To sew up my Scando-Summer series, I set off for Stockholm.

On the Expectations-o-Meter, Stockholm did rather well.  I was thinking I'd be bored, but it's a lovely city with plenty of stuff to see.  It's got some great architecture (my fascination with such should be clear from my photos) spread out over eighteen big islands.  So like Venice turned up to 11. 

It turns out that Sweden is not just ABBA, Ikea and Absolut, but also Astrid Lindgren!  So I went to an exhibition and now know what "Pippi Långstrump" looks like in about thirty different languages.

A Stockholm highlight was the Vasa Museum. Turns out back in sixteen something, the King o' Swedes needed a big ass ship with which to scare the Poles, so he had one built.  He wanted it extra big and extra frightening, so he had them add an additional gun-deck (and shitloads of scary Black-Pearl-esque carvings), which they did...without otherwise changing the general design in any appreciable way.  You can see where this is going.  They launch the thing, a gust of wind comes along, she tips....then rights herself.  A little bit later, another gust, water comes in the lower gunports and over she goes.  30 minutes, 1300 metres.  Suck on that, Titanic.

The thing about the Baltic is that it's too cold and too brackish for the little wood-eating bugger that munches on sunk ships.  So 333 years later, they locate the Vasa, haul her up, dust her off and build a museum around her.  And it's awesome.

The ship rocks, all the stories about it rock, the skeletons and all their belongings rock.  And that fact that it was once considered unlucky for sailors to be able to swim?  That rocks too.

In Stockholm, I also discovered the origin of a red wooden horse I got from my grandparents when I was a kid.  I'd never actually previously wondered - obviously, it came from Nanny and Pa Land.  Turns out they must have picked it up in Sweden, where one or two of these horses are available for purchase.  I am pretty sure that they got me the toy llama in Argentina, but I should probably go there too, to check.

I went to my friend's Brownie troupe meeting when I was a kid and thought it was lame.  I'm not an enthusiastic joiner.  I'll join, but it'll take a fair bit of momentum of the masses.  It's the reason I'll probably create a FaceBook account soon (thanks to Nat and Cin and general consensus).  It's why I created a MySpace account (thanks Cin and Yammy and Nickel Creek).   It's why I have a LinkedIn account (thanks Naveen and Claus).  Obviously, I have an MSN/Windows Live Space too, thanks to Nick and TD. 

Like a contagious disease, I have begun to pass it on.  I recently converted my sister over to a Space.  She's currently on a three-month trip around Australia with her family, so the updates and photos are pretty interesting.  She's just about the only person I know whose holiday happy snaps include pics of taipans, dingoes and crocodiles munching on water buffaloes. Check her out: http://vallancefamily.spaces.live.com. 

I'm glad my sister has started blogging and I hope she keeps it up after she gets back.  She's always been very good (and rather amusing) about keeping everyone up to date with everything through emails and Christmas newsletters, so it could be fun.  Someone else I'd like to see begin to write something like this regularly is my mother.  The woman has a wicked turn of phrase and a stash of interesting stories.  When was the last time someone told you about rescuing a calf that had fallen over a waterfall, and having a herd of cows look on and offer advice?

My only self-starting incursion into social networks has to be my foray into Twitter.  My curiosity got the better of me when I kept hearing about it, so I signed up to investigate. http://twitter.com/ilanas

I'm still not sure what it is.  I like all the departures that people have taken from the core functionality with apps leveraging the API and text messaging integration.  I can now SMS my own To Do list!  Still, the rest of it - the "What are you doing?" conceit...  Surely, no-one thinks their activity of the moment needs to be shared so broadly or preserved for posterity? 

I'm sure that my use of it to capture random thoughts is a symptom of living alone.

I bought a bike!

I've lived in Denmark for almost 7 months, and bike-buying was way overdue.  This place is designed for getting around on two wheels - it's got big fat bikepaths everywhere, but most importantly, it's as flat as a gymnast.  Everyone has a bike - after all, it's vital and outdoorsy and can be done while wearing a scarf.

This is my first bike since the blue one with big handlebars that I got for my ninth birthday.  This one doesn't have sparkles, but it's still pretty cute.  I worried that I'd get bored with the whole biking thing in approximately 7.5 minutes, so I bought the second cheapest one at the local supermarket.  Truth be told, I would have bought the cheapest one but both samples were broken in some way, and that just didn't seem like good odds.

Riding a bike is actually like riding a bike, but it's still a bit nerve-wracking for the first little while.  I tottered around my courtyard for a bit and then set off to the fried chicken shop.  This was to offset any potential ass-shrinkage due to unexpected exercise.

I also bought a lock and some lights, so I'm all set.  All I need to do is ensure I don't do a Daniel and get into any fantastic smashes because like everyone else in Copenhagen (and Amsterdam apparently), I certainly didn't buy a helmet. Don't tell my Mum.

Figuring that summer is the only acceptable time to head north from here, I lined myself up a trip to Oslo.

I arrived Friday night, and Oslo did not blow my mind.  I hear there's some interesting museums and such, but it just seemed clean and pleasant and quietly pretty.  So basically, Copenhagen.  With trams.

On Saturday, I set out on The Mother Of All Daytrips.  First, I caught the train from Oslo to Myrdal on the Bergen railway.  It passes through a range of different scenery, from Cascade-like, to alpine.  In the distance at one point, I could see the Hardangerjøkulen Glacier.  Or I would have, if it hadn't been pissing down the entire time I was in Norway.

From Myrdal, I caught the Flåm Railway down to....yep, Flåm.  This is a 20km trip that takes about an hour as it slows down to let everyone gawp at waterfalls and mountains and stuff.  Very pretty.  I sat next to a cool older German couple and we spent most of the trip giggling immoderately about the snoring Russians next to us.  That's the way to see Norway.

From Flåm, I caught a boat for some fjordy-goodness to Gudvangen.  These fjords (Aurlandsfjord and Nærøyfjord) are big and/or narrow and/or something notable.  Anyway, they're World Heritage listed and fairly impressive, but perhaps would have been more pleasant if it hadn't been pissing down the entire time I was in Norway.

From Gudvangen, I caught a bus up "the steepest stretch of road in Northern Europe".  Steep, and close to the edge.  The bus slid backwards at one point.  That was fun.

The bus went to Voss, home of just about the poshest water in the world.  The one LiLo poses with to prove she's off the sauce.  From Voss, I jumped back on the railway and hit Bergen a bit after 8pm.

I overnighted in Bergen.  I'd carefully booked ahead, 'cause it was high season in western Norway.  Of course, they had a competence failing and lost my booking.  From there, it was a bit of a Bethlehem situation.  I ended up sleeping on the couch of a bald guy with a leopard print eye-patch.  We talked about yoga and community consciousness.

The next day, before flying home again, I did Bergen.  The absolute highlight (possibly of this entire European adventure) was the Leprosy Museum.  The rest of Bergen was pretty and quaint, but it would have been nicer if it hadn't been, you know, pissing down the entire fucking time I was in Norway.

And yes, I did cut and paste every Norwegian word in this post.

• Your phone book only has 19 Smiths, but it has five and a half pages of Jensens.
• Crown Princess Mary shows up on magazine covers even more regularly than in Australia.
• That weird sound?  They're testing the air raid sirens.
• A nice summer afternoon is the same temperature as a Brisbane winter midnight.
• Danish pastries are called Vienna bread.
• Your movie ticket comes with seat assignment.
• The water leaves more crap on your dishes than the food did.
• Most of the shops on your street are shut for six weeks in summer.  Even the 'convenience' store.
• The first four items on a menu are herring.
• Hills?  Oh, yeah, I remember hills.
• Your address doesn't include a state, and your phone number doesn't include an area code.
• "Shobnhown" (from Swedes and Norwegians) and "CopenHARgen" (from anyone else) kind of annoys you.
• You sometimes go into the ladies' at work to find the seat up.