After another great breakfast before we rugged up and headed off to the bottle shop – System Bolaget (In Sweden, alcohol can only be purchased directly from a government shop). Pete, Simon and all the kids in the bus and the rest of us with Ylva. The kids stayed in the car while the adults bought some Australian wine and some Glögg wine. Glögg wine is a hot spiced wine enjoyed at Christmas time. With these purchases on board we headed into Stockholm.
We walked through the old town to catch a ferry over to the Island of Skeppsholmen.
After a short, freezing walk we arrived at the Swedish Centre for Architecture and Design to view the Gingerbread house exhibition. This is an annual competition. They entries ranged from young children through to experienced bakers. The outcome was an amazing array of houses. The theme was thinking outside the box. These are our favourite houses.
We had a freezing walk into town. It was raining a little and the wind chill gave us ice cream headaches on the outside. The old town of Stockholm is amazing. The architecture and colours evoke a wow. We walked through the Christmas Market. The kids loved looking at the lollies and the crafts.
It was now time the Christmas Table – a traditional Smorgasbord filled with traditional Swedish fare eaten at Christmas time accompanied with Swedish beer and Schnapps. Ylva and Simon had booked back in August. The venue was the old National Archive building which created an amazing atmosphere with fairy lights, wood panelling and a Christmas tree. We were joined by Simon’s parents. It was amazing – we started with Herring and fish, with the next course being cold cuts and cheese before moving into the hot food which consisted of meatball, fish pie, blood puddings, pork spare ribs, potatoes, with creamed spinach and brussel sprouts.
We passed the afternoon with much food, laughter, traditional Swedish carols and schnapps accompanied by many toasts – Skål. It was so much fun. We exited around 5pm to darkness. We walked passed the Opera house to NK which is like David Jones in Australia. Here the children (and some of the Adults) had photos with Santa before viewing the Christmas windows (reminding us a little of the Myer Windows back home).
We headed back home full and smiling after another great day.
