'Holm is Where the Heart is

Okay, so in our last gripping installment from Stockholm, I was staggering back to the hotel from a shrimp-off, being followed by a flock of squawking seagulls.

Apparently it was the first nice weekend and there were people everywhere. As one of the guys on the cruise said: "The natives are restless". One park that I went to was packed with people, and each group had a little barbeque burning:

Picnicing in the park

The rubbish bins were just buried in mountains of rubbish. Hmm, I wonder what happens if you dump the coal from your barbeque into a full rubbish bin?

Bin fire

The fire engines passed me when I was a little further down the road.



This next photo probably won't interest anyone but me, but I loved it. The little wooden boats are something straight out of Tintin. Incidentally, the tall, narrow buildings of Stockholm reminded me of those in Brugge. I made that comment to someone, and they said it was because those northern European countries were members of the Hanseatic League. So there you go.

Wooden boats

Graffitied hut on a hill

On the old houses, you can see an emblem of a phoenix rising from the flames above the door. This dates from Stockholm's early fire insurance program. The people who paid the insurance were given the emblem, and the firemen were required to save those houses with a phoenix on them before others.

Viking weapons in a tourist shop window