Meeting Gi in Umea

I've taken several interesting trips since my last blog entry

-- Porto Seguro, Brazil and Shenzhen, China last year to name a couple -- but all were work related, and also presented their own special barriers (e.g. no blog access from China) to updating this travelogue, But this year I promised Gi that when her job in Umea, Sweden ended I would take some time off to travel through some of Scandinavia with her. As usual, we waited until the last minute to finalize our plans, but the trip is now underway, and in the following entries I'll try to recount some of what we do as we leave Umea for Stockholm, then head to Bergen, Norway, circle through the fjords and by train to Oslo, then down the coast to Gothenburg, Sweden, before finishing up with a few days in Copenhagen.

I arrived in Stockholm with the dawn on Monday morning and then had to hang around Arlanda airport my flight to Umea left in the mid-afternoon. The weather was delightfully crisp in Umea as spring is just getting up a head of steam. The daffodils and tulips are in full bloom and the leaves on most the trees are just bursting out with that brilliant green that only spring can bring. All in all it was extremely welcome after the 90 degree days we've been suffering in Athens the past month.

We were fortunate that Bjorn Sundberg hadn't started working full-time at his new job with Stora and happened to be in Umea Monday night. Gi had made arrangements for us to get together for dinner, and we all enjoyed a lovely meal at Rex. The reindeer was cooked perfectly. I would have loved to keep the evening going longer, but the travel time was about 24 hours of which I slept little. Crash and burn came rather soon after dinner, and it was no surprise that Gi complained of my snoring the next day.

Tuesday was Gi's last day at work, so while she wrapped things up in the lab I went out to hike a bit further afield in Umea. It's been 9 years since my last visit and things have changed a lot, much of it in preparation for their turn in 2014 as European Capital of Culture. (Don't blame me for the spelling -- I think it should be Capitol, as well -- but I'm following what they say on multiple websites.) Anyway, the place looks pretty spiffy, and if they can just get the new rail lone finished in time it should be a great time, indeed.

Eventually I headed over toward Lake Nydal, which is just east of campus, following the lakeshore trail south until I found a little sheltered bench situated on a shallow arm of the lake that was more bog and fen than actual lake. I'm sure most of the locals ignore this area, but while I sat and smoked a cigar a pair of Eurasian cranes stalked the marsh across the way while arctic terns flew up and down the grassy edges ever alert for small fish in the shallows. A mob of crows came through at one point looking for trouble, but they were little match for the terns as aerialists and they soon beat a hasty retreat. Several insect hatches were on and while swifts flashed back and forth after the flies that made it aloft, mallards, scaups and buffleheads made easy pickings of the flies that almost made it. Leaving the lakeshore I nearly ran into an enormous red ant nest -- the thing was almost 3 feet tall and at least 4 feet in diameter at the base. The entire top of the next was alive as the ants swarmed out to take advantage of the sunny day. What a wonderful place to while away and hour or two, and it was only a 10 minute walk from the lab.

I wandered back to the lab around 2:30 to meet Gi's co-workers and to have some cake to celebrate her last day. It was a fun party, but jetlag finally caught up with me and I fell asleep on the breakroom couch when folks left to finish their work before heading home.

Tuesday evening was mainly a mad dash to finish cleaning the apartment (despite what the building super said afterward, the place was nearly spotless when we left -- no doubt she was looking to squeeze an extra dime out of someone), and then I played the home version of "Chopped" cooking a meal for six using every remaining mystery ingredient in Gi;s refrigerator and freezer. Gi awarded me penalty points for making every pan in the kitchen dirty. We both decided to hand up the towels sometime between the sun setting around 11 PM and the midnight twilight. Wednesday morning the taxi arrived at 7:45 and we made a quick dash to the lab to drop off several boxes of bedding and household items -- some borrowed and some purchased -- before heading to the airport to catch our flight to Stockholm. We were booked at the Radisson at Arlanda for the night, to make it easier to catch the morning flight to Bergen, but several free hours (and the late summer sunset) gave us plenty of time to catch a bus into Stockholm to wander around and catch dinner.

It's such a beautiful city, and we enjoyed wandering down the long pedestrian mall,

then past the guards at the royal palace,

and into Gamla Stan (Old Town) with its many sites of interest, including the Svenska Academien (location of the Nobel Museum)

and the sculpture of St. George slaying the dragon.

Fortuitously, we were able to meet up with Gi's boss, Ulrika, and some other colleagues later in the evening for a lovely dinner at Frippe, just behind the Royal Dramatic Theater.

I certainly hope we find a reason to return to Stockholm before another 5 years pass.