A Weekend of "Firsts"

I don’t know about you, but my week has flown by fast! It feels like I just got to Copenhagen yet I am leaving for Rome in 22 days… yikes! But as per usual, I am getting ahead of myself. Instead, I want to share some exciting “firsts” that I did this weekend in Stockholm, Sweden!

This weekend, I traveled with three of my good friends to the capital of Sweden (and it only took a nine hour overnight bus ride to get there!). This was the first weekend trip I have gone on that has not been scheduled by my program. We planned, booked, and explored by ourselves… and I have to say, it was awesome!

We arrived in Stockholm on Friday morning and explored the rainy streets of Gamla stan (also known as “Old Town”). And, of course, in celebration of International Women’s Day, we treated ourselves to a spa day at a bougie hotel. After a long bus ride, it was very nice to relax with a massage, bath, and a few trips to the sauna. This was my first ever spa day and let me tell you - it was totally worth it!

With a chill day on Friday, we packed a lot into our Saturday schedule. We started our day at the ABBA Museum, which included some intense singing, dancing, and a few good fangirl moments. We took a hike to see some Nordic animals (including reindeer) at the local Skansen zoo. We explored a few Swedish museums, we tried traditional Swedish meatballs, we drank traditional Swedish coffee. The meatballs were out of this world and the coffee was pretty much straight whiskey… I honestly was not aware of that as I ordered it, but half way through my drink I was really enjoying it!😉 And to finish the day off, I went to my first Ice Bar! It was (as you guessed) really cold but super fun!

This was also my first time staying in a hostel. We booked four beds in a private room at the Långholmen Hotel in central Stockholm. This was part hotel, part hostel, part museum. Why a museum, you ask? Well, it was originally a prison during the 1700s. It was abandoned in the mid 1900s and opened as a hotel in 1989. Our hostel room just happened to be located in the museum portion of the building... and needless to say, we had a few good scares from old mannequins in prison outfits. It was quite creepy, but we made it work.

This semester is all about “the firsts” for me. I would consider this weekend a great example of how I am really enjoying the firsts that this trip has brought to my life. And I’m so grateful I got to share this Swedish experience with some pretty amazing friends!

Your newfound traveller,

Olivia

Pictures: The streets of Stockholm, spa day, SWEDISH MEATBALLS, the ABBA Museum, Skansen zoo, Ice Bar, and the view from the bus ride through the Swedish country side.