneath the tower and park wherever you deemed it proper.

Apparently, water towers are a part of civic pride in Gothenburg, and they have a bunch of them, each uniquely designed.

Ours is on the upper right

  There's a cafe at the top of the tower as well, and it seemed to be doing a good amount of business.  We were just there for the view though, so stepped outside into the elements.

With a better camera and better conditions, you could see the other water towers

And Gothenburg for that matter

We decided to take the elevator back down for shits and giggles.  Little did we know that the elevator was a concept model for the Coffin of Doom®.

I wasn't claustrophobic beforehand. 

We headed back to the house from there, and mostly had a lazy night in, eating ad hoc meatballs, and watching Swedish TV (mostly American TV with subtitles).  We got our train tickets to Copenhagen and finished off our ice cream cake.