Sirened

One of the things that I’ve always wanted to see in life is a day with no real night. And if you’re in Stockholm close to the summer solstice like I was, you’ll see just that. Stockholm is in the eastern part of the Central European Time zone so it’s official sunset isn’t insanely late (around 10:20pm at summer solstice), but if you’re looking to the north this is the light you’ll see from around 11:30pm-2:30am. At around 2:30am it starts getting lighter because sunrise was around 3:30am when we were there (July 2nd-4th).
Stockholm is around the same latitude as …read more

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Those aren’t my words, nor is it technically truth, but it’s the claim you’ll find immediately upon arrival in Sweden’s capital. Stockholm boasts itself as the capital of Scandinavia because of it’s elegant beauty, cleanliness, fine cuisine (and we did have 2 fantastic meals in the city) and the fact that the Nobel Prizes are awarded in this grandiose city built on several islands.
Swedes are obviously proud of their culture and heritage and once you pass a totally pointless customs at Arlanda airport, you’ll find pictures commemorating famous Swedes. People such as golf great Annika Sorrenstam and tennis relic Bjorn …read more

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I’m back after a week’s vacation in Sweden and Denmark. It was a fabulous time and we really lucked out with the weather. You never know what you’re going to get with a Scandinavian summer but we couldn’t have asked for better; in Stockholm the high’s were in the mid 70’s and sunny. And incredibly, I even got a little sun burnt!
The only downside to the trip was how expensive Scandinavia is. While Sweden and Denmark are part of the European Union, they do not use the euro as their currency. Instead they use kroners, same name for both countries …read more

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Europe is filled with discount carriers that can take you just about anywhere you want to go, for cheap, even with US dollars and despite even higher fuel costs on this side of the pond. Discount carriers include Ryanair, Easyjet, SkyEurope, Transavia and Sterling to name a few.
Sterling is a Scandinavian based airline and from Amsterdam they fly to Stockholm, Copenhagen, Oslo and Bergen, Norway. Of course, if you’re flying from a major Scandinavian city there are many more European destination options.
Obviously with any good deal you have to be somewhat flexible in the dates you can fly. But when …read more

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