The hotel puts on a quite tasty Scandi breakfast buffet each day – cereals, breads, meats, cheeses, boiled eggs (and my fave salmon paste and gherkins) with coffee, tea an juices. It was pretty tasty for a three star hotel breakfast and included in the room rate. After loading up, we decided to wander into the main part of town. The girl on the plane had raved about the impressive Christmas display at NK, Sweden’s main department store. Dan had also discovered a model shop not far from there.

First though, as it would be a while yet before the shops opened, we decided to just wander around town to see what we could find. There had been new snow overnight so everything looked like it had a light sprinkling of icing sugar over the top of it – just like it does in fairytales involving snow covered castles, although these were mainly churches and 500 year old apartment buildings. We took some photos as we wandered through the old town although because of the closeness of the buildings here, the snow had really only settled on the rooves.

When you walk towards Normalm, the retail centre of Stockholm, you walk through Sweden’s magnificent Parliament building. One of the multitudes of royal palaces is to your right as you approach the parliament building. This isn’t a palace that the Royals live in and the parliament building itself is actually more impressive. And what was more impressive to us is that it is a building that you walk through when you go from one end of the city to the other – unlike our own Parliament House which sits on its own on a hill, largely disconnected from the city below it.

We wandered throughout the city centre, Normalm, with its main thoroughfare decorated for the yuletide season. We stopped to take photos of churches and interesting building while we waited for the retail outlets to open. Despite the fact that the daylight only lasts from 9:30am until 2:30pm in Stockholm, most retail outlets don’t open until 10 or 11am. With opening time fast approaching, we headed to Dan’s Holy Grail, the model shop he had found in Stockholm. I gave him 20 minutes in there while I looked in a povo mall nearby. One of the most prevalent stores throughout Stockholm was there – the3 enticingly named Indiska but rather than a store inspired by the two well loved music genres, it is actually a fashion chain store whose wares are a bit of a cross between modern interpretations of Indian and Scandinavian fashion. Which is quite a bit different.  20 minutes clearly wasn’t enough but I have to admit there was some pretty cool stuff in there – like X files toys. I don’t know how many of you have been in a model shop before but they are a bit like comic stores – mostly filled with men – and the guys behind the counter usually looks like the comic book shop guy from the Simpsons. This place was no different although because it is Stockholm in winter, he wasn’t wearing slides.

From here we headed to NK to see the Christmas display – while it was very Swedish (read understated and quirky) it wasn’t as impressive as I was expecting. It is kind of a pity that we will arrive in London after Christmas as I bet the windows at Harrods and Marks and Spencer would be pretty awesome. We were pretty cold by then so we decided to use the facilities at NK – which were pretty luxurious for the 8 SEK, and grab a coffee.

From here we headed out towards the waterfront. We had decided that Skagen, the Swedish historical park and zoo (with the largest Christmas market in Stockholm) might be a good place to spend the afternoon. There was actually some blue sky and sunshine peeking through the clouds, which made the journey there so much more enjoyable. It was still snowing lightly while we were walking around in the morning but when the sun came out some of the snow began to melt slightly and then refreeze when the temperature dropped. We had to walk pretty slowly to avoid sliding over which would have branded us easily as tourists (if Dan wasn’t already walking around with his big camera around his neck.

Skagen is pretty good value – it cost us the equivalent of $20 each and we spent the best part of four hours walking around. There is something here for everyone, a labyrinth of artisan workshops where you can spend time watching glass blowers and the like at work, a collection of houses from all periods of history that have been brought here and fitted out as an open air museum and the zoo, which is where we spent the most time.

I saw my first ever wolverine (and now can’t get the Dave Graney track out of my head – Dan pointed out that perhaps I could be thinking of Hugh Jackman instead, although I’m not sure that is quite what he had in mind when pointing out the movie may be a more well known reference. We also saw the hugest owl either of us had ever seen (and caught the feeding time of a couple of other fairly impressive specimens. We also saw wolves, peacocks, Sweden’s version of bison, long extinct in the wild but being re-released following a successful breeding program, elk and a quick glimpse of a seal as he darted around his rather mucky tank. It was a bit cold for him to be out up top today. Despite (to my mind) Sweden’s favourite sons singing about them – I didn’t see a single penguin or polar bear in the Scandinavian animals zoo. I did see sheep and cows though. We wandered back down the hill in search of the Christmas Markets – they looked really impressive. Unfortunately they were all closed. What Lonely Planet had failed to point out was that the Christmas Markets were only open on the weekend. It didn’t really matter – the market in the old town was kind of perfect and there are many more to go, I am sure. (Penguins and Polar Bears – Millencolin – of course while we’re in Sweden, my Swedish punk heroes are in Australia playing the warped Tour)

We stepped into the restaurant at Skagen for a hot chocolate to warm up. The wind and walking around in the snow had made me cold. My feet were actually cold for the first time on the trip. After that we walked back into town to find the Ostermalms Saluhall, with a pit stop in a design store to pick up a Swedish decoration for our tree – a little angel. We are collecting a decoration in each place we strop, then we are intending to find a small tree in Berlin and decorate it with them. There are Saluhalls littered throughout Stockholm – essentially a big market hall where you can buy your produce and also sit and have a meal. We found a nice little counter with some friendly staff and ordered some lunch. I had fish soup – just the glorious warming winter food I was after. It came with complimentary bread and with aioli to stir in. A tomato based soup with huge amounts of fresh fish, it was glorious. Dan had a hamburger, although it wasn’t something sandwiched between two pieces of bread. It was a massive hamburger patty, served with a huge amount of mashed potato (they love their mash here) and ligonberries and freshly pickled cucumbers. I got the cucumbers and they were perfect – pickled yet still crunchy. I might have to learn how to make it.

After a sojourn in the hotel, where Dan slept and I tried to fight jetlag with downloading my photos and doing facebook quizzes, we headed out for dinner. The girl in the hotel recommended a Swedish style restaurant but they looked incredibly full so we chose somewhere else. I wanted to try the Kortbuller (meatballs – the ones ikea sell frozen). They were OK but the sauce didn’t taste that much better than the ikea version. The ligonberries and pickles though were superb. Dan went a bit less traditional and had a steak which was served with mash and asparagus. The wine list was quite lofty and like all lists I have seen wherever I travel, included a good selection of Australian and NZ wines. With no Swedish wines to speak of, I chose a French Pinot Noir. Not as layered and textured, nor as spicy as its ANZAC cousins. After dinner we decided to hit one of the bars – we watched Norway play Argentina in Handball on the telly and Dan had a beer that was his least favourite so far. I had a local apple cider which was even sweeter than the non-alcoholic version you get in the supermarket at home. After dinner, it was time for sleep.

Christmas themed activities – 6  War museums and model shops – 1