Well into my big batch of travels, last week saw me travelling to Sweden for a change. No, I don’t speak any Swedish (unless ‘Hej’ and ‘Tack’ counts as language knowledge), but luckily most Swedes speak really decent English, so communication isn’t too difficult.
Apart from a weekend in Stockholm many moons ago, I have never been to Sweden before I started working in my current job. In the past year I have had a few trips, however have not always had a chance to actually see anything. But what I have seen is very pretty and makes me want to go and see more of this country… so maybe a road trip at some point? We’ll see.
This week’s trip actually started in Denmark, not Sweden. As my client is based in Malmö, flying to Copenhagen is the easiest option. Malmö and Copenhagen are linked by a very long bridge crossing the bay and there is a direct train taking you via this bridge to Malmö and beyond.
From Malmö (or actually from the next stop Lund, which was more convenient for the pick up) we travelled to Helsingborg for our meeting.
As there was a second consultation in Ängelholm scheduled for the coming day, staying in the area made sense.
So I booked myself into a central hotel in Helsingborg, hoping to get a chance of having a tour around town in the evening.
The hotel I went for was the ‘Radisson Blu Metropol’, a fairly new and contemporary hotel (it opened in 2015) in a central location near the harbour and town center.
It is not much of a looker from the outside, a cube building, nothing special. But the interior is designed nicely, with lots of little details and quirks. So not your box standard chain hotel.
After a couple of rainy spells throughout the day, the evening was clear blue skies. So I decided to not run a risk and go for my tour straight away… just in case.
So first I walked down to the harbour and along the waterfront. There were a couple of large ferries coming in and leaving, plus smaller boats in the harbour itself. A couple of people were walking or running along the seafront, but as it was already out of season, it wasn’t terribly crowded. V idyllic and picturesque.
To enjoy the sunshine, peace and quiet, I stopped for a quick espresso along the way. There are several small coffee and eating places dotted along the way, however a lot of them were already closed. Although this seems to be a coffee chain (or at least there was a second one with the same name a few roads away, so I assume it is some kind of chain), it was a cute quirky little café, with very friendly and chatty staff (again, English wasn’t a problem at all, thank god for that)
Once I had enough of the waterfront, I ventured further into town, towards Kärnan, a medieval tower and only bit remaining of a much larger fortress.
After a good two hours of walking I called it a day and made my way back to the hotel for dinner and an early night… after all, I did get up at 3.30 that morning.
So tell me, how was your week?
