Mark's Travels

10 years of travel blogging from 35+ countries around the world

New Years Eve in Stockholm 31st December 2002 in Stockholm, Sweden


This morning we woke up, got ready and went over to Anja's Mother's cabin to say goodbye. From there Rainer drove us to a gas station where we waiting in -30°C weather for a bus. While waiting I went and got some food and drinks from the super market. I found this drink that had a really funny picture of a woman and a tiger growling at one another. Eventually the bus came and we were off on a 6 hour journey from the very west of Sweden to the very east with Stockholm as our destination. Though we were always in Scandinavia, I felt at times during my stay in Stockholm that we had crossed over into the eastern Baltic States. The bus drive was enjoyable. I slept, did some reading and looked out at he beautiful scenery. There were quite a few frozen waterfalls on the rock walls that border the roads. And at one point we drove past an aeronautical research facility that had a fighter jet on display in front of it. One thing I have noticed with the cars here in Sweden is that a lot of them have rally lights on the front. The sun rises at 8:30am and sets at 3:30pm this time of year. The sky was clear so the trees had a brilliant red and golden reflecting off of them during sun set.

Around 5pm we entered into Greater Stockholm, I could see fireworks all around. The city is probably the most beautiful I've ever seen. Eventually we arrived at the Central station that had made news 2 days prior with a 12 hour hostage taking by an Ukrainian Asylum Seeker in a bouched robbery attempt. It was only -13°C but with the wind and the humidity so high it felt much colder than the -30°C in Tucksfors. I decided that I like exploring but not for my hostel in this weather so we caught a cab up the road to our hostel.

This hostel was unique in that it used converted offices into bedrooms and it was on the 4th and 5th floor of an office building, usually hostels have the building to themselves. The only way up or down was by elevator. The elevator was really dodgy too. I remember seeing shows about hard times in Russia and I was thinking how this looked like the backdrop for some of those scenes. On the way up we talked to a friendly American girl in the elevator. Once we were checked in I told Anja that we will meet back at the hostel at 11pm, an hour before the new year. Then I was off.

I made my way from central Stockholm to the Island of Gamla Stan, the old city, where Stockholm originated. The Island is only about 500m squared but it would take you at least a day to explore it fully. On the Island is the largest Palace in the world still in use with 608 rooms. The only way I can describe this building: Take the smaller Petrocanada tower in Calgary and squish it down to about 10 stores.

I walked around Stockholm until about 9pm when I found it too cold to go on. When I went back to the hostel I went into the TV room and hung out and chatted with, along with Anja, some French, Italian, Australian, Dutch and Canadians there. The Italians were in their pajamas having a pajama party, there was plenty of wine, beer and booze to go around which is rare for Stockholm with Sweden's tight grip on the sale of Alcohol.

Around 11pm we all decided to go out. We searched for a whole hour to find somewhere open. I one point I had found a group of drunken 15 year old Swedish girls (talk about striking gold!). I chatted them up to see if they knew of anywhere interesting to go to but they were far past any clubbing with their mates looking as though their about to do the techni-color-yawn. Eventually one of the guys from my group came up and told me they were too young. One thing lead to another, mostly due to nothing being open, fully booked or too expensive that I wound up spending new years 2003 in Burger king with my flat mate and an Australian couple taking photos of a drunk OZ making Peace signs with an Asia tourist while being yelled at by a burger king employee for videoing inside the restaurant. At least it's better than being stuck on an aircraft. See video here


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