Stockholm

Okay, my first actual travel report. I hate to disappoint you but it's not going to be very long because the trip lasted for less than two days.

So, last weekend I went to Stockholm, Sweden for the day. I'll have those of you who're not from Finland or Sweden know that it's really easy to travel between the two countries by ferry. There are two major ship companies you can choose from (Viking Line and Silja Line), both of which operate daily between Turku & Stockholm as well as Helsinki & Stockholm. The trip's a bit longer from Helsinki and a bit more expensive, too, but then you also get to sleep till later when you travel from Helsinki as the ferry arrives in Stockholm at 9:40 am while the ferry from Turku arrives in Stockholm as early as 6:30 am - EEEEK! Not good for someone like me who loves to sleep, no matter how much fun travelling is :D.  If you want a cabin, you can get one for two people for something like 90€ if you travel to and from Helsinki, and it's even cheaper if you  travel from Turku or get some sort of package deal.

Anyway, I went with my friend Tiina - you know, the one I mentioned in my intro post as well. We've both been to Stockholm a million times and both of us have lived in Sweden, too, so more than a sightseeing trip, going to Sweden, for us, is going back to the culture that we love and adore. These cruises are mostly all about food, shopping and the language that we both love and have studied at university as well.

The ferry left at 5:30 pm on Friday, then we spent around six hours in Stockholm on Saturday, and finally left back for Helsinki at 4:45 pm to arrive in Finland at 9:55 am the following morning.

Instead of going on and on about what we did (as we didn't do much at all), I'll give you pictures.

Tiina (left) and me in our cabin on the M/S Mariella.

On these cruise ships, there's always a fabulous buffet that you just have to have. If I remember right, it costs 32€ on the ferry and maybe 28€ or something like that if you pay for it beforehand. As you can see, I love seafood!

Main courses.

Okay, it might look disgusting to you but it looks heavenly to me :). In other words, lovely desserts (and I recommend mixing sweets with ice cream :D!).

Stockholm! The weather was quite gloomy but still definitely better than here in Finland!

Stockholm is just so lovely! I love taking this boat to Djurgården in the summer and eating ice cream there, maybe going to Vasamuseet for a bit - and I still need to see some live gigs at Gröna Lund, the amusement park, there.

A random café in the Old Town, or Gamla Stan in Swedish :).

People in Gamla Stan.

There are lots of narrow alleyways like this in Gamla Stan :).

I guess many people would agree with what the tee says :D-

One of my favourite record stores, Bengans, on Drottninggatan.

Sushi is my life! Especially salmon nigiri and avocado nigiri as seen in the picture :). Whenever I go to Stockholm, I always have to eat at Bamboo City - they have a sushi buffet, and stuff like that is to die for!

This is what the ferry to Sweden looks like :). This ferry sails under the Finnish flag that you can also see in the picture.

Some more food - yes, eating's one of the best things about travelling :D!

This is what I bought = a bag, a hoodie, a Victoria & Daniel magnet and a ton of sweets and chocolate. Usually I buy lots and lots of clothes in Stockholm but this time I was too tired to concentrate on stuff like that.

Okay, so that's basically it for now :). Stockholm's always nice so all of you, go there :D! My next trip will take me to Canada and the US so until then!