Orebro, Stockholm and Upsalla, oh my!

Last I checked, I was in Oslo, heading for Orebro, Sweden. And now, here I am in Stockholm. I did spend 2 days in Orebro. Left Oslo in the rain, and the bus tried to outrun it all the way. Unsuccessfully. I did get one morning with some sunshine, but not near enough. Nevertheless, I enjoyed my stay in Orebro. Not as much as I'd hoped I would, but still a pleasure.

The guide books say that Orebro is a picture postcard city. I can see why, with a castle on an island in the middle of a river. Then there's the really big town park, filled with grass, trees and flowers. After that, there isn't too much to talk about, though.

The castle tour is interesting, mainly because of the stories the guide, dressed in period costume, tells. There are many paintings of Scandinavian royalty, and he had stories about most of them. Some were probably very true, and historically accurate. But some, the more entertaining ones, stretched the imagination more than a bit. But who am I to comment on the accuracy of the guides pitch?

Aside from the park, which I spent a good bit of time in, sauntering along at my leisure, another item on the city's list of sights that interested me was called the sculpture walk, or something similar. Decided a walk wouldn't hurt, and there wasn't much else to do. It was about 1 or 2 K from town, through a semi-residential district. Nice area. Then I got to the sculpture walk, nearly another K. Walked the entire length and back, and took photos of all the sculptures I saw. All four of them. And none particularly impressed me, with one possible exception. At least it was a nice area to walk in.

I did visit the town museum, a mix of history and art. Nothing really impressive. One art exhibit was supposedly the 7 stages of life. And no, I don't remember what they were. But the stage on childhood made an interesting point. There is a UN resolution, rule, position, (I'm not sure of the correct term) on children's rights. One of them is the right to not be physically or sexually exploited. The point made was that we live in a world that this has to be stated. Enough editorializing.

There was a hand's on exhibit for children which I participated in. It was on the Runic alphabet, the early Scandinavian means of communicating, primarily on big rocks, rune stones, as memorials. The exhibit had magnetic backed runic characters which could be used to spell things out on a large board. I'm sure most were kyds names and such. This kyd spelled out "Tehachapi". I'll bet there are some confused folk trying to make that one out.

Orebro is really a nice tourist town, but mainly for Swedish tourists. It's the first place I've been to with almost no English in the town brochures, museums, places of interest in general. Even the posted menus were all in Swedish. I had to ask for an English menu. Usually, they have both languages on the menus, or an English menu posted side by side with the local language.

On that subject, I've stopped condemning myself for not knowing the languages. I do have a little bit of condemnation for the US as a whole for not encouraging more foreign language in our schools. They start in the third grade here teaching English. But on the other hand, what language should we teach? English is the second language nearly everywhere I've been. Some English people I met a while back attribute that to the American GI's after WWII being all over western Europe. Good point. More editorializing.

From Orebro I headed for Stockholm. The original plan was to pass through, and go on to Upsalla for a couple of days. But Upsalla is only an hour away, and buses run hourly. So I decided to stay in Stockholm. That way I can stay in the same room for the entire time in this area.

I did go to Upsalla today. Rainy, but that's OK. I will need a new umbrella by the time I get home. This one is getting a lot of use, and is close to retirement, as is my suitcase, and possibly backpack. On to Upsalla.

One of it's main attractions is a site just out of town where there are three huge burial mounds. Interesting museum about the history of the mounds, and walking the area around the mounds. They were excavated sometime in the 19Th century, if I remember correctly. They were on a ridge, and the dead kings were cremated with important possessions to take to the next world, then the entire site was covered with earth. They estimate it took 100 workers three months to complete the process. You can imagine the size. Not a great pyramid, but still impressive.

Also went to the town art museum and castle, combined. Neither impressed me too much.

The 18Th century botanist, Carl Von Linne, or Linnaeus, taught at Upsalla University. There is a museum about his life in his original house. Guests even had to wear plastic booties because the floor and carpets are original. He's the botanist that developed the scientific naming method still in use. He also is noted for something I'm impressed with. When Celsius developed the Celsius scale, he set 100 as freezing and 0 as boiling points for water. Linne was the one responsible for reversing it. I like that.

Yesterday was one of the worst I've had in a long time. I tried to change my return reservations, successfully, eventually. But what a time! If you ever try it, be advised, the airline ticket counters at the airport won't help. I took the 45 minute (one-way) bus ride to the airport to find this out. They'll tell you they are just an agent, and to call the airline. (at least BA and Spanair here did). And no toll free numbers. One even gave me the wrong phone number, and Spanair's web site didn't have their local office's number, only their agent, who couldn't or wouldn't do anything. So find a quiet place with a pay phone, get a WHOLE bunch of coins and get with it. I spent well over an hour on the phone. Admittedly, I had more than just a return flight to change, but what a hassle. Nuf of the bellyaching.

Tomorrow I'll wind up my visit in Stockholm, and then on Monday head for Linkoping, then Goteborg later in the week. And now it's time for dinner.