So, what did I do this weekend apart from catching the sun? Well…
Girls’ weekend out. What do you think we did? We shopped. And how. We also ate good food. Plenty of it. And we had a few drinks. Or more than a few. And we stared at boys. Seriously. It’s a wonder we didn’t get ourselves into trouble.
By the time we got to Stockholm and the hostel (Pensionat Oden, lovely place) Thursday evening we were all starving. As we’d had tips from two separate people that Akkurat in Hornsgatan was a good place for whisky, and I had a vague recollection of the website mentioning food, and we realised that our hostel was also on Hornsgatan, we walked there. In fact, we practically ran there. The food was very good, though we barely had time to taste it. The menu was even better. The others laughed at me because I spent the first hour, and much of the time following that, too, simply drooling over the list of whiskies (it’s available on the website, so you can go see why). Ir got mad at me because I ended up talking to the guy she’d been eyeing up – it was completely unintentional, I swear, he just happened to sit by the only open spot along the bar when I went up to order a Linkwood and he obviously knew something about whisky. I must admit he was rather good looking, but, you know, it’s me we’re talking about here, I don’t chat up men in bars. Though Ak and Ir don’t know me well enough to know that so that was my reputation shot for the weekend. Quite amusing, really.
Friday… Well, we went shopping, didn’t we? We walked through Gamla Stan and arrived at the castle just at the time when the changing of the guards took place, which was pretty cool. Even more cool, in a one up for Norway kind of way, was the very obvious fact that the guards at the Swedish castle are positively sloppy compared to the Norwegian Garde (HM Kongens Garde). They couldn’t even keep pace properly. We all had attacks of fierce national pride, but took lots of pictures anyway. Well, you know. Men in uniform, right? And you can’t deny that it was a pretty spectacular sight, as the relief guard actually comes riding in and then they change over and the guard going off duty rides off on the same horses.
A little later we passed the Opera House, and I suggested we check the programme and ask if they did “last-minute” tickets at all. They did, and so at half past six we returned and aquired seats for La Boheme. We’d planned on grabbing a burger or something if we did get tickets and eat out properly if we didn’t, but in search of a burger we found a likely-looking Italian restaurant and gave in to temptation. I don’t think I would ever have planned to eat one-and-a-half calzone (Ir didn’t finish hers) and drink a third of a bottle of red (lovely wine with an easy name: Piane de Maggio) in less than twenty minutes, but it turned out to be possible. The opera was enchanting, though the supporting soprano was better than the lead – at the very beginning I thought: “This was a bad idea, I am way too tired, I won’t be able to enjoy it and it will seem to last for ages.” But in fact it seemed to last for about fifteen minutes. I couldn’t believe it when the interval arrived (and no, I didn’t fall asleep, I was quite definitely awake and enjoying myself the whole time). I should definitely go to the opera more often.
Following all that culture we ended up at Akkurat again, and AK and I gave Ir lessons in how to flirt (remember, I’d established myself as an expert the night before – in any case, if you know a little about body language you can pretty much make it up as you go along). Nothing came of it, though, and we all went home to sleep around one instead of partying the night away.
Ir wanted to do more shopping Saturday, whereas AK and I really just wanted to potter about, so we split up. Unfortunately, pottering about in shops such as Indiska and “The English Shop” does tend to mean you end up shopping anyway, but never mind. Towards lunchtime we met up with the guy that had offered to sort out blind dates as he’d offered to give us a little bit of a tour in lieu of the non-appearance of the promised dates (which was just as well, really). And a tour was what we had, though I must admit I was the most grateful for the last stop on the tour, when he left us (he had a dinner-party to attend) outside The Bull and Bear Inn, which we promptly entered. An “English” pub with Stowford Press on tap, excellent food and a good whisky selection – what more can you ask? I could happily have stayed, but we had planned to “go out” properly, so after a few pints we headed back to the hostel to prettify ourselves and check out the nightlife on Söder. It had it’s ups and downs…
Down: The Half Way Inn – a scottish pub that did an ok Irish Coffee, but was otherwise pretty boring.
Up: A curry house nearby with delicious food (they did chicken kashmiri, which is unusual).
Down: Snaps – a nightclub sort of thing. We watched some people play blackjack, which was interesting, but decided that a combination of excessive heat and humidity and people smoking something that definitely wasn’t tobacco would not make for a good combination in the long run, so we moved on.
On the level: The Old Beefeater – on the upside, they had cider and we were chatted up by several people, including a woman, on the downside none of the people who chatted us up seemed interesting enough for us to want to extend the conversation – including the woman.
And then I went home to sleep, being, by that time, pretty much cidered out, and left the others to scaring Swedes.
And Sunday… I’ll tell you about Sunday later, I really need to get going now.