aventuras de alyssa

Our first trip as a group was to Stockholm for the weekend of November 11th-13th! It was my first time in Sweden and we had the most perfect weather! I flew out of the Stansted Airport (which is about 1.5 hours from my flat via bus and train) on Ryan Air. It was a very easy flight and I met my friends in Stockholm. My friend found this amazing Airbnb in Gamla Stan, which translates to Old Town, that was over 400 years old and had a dungeon. Before I get into the weekend, here’s two key things to note about Sweden:

1. The sun sets VERY early in the fall/winter time. Be prepared for many hours of darkness if you go when we did. I knew it was going to get dark early, but this felt excessively early once we were actually there.
2. They have strict liquor laws in Sweden – you can only purchase alcohol over 3.5% in their state-run stores and these stores have limited hours, aka they close at 3 pm on Saturdays and don’t open on Sundays. You can still get drinks out at bars (they stay open late – later than London) and lower percentage beer from the 7-11s, but if you want to drink at home in your dungeon, be sure to purchase your alcohol before 3 pm… We learned this the very hard way and accidentally UberEats delivered about $100 worth of alcohol-free wine and beer to our Airbnb… We’ve learned our lesson now! And in all honesty, we did not need anything higher than 3.5%!

Also, I’d like to mention that we went to Sweden with no plans (except for Saturday brunch). We showed up and figured it out on the go, which turned out to be incredibly fun! If you’ve been before and think we missed something vital, leave a comment and let me know! I’m sure I’ll be back – there’s definitely so much more to see and do.

friday

After dropping bags off at the Airbnb, we went to this viking bar called Aifur where they announced our arrival and had my friend walk on top of the table to get to his seat! There was live music and lots of cheering – it was incredibly fun! I had the Helga salad, and several pints out of ceramic pots. We met up with our friends, who had gotten there later, at another bar that was downstairs in a cave called Sjätte Tunnan. It was a medieval cellar that we picked because it was open until 3 am. We met a variety of characters there – some guy named Woody who was wearing an expensive suit (allegedly – we never got confirmation on this), a man dressed as a pirate, and a girl who told us you can’t visit Manchester or Liverpool for more than three days (apparently there’s not much more to do after that). It was an interesting evening that ended with us having a dance party in the dungeon until 4 in the morning!

saturday

On Saturday, we had brunch at Österlånggatan 17. We sat outside and enjoyed the sunny and warm weather. The food was delicious! I had wanted the avocado toast, but turns out that wasn’t a menu item (the online menu wasn’t updated), so I ended up having a burger. The carbs turned out to be very necessary because we started drinking at brunch and didn’t stop all day 😛 After brunch, we walked around a bit before a canal cruise around the archipelago. I hadn’t realized how many small islands there were around Stockholm, so it was very fun to see all the islands, boats, and the sunset! After the canal tour, we walked around a park in the area, Kungsträdgården, where they were doing a winter festival celebration to kick off the Christmas season. We just missed the end of the concert (had to stop in the ladies room – whoops!), but we found a nearby cafe for some hot mulled wine and cider. This was also when we realized our mistake of the liquor stores closing and ordered the alcohol-free items… You live and you learn!

We went for dinner back in Gamla Stan at Caliente Tapas. I can’t say I anticipated Stockholm having good Spanish food, but these tapas were incredible and exactly what we needed. We went back to Aifur for a drink before heading over to a cool cocktail bar called A Bar Called Gemma. My friend had gotten this as recommendation from her Swedish colleague and it was such a fun bar – the cocktails were all in neat glasses. We needed somewhere to go next, so we asked the waiter and he asked what the vibe was that we were going for. I looked him in the eye and said “we want to get dirty and dance!” Such a bizarre thing to say, but this man gave us the absolute perfect suggestion, a club called Berns. The music was impeccable and I honestly had one of the best nights of my life, I didn’t want to leave!! We stayed at the club for a while and then we did head back to the dungeon for another late night seance / dance party!

sunday

We had to check out of our Airbnb at 10 am and we woke up at 9:40 am! It was a mad dash to get out in time and we just about made it. We took a taxi to the train station where we dropped our bags for the day since our flight was later that night. I found us a place for breakfast in a mall – it wasn’t great food and we were all feeling a bit hungover, so it didn’t help. We took the tram over to another island where several museums are. We immediately went to the Spiritmuseum, where we sat in their cafe and drank beer for a hair of the dog (which was much needed). We didn’t even go into the museum… the cafe was very cute though!

Wanting to something touristy and historical, we visited the Vasamuseet. The Vasa is the only almost fully intact 17th-century ship that’s been salvaged. She was a 64-gun warship that sank on her maiden voyage in 1628. Touted to be the greatest Swedish warship, she sank after sailing only 1400 yards. In 1961, she was pulled from the harbor (via various methods that took a very long time), refinished for a few years, and is now on display at the museum. The museum is quick, about an hour and a half is all it takes to get through, so naturally we found ourselves at the museum cafe with more beers! Our final stop in Stockholm was at the ABBA Museum. I had so much fun here – we watched the opening video three times! They had a stage where you could go sing with holograms of the band and see original outfits that they wore. We could pose in Mamma Mia sets and, of course, ABBA music was playing the whole time. Highly recommend these two museums, though they are a bit pricey so just something to look out for when you visits. We headed back to the train station to catch the train to our plane (we didn’t end up getting home until 2 am which was a bummer, but the price we paid for a fun weekend) and said goodbye to this beautiful country & city!