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Sweden

Kebab in Sweden--Special Feature--Click Here!

Emma Andersson kicks Brennen's butt in hockey while Magnus watches

It didn't take long upon my arrival from Finland to Sweden to realize that I was in a distinctly different country.  Standing in the centrum of Umeå, with my Lonely Planet guidebook opened to the map, I was very surprised to have two nice people come right up to me to help.  They asked me if I needed help finding where I was going!  I think I could have stood in a similar Finland centrum for several weeks before anyone would ask if I needed help!

After a night in Umeå I took the bus across country to my favorite place in Sweden: Östersund.  I met a very nice lady on the bus who was going there to ice fish.  Now this is my kind of place, where women travel by bus to go ice fishing!  I decided to stay there for a while and see if I couldn't do some ice fishing myself.  So I booked a room at the Hotel Östersund and went out to seek some fishing advice.  The desk clerk at the hotel told me to go to Fiske Service, which was the best fishing and hunting store I saw in all Scandinavia and Finland.  They set me up with two fine fellows, Jens Berger and Peter Sjödin, whom I met for coffee and arranged to fish with the following day.  For dinner that night I had kebab, my very first ever.

Although I did pay them to guide me I felt after the day that we really fished together as friends.  Should Peter and Jens ever make it to Minnesota they are always welcome at my fish house, and I'm sure they would enjoy it very much.  I'll even see if I can find some surstromming to serve them and I promise I will never play Rammstein.

Here are some photos from Östersund and my excellent day of fishing:

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Peter sets up a Swedish tip-up device

The evening ended at Jens' house where we had a delicious meal and several very tasty Swedish beers.  We fished this day both for Gädda  and Abborre , and then for Harr in a different area.  All 3 fish were caught.  Peter and Jens also told me quite a bit about the Östersund area and all about Jamtland, and they were obviously very proud of the area.  The next time I travel to Sweden I will definitely go to Östersund because it was really my very favorite part of the country.  It has many lakes, mountains, and you can do almost every type of fishing and hunting there.  Although at least one of my relatives in Southern Sweden said "they are communists up there", I think if I were to move there this is where I would live.  Besides, I think I talked Jens into supporting George Bush so maybe that whole communist thing is a way of the past.  Even so, Viva Jamtland!  If it ever really becomes its own country I might think about leaving my beloved USA to be a citizen.

I was sad to leave Östersund, but having not seen my brother since the previous summer I was excited to take my first night train south.    I had a whole sleeper car to myself, and sleep I did all the way to the southern tip of Sweden: Malmö.  After exchanging many SMS messages on the cell phone, I was warmly greeted by Magnus Thomasson at the Malmö train station.  Later that day we headed out to the Malmö airport where we greeted Brennen.  From there we met Emma for lunch in Lund (like the boat) and began a couple days of enjoying Malmö.  This included a day trip to Copenhagen, Denmark as well as Brennen's first kebab. Here are a few shots from this part of the trip:

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Brennen arrives in Malmö, Magnus does the twist

All in all we spent two nights in Malmö, left a few things at Magnus and Emma's flat, and headed to Norway.  We very much appreciated all the hospitality that Magnus and Emma showed us--including the trip to Copenhagen, the tasty meals and beverages, frucosts, friendship, but certainly not getting our butts handed to us in table hockey.  When they made us play as Finland, we should have known we were in for a beating.

To follow along with the trip in order, go to Norway now.

Brennen and I got on the train in Narvik, Norway and moved into our sleeper car.  Just before the train left the station we were met by an "over served" Norwegian fellow who offered us sips from his bottle of Tyrkisk Peber booze and looked like he wanted to stay in our car.  Fortunately the conductor moved him along, and his spot was replaced by a nice engineer from Stockholm who had been up north skiing.  We shared the car, slept the night, and played several games of Crazy-8's before our train arrived in Stockholm.  After a brief layover in Stockholm, we caught the train to Laxå and were warmly greeted by Barbro and Eldroy Engvall.

Barbro and Eldroy took us to their summer home at Rosendalen, which is just up a short hill from a big lake called Skagern.  At the bottom of this hill is Herrägen where my grandfather's mother Anna and her brother Fredrik lived as a child before emigrating to the USA.  We stayed here for several days and learned a great deal about our family history on the Engvall side.  Barbro and Eldroy were excellent hosts and we very much enjoyed the time spent with them--and not just because they washed our stinky clothes.  Here are some photos of some of the things we did with them:

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Brennen before the calm shores of Lake Skagern

Along with helping Roland with his nets we also went out one night in search of the wild pigs.  No pigs were sighted and we thought perhaps that this was a joke played on the Americans, but we trust Barbro and Eldroy.  Eldroy showed us many pictures that my Mother's Uncle Fred had sent home to Sweden in the early 20th century.  Their son Johan came to visit the second day, but he was elusive to photograph.  Johan was a fine fellow though and I think he would fit in at men's night quite well.  On a sad note, we did attend the funeral of Arne who lived at Herrägen and was much beloved.  He was a fisherman and for this and other reasons I wish I could have met him.

Barbro, Eldroy, and Johan wished us bon voyage at the train station and we headed into the Stockholm portion or our trip.  There we met more Engvalls:  Niklas, Eva, and Emil.  They offered us more Swedish hospitality in their new home and were excellent hosts.  We took a trip to Stockholm for the day, visited a new fishing store, and celebrated a Walpurgis Night fire by the lake near their house.  We also had several fine meals in their home and found that these Swedes like spices a little more than other Swedes we have met.

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Eva, Brennen, Emil, and Niklas in downtown Stockholm

After two very good days and nights with Eva, Niklas, and Emil we once again boarded a train, this time for Växjö, and headed to meet some Anderssons.

In Växjö we were met by Kjell and Annette Andersson who kindly invited us into their home.  The Anderssons, and their daughter Emma, had visited Hotel Carmen in Minnesota a few years ago so it was very nice to see them again.  We had a great deal of fun together, including a meal of roasted Moose, a trip with Kjell to see the home our great-grandfather emigrated from, a stop through the woods to see where Kjell hunts moose, and a trip up to Jönköping to visit Kjell's mother and Kjell's sister Gunvor and her husband Tommy Johansson.  Here are some photos:

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Kjell and Annette Andersson

After a few busy days with Kjell and Annette it was once again time to board the train and head to Malmö.  This would be the last stop in our trip where we would gather all our gear, pack up, and head back to America.  Once again we were the guests of Emma and Magnus.  The highlight of this stop was a dinner with Eivor Hertzman and her daughter Ann who will be visiting Hotel Carmen this spring.  After this dinner I took the train to Copenhagen, Denmark barely slept in a crummy airport hotel, and caught the planes back to the USA.

I will surely return to Sweden someday, and as I still have enough frequent flyer miles to fly in World Business Class there (twice) it might not be so long from now.  It was an excellent trip and I appreciate everything all of you did for us.  We had a tremendous time and I wonder why it took me until I was 38 years old to finally travel there?

Med Vänliga Hälsningar ,

Brad

Kebab in Sweden--Special Feature--Click Here!