Phespirit goes to Sweden
Stockholm     April 2006

Upon returning from his only previous foray into Sweden - to Malmö and Helsingborg in 1998 - Phespirit was less than complimentary in his reflections. It took him eight years to arrange a return visit for another look at the country, taking an Easter break to its capital city. This time the three days he spent wandering around Stockholm and its impressive national institutions could scarcely have done more to lift his feelings about the place.

As he was visiting during the Easter holidays Phespirit prepared by browsing a few Swedish tourism web sites to plan his itinerary and, more importantly, to confirm the opening dates and times of all the places he fancied taking a look around. Arriving at Arlanda airport on Maundy Thursday he caught the airport bus to the city centre, checked in at the nearby Adlon Hotel (as pre-booked), got a good night's sleep and then started out the following morning.

• Good Friday - The first move was to buy a 48 hour 'Stockholm Card' that Phespirit had calculated, at 420SEK (about £33), would work out fractionally cheaper than the combined entrance fees of the places he intended to visit. Next he set about exploring the narrow streets of the old town, Gamla Stan, and the adjoining little island of Riddarholmen. The first building he'd planned to look around was Riddarhuset (house of nobility), but this was the first and only place that turned out to be closed when he'd expected it to be open. He had a look around Storykyrkan (Stockholm's cathedral) shortly after midday, then at 1:00pm caught the ferry to the island of Djurgården where he visited the Skansen open-air heritage museum (at which point the clock started ticking on his Stockholm Card) and Vasamuseet, home to the vast, stunningly-preserved 1628 ship Vasa.

• Saturday - On this beautiful cloudless day Phespirit began by re-taking several of the photos he had taken on Friday when a fine, high mist had hung beneath white skies. At 10:30am he boarded a 'Royal Canal Tour' sightseeing boat, which did a single lap of Djurgården, carving through an ice-packed canal and returning one hour later to the quay by the Grand Hôtel from where it began. Next to Kungliga Slottet, the royal palace, where after observing the changing of the guard he visited the Royal Appartments, the Museet Tre Kronor, the Skattkammaren (treasury), the Livrustkammaren (armoury), and Gustav III's Antikmuseum. In this latter museum, visitors pass along the first hall adorned with marble busts of Roman Emperors, then turn right to enter a second hall of marble figures, only to be confronted instantly with the spread legs and lounging genitals of Endymion - a full-size reclining male nude. Phespirit observed visitors of a sensitive disposition gasp and reel backwards.

  Leaving the palace at 3:00pm, he headed south via Tyska Kyrkan and crossed the main bridge to the island of Södermalm. The Katarinahissen elevator lifted him 38m from the waterfront to a walkway with good views back to Gamla Stan, plus easy access to Katarina Kyrka (apparently once notorious for its witch trials). Heading west, he walked along the cliffs of Södermalm, via the Monteliusvägen footpath, to the island of Långholmen. After completing a single lap of this small wooded retreat, he returned to the city centre via the metro.

• Easter Sunday - At 10:00am he joined a guided tour of the Stadshuset (town hall), followed by a tiring dash up the stairway of its giant tower. Next a quick dash on the metro to look around the Historiska Museet, specifically to admire the dazzling display of ancient riches in the 'Gold Room' (Phespirit's favourite piece: the Leuhusen Golden Chain). Then a return dash by metro to catch the 1:30pm guided tour of the Riksdagshuset (parliament). Having dashed enough for one day he strolled at leisure across to the National Museum, but nonetheless managed to catch the "Couples in Art" exhibition before his Stockholm Card timed out. Top art in the museum: the marble bust of 'Lady Maria Stella Newburg, Comtesse von Ungern-Sternberg' by Joseph Nollekens, and Anders Zorn's 1906 painting of 'Girls from Dalarna having a bath'. Finally, to the crap Moderna Museet, filled with garbage made by time-wasters. The usual thing.

Stockholm is without a doubt the finest of the five Nordic capital cities. It is self-styled as "The Capital of Scandinavia" - a claim against which Phespirit could find no argument. To him it felt like a Vienna of the north, which is high praise indeed.