Götenborg

So here I am in Götenborg (Gothenburg) in Sweden. I have only a few past experiences of being in countries where English was not the norm, but I have to say this has been one of the most easy and pleasant thus far. Everyone converses in Swedish of course and all the signs are in Swedish only except in the airport and main train station, but there are plenty of people around who know English and they all seem quite friendly.

The first thing I noticed on reaching the city was all the bikes. They have the best system of bike lanes I have ever seen. By far. I think every street of any decent size has a dedicated bike path--either together on one side or down the middle of a green way parkland that splits the left and right hand sides of the cars or to each side of the street paralleling the main traffic. There are also dedicated tram and bus lanes on the big streets and public transit seems regular & frequent, though I have not tried it out yet. I will be doing so in about an hour though!

I have walked all over the place. I think I walked about 12-14km yesterday. I have yet to translate that to miles. Today must have been about 6-8km so far. I have gotten lost repeatedly, but I am learning my way around better and better now.

Breakfast at the hostel (Slottsskogens Vandrarhem in case you were thinking of visiting Sweden) was strange but good. Apparently they find it strange here to have sweet things for breakfast. There was meat and cheese and breads, pate, cereal (but all very "grain" like, no very sweet ones), plain yoghurt, fish, etc. I noticed other people eating cereal in their yoghurt so I tried that (I think it was a muesli type of thing with vanilla yoghurt, the only flavour that was not entirely plain) and it was quite good. And I had sandwich type food as well. It certainly kept me going well!

The highlight of the trip has been meeting up with a couple of young ladies I do online role playing with. It is so fun and funny to finally put faces and voices to people you have conversed online with and read the characters & stories of for months. They are both fellow geeks, fellow voracious readers and great fun. It is a pity it is a busy time of year for them with school starting back up and other stuff going on, but we have all had a great time meeting and hanging out (though serially--they did not have any free time in common!).

Well, I still get a bit more time in Götenborg for which I am glad. My camera is sadly having a nervous breakdown (I took one picture and then it decided the memory was full...) so it seems I will not have much in the way to show, but oh well, I shall just have to concentrate on the memories.