Visit to the Swedish Relatives

I got the train from Interlaken to Zürich and from Zürich to Frankfurt . I arrived into Frankfurt at 3pm and did not have a flight to Stockholm until 9pm. It turned out that RyanAir's Frankfurt Airport is not in Frankfurt, but an hour and a half away. While in Frankfurt I did some laundry and hung out in a hostel. I missed the 5pm bus so I took the 6pm bus.

I finally got to the airport and boarded my plane at around 9pm. At this point I had been traveling about 13 hours. During the flight it started to snow a lot and it looked as if we were going through space at the speed of light with stars passing us constantly, it similar to scenes in Star Wars. It turned out that it was snowing so much that the plan could not land at the airport that was planned and has to head to the Stockholm downtown airport. This was a great thing because once again the RyanAir airport was far away from the center of the city. When I got to the center of the city I headed to the hostel I had stayed at the previous time I was in Stockholm. My plan was to follow someone into the hostel and then sleep on the couch. This plan was good except that the workers at the hostel know backpackers very well. On the door there was a sign that said, "Sorry we are booked for the night, Ps That means no sleeping on the couch". I was a little screwed at this point because I had left my big bag back in Frankfurt along with my travel guide. I ended up walking to the train station and finding a map of the city that included hostels. I turned out that the nearest hostel was almost a mile a way, so I decided to go the nearby Best Western Hotel. It was quite expensive, but I was able to get a good night sleep and a great breakfast in the morning.

After the breakfast (11/10/07) I walked over to the train station where I met Kathy Johnson from Traverse City, Michigan. We boarded the train to Hallsberg and arrived by 12:15. A couple picked us up I don't know they're names, but it was a man in his 70's and his fiancee. They took us right to the reunion at a local church where I got to meet everyone. They were all very kind and I was surprised how many had been to the United States. They had tons of pictures of Cadillac Michigan, Traverse City, and my house I grew up in Bethany Beach and Dundee. I really enjoyed talking to Par Johnson because he knew my parents and my grandparents. He showed me pictures of our Dundee house before the additions and also pictures of Nana and Papa. Kristian then showed me the family tree starting with Karl Johnson, my great great great grandfather. His grand daughter Signe was my grandmother. A little while later the couple that picked me up came out in traditional Swedish dress. They did a traditional dance that was great. He spun her around it looked like they were having a great time. I was especially interesting because they were both around 70. It was interesting to watch this giant man be so focued on this dance, this seemed different from American culture.

The reunion only lasted a few hours and then I was taken to Erik's house. We ate some dinner then they showed me around their city. We saw a castle where the high school had their dances and some businesses were located. After this they took me to Eva's house out in the county side. her house looked right out of Bethany Beach I could see why the Swedes moved to Michigan, it looks the same with all the water forests and farm land. At Eva's house we drank coffee and at cake and they told me hour Erik's son in law was a submarine captain and trained with the US Navy's submarines doing training routines. They were proud of how the Swedes had won the training mission. Later on Eva's husband too me out to his garage where he was restoring two Mustangs, a white 1966 and a blue 1964 and 1/2. This was incredible he had bought the 1964 when he was 18 and had it shipped over to Sweden That finished the night and we headed back to Erik's house. His wife made us soup and we headed to bed.

I woke up early (11/11) because Erik wanted to show me my ancestor's houses and I had to catch a 7pm flight. He took me to Karl Johnson's church and then where he and Signe was born and raised. He made it interesting because he was always reminding me that Signe walked down this road, went to that building, or worked one of those fields. As we were heading to the next place. Erik's decided to take a quick right turn so he braked hard and then there was a boom. I thought the car's axle had snapped, but we had been rear ended. It turned out that the other car was completely destroyed, but Erik's Tank like Volvo had a lot less damage. We headed back to their house with everyone safe and healthy.

At 3:30 they took me to the airport an hour and a half away. I said good by at the airport and thanked Erik for everything.

I really enjoyed my time with them. They were so kind and generous. They feed me well, put so much effort into speaking English, and so happy to show me around. I enjoyed seeing their way of life. They appreciated their family, and were happy with what they had. I guess they don't live in a consumer culture.

At the airport duty free shop I ran into a girl that I had met on my flight to Stockholm. We caught up on each others weekends and then started boarding, she went ahead because she had priority. I was able to still get a seat by her and we ended up talking part of the flight and then I started reading. When we landed we had to run to the bus because we did not want to wait for the next one. Once I was back in Frankfurt I headed to the hostel, had a beer and went to sleep.

Interlaken and Gimmelwald

I woke up early the next morning (11/5), 6am, to catch a train to Interlaken. I arrived at Interlocken at 2 and went to the tourist office to find a hostel. I ended up staying at Balmer's, but was not very impressed by it. It seemed like cool place to hang out, but the pillows were tiny and the rooms were crowded. Interlaken was dead during this season, so I headed to Gimmelwald (11/6) where the Mountain Hostel is that I was excited about even before this trip. To get there I took a train, bus, and gondala. This place was beautiful, it was literally surrounded by snow covered mountains. When I went in the hostel I was greeted by some other guests that were martial arts instructors. I did not get to talk long since they were going on a hike. I ended up just sitting in the hostel most of the day resting. I did do a trip up to the grocery store, but arrived at 12:12 when the store closed at noon. I ended up going to Esther's restraunt to buy a sandwich, yogurt, and beef jerky. It was all very good. The rest of the day was spent looking at emails and playing pool with the other guests.

The nex day (11/7) I woke up at 7:30 and ran up to the grocery store because people were planning on hiking at 9 and I needed to get back by then. I got back at 8:30 so I had some time to chow down musilii. We decided to hike up a valley and follow a stream to where the stream had carved out a cave inside a glacier. The hike took two hours to get to the cave. The hike was filled with scenery. The entire way was a rocky path along a steep mountain, at a few points we were in a pine forest that was beautiful. When we had hiked the two hours we were close but did not know where the caves were. We got to the end of the valley and it was enclosed by mountains, but we did not see a cave. It had to be ahead, so we kept walking. When we got to the top of a steep hill made of razor sharp rocks it was right there, a giant black hole dug straight into ice. Getting down there was tricky because there was a 45 degress slop heading into it that was covered with ice and loose sharp gravel. When we got down in it it was much larger than I had thought. Four of us put our head lamps on and walked in. The width of the cave had to be 20 meters wide and 10 meters high. The cave walls were similar to egg crate foam texture except on a much larger scale. Like in rocks there were different colors of ice probably from areas of high pressure. Some of these layers were extremely clear and you could see a few meters in and other were foggy from the air bubbles in it.

The four faster guys in the group including me walked further into the cave; we followed it for about 15 minutes before we took a break. We paused for a minute and turned off the head lamps. It was the darkest I have ever seen. I put my hand up to my face and could not see a thing. After we decided to turn back becasue we thought it might be dangerous because we did not have the porper gear. I wanted to go a little further and see if we could find the exit where a water fall was. When back at the hostel I ordered a pizza and beer and exchanged stories about the day with the other guests.

The martial arts instructors invited me on a hike (11/8) for this day, but I declined bacuse I had no food to take and they told me they were going for 9 hours and I wasn't sure I could keep up. At around 11 I went outside and it was an absolutely beautiful day. I decided to not sit around and take a hike. My plan was to follow the same trail as to the ice caves and then follow a trail that went up to the mountain. After about 2 hours I had made it pretty far and decided to go 30 minutes further. After 30 minutes I made it to a small camp of 3 buildings, from here I could see the top of the mountain Spitzberg and Berg. This was where the martial arts guys were hiking. I decided to hike up there, but did not know what trail to follow. I followed one for 30 minutes, but found out it was the wrong one, so I turned around and went back to the camp. At the camp I followed the sign that led up the mountain. This was a very steep climb and I was nervous about getting hurt because I had not told any one where I was going and did not have the right gear. After about an hour of walking and crawling up the mountain I was close to the top. I could see the restraunt and tourist center clearly. There was probably only 200 meters difference in elevation, but it was steep. I was ready to keep climbing, but they had removed the trail markers, so that dumb hikers don't get themselves killed. After some comtemplation I decided to head down the mountain because I thought it was too dangerous to hike on unmarked trails with no one else with me and no gear or radio.

When I got back to the hostel I realized I had been hiking 6 hours and the other hikers were not back yet. After an hour the people that did the same hikes as me arrived. They ran into the same problems I had. The martial arts guys could find the trail and decided to blaze their own. and another guy got close to the top, but would always slide down the snow because it was so slick. I was proud that I was the first the first back and the one that hiked back, though they got to the top they did take the gondala back. We had a good time telling the stories of the day's adventures.

At 8 that night I had to head back to Interlaken because I had to get a train at 7am the next morning. When I got to the hostel the lady told me the reception was close, but the sign said it closed at 11 and it was only 9:30 so I pushed a little bit and she let me in. Next stop Swedish Family Reunion

Paris, Nantes, Köln, and Molly Anderson

Paris is a beautiful city, but on the other hand all the myths of France are true. It was the most annoying city to travel through. Every train that you board requires a reservation and you probably need to get it 2 days before because the trains get so full, the people are rude and are unwilling to speak english even when you ask in french, and the hostels are really bad.

After I had gotten settled in my hostel I decided to take a long walk around the city. From my hostel I headed towards Notre Dame to get a few good night shots, then headed to the Lourve, and finally to the Eiffel Tower. Notre Dame was a beautiful cathedral, but I still like the one from Cologne a lot more. The Lourve is absolutely huge, I would guess that you could fit 10 football fields in it. It is a beautiful building and after contemplating if I like the glass pyramid or not, I decided that it goes well with the museum. Outside the museum is the Arc de Triuph, or so I thought. When I saw it for the first time I was really not that impressed with it because it was not that big, but the next day I found out that it was not it. I guess the real thing was in another location of the city. Finally after 3 hours of walking I got to the Eiffel Tower. I must hand it to the French, it was absolutely huge. I thought it would be like 300 feet tall, it was like 900 feet tall. I didn't go up it, since I was planning on going up it with Molly Anderson from Bethany Beach.

The next day (10/31) I had to switch to a hotel because the hostel did not have any rooms for the night. I missed the bike tour that I had wanted to do because I could not find it, but was able to find it after a while I found it and was able to do the 4 pm bike tour. When I got to the bike tour I found out that I was the only person that had showed up so far. The girl that was running it was from Texas and a really fun person to talk to. When we were about to give up on other people coming a man from New Jersey showed up. He was a retired navy pilot and currently and enterprenuer/ commercial pilot. The tour guide took us out for 3 hours, but did not see much more than when I walked the previous night. Afterwards I went to a bar with the American guy; he paid for the drinks and a few appetizers, but I would rather not have had his company since he told me the most discusting stories. He didn't seem to get the hint he should stop telling me them eventhough I did not respond to any of them.

In the morning (11/1) I went to the train station to go to Nantes to see Molly Anderson. I had already told Molllz that I would be on the 12 o'clock train, but could not get a reservation for the train until 6:30. I tried to find internet to send her an email that I would not be on the 12 pm train, but had to walk the entire citz to realize Paris does not does not have internet cafes. I had to go back to the hostel to email her, I finally sent an email at 3 a half hour after my train was suppose to arrive. When I went back to the train station I bought National Geographic about hunting and memory loss, it was a good way to pass the time. I finally got to Nantes at 8:30, but did not see Molly there, so I headed to her place. I didn't have a map except for one that I had copied off of google maps and it didn't have any major roads on it. I ended up spending about two and a half hours looking for her place. Along the way I asked a french guy for some help and he just told me to go away. I was really to kick his ass since it was 10:30 and I didn't know where to go, typical french. I got really close to where she lived but could not find the last road, I saw a couple walking to their car so I asked them for help. They were very kind and gave me a ride just up the street to where I needed to be. I finally found Molly and was excited to see her; I showed her some of my pictures; she introduced me to her friends and professors; it was a great time.

Over the weekend Molly was meeting her friend Chris in Cologne Germany, she invited me to go, so I accepted. In the morning (11/2) I tried to go the train station to get a reservation, so I could be on the same train as Molly. I turned out that when I tried to go out the door at 7:30 I found out that you need to have a key to open the door. I ended up waiting until 8:30 until someone finally came down stairs that I could ask for a key. I could not get a reservation for the same train as Molly to Paris, but was able to get the one the hour after. I was pretty annoyed because I could not get a reservation for the same train as Molly to Paris, and inorder to get a train from Paris to Cologne I had to spend 88€. When I finally got to Paris I ran to Molly's train and kept looking in the windows to find her. Finally after I had looked in 20 cars I found her and luckily she saw me because the train was suppose to leave in 3 minutes. Since I did not have a ticket for that train but the next one to Cologne I asked her for the hotel information that we were staying at. Molly suggested me ask if I could get on the train even though I had the wrong ticket and fortuently they let me on.

When we got to Cologne we headed to the hotel. Hotel was verz fancy, a Sofiatel. Mollz had only paid for one person so I had to sneak in. As she was checking in I walked to the 2nd floor and waited until she found me. The room was small, but nice. We went to the train station and got a bratwurst and then to the hostel I had stazed at before and drank a beer. Mollz wanted to look at the ice bar across the strrat so we went over there and got a shotand then headed back to the hostel for another beer. I checked my email and sent some emails to friends and family. We then headed back to the hotel for some much needed rest.

The next morning at 7am Molly's friend Chris Hanley arrived from Cairo. Chris went to sleep and Molly and I went down to the pool and hot tub, which turned out to be awesome. The pool was all black graniteand had light to make the rock glitter, on the side of the pool thez had stainless steal tube benches that that blew air out and caused the water to bubble, Mollz and I enjoyed this novelty. We were switching from the pool to hot tub everz five minutes and continued this for about an hour and a half. Soon after we went up to the room and woke up Chris and we all got ready to go out and see Cologne. When we got to down town we went inside the Cathedral took some pictures and then moved on. We then headed to the Roman German museum. Chris was verz interested in this because he studies ancient historz and some theologz. This museum was not to interesting because they only showed pots and items from general life. We left and outside between the museum and cathedral we found a protest of turks wanted to build a mosque in the middle of Cologne, This was interesting but did not paz much attention to it at the time. We moved on to the Chocalate museum which was suppose to be the real life version of Willz Wonka. This was intersting to Mollz and Chris, but I had alreadz been to on in Bruges, so I was not that interested in the information. I did enjoz the making of the chocalate because of the mechanical machines and the flowing milk chocalate. At the end we bought a few samples and gifts for people back home.

For dinner went to a Burger Kin in the center of town. We then headed bacvk to the hotel to sit in the hot tub for a few hours. At 11 the pool shut down so we left, but the night was still young. The hotel was hosting a party, so we headed to it. It was fun, but we were the onlz people under 30. I think I enjozed watching the old men bust their moves, which weren't too impressive. After of a couple of hours of poorly picked music we went back to the hotel room to sleep.

The next morning (11/4) Mollz and I headed to the pool and sa una. Chris came later since he woke up late. We then headed to the cahtedral to clim to the top of the right tower. Zou wounät think it would be verz manz stpe but Molly and Chris counted and almost go to 500 steps. From th top we could see all the turkish protests with communist and turkish flags. We went down to where the protestor were and Chris and I pretended to be participants as Mollz took phots. I think we then went to a cafe and got coffee and cake. Later on we went to an old pub that served beer in oak kegs. I had been to this place earlier in this trip, but I wanted Molly and Chris to see it. We got some traditional German food, I thought I might be sick afterwards because it was such a heavy meal. After this we went back to the hostel and I check my email and bought flights for the family reunion and Molly and Chris headed to mass at the Cathedral. When they got back from mass we headed to the hotel to soak in the hot tub and drink Jager Bombs and champaign. Next stop Interlaken.

Bruges, Brussels, and Luxembourg

Bruges had been suggested to me and was a great city to visit. The city is divided into two sections the old and the new. The old sections has buildings that date back to the 18th century and certain building go back further than that. The old town square lies in the middle of the city, from here you can see almost everything. Right on the square is a huge cathedral and the other sides of the square had massive old styled archicture building that were probably used for the royalty and government. Right down the road there is another cathedral and a little ways further is a 3rd one. Everywhere in the old town there are cobble stone streets with stone building lining it which were all natural colored.


The hostel I stayed at was about 5 minutes from the city center. It was a great hostel by my definition because it had a lot of people there, cheap, had a central hang out location, and 1€ beer. The first night I hung out with some Australians and Americans at the bar and had a good time. One of the Australians was really cool he's a competetive spearfishman, so he had plenty of stories about the fish that he caught and friends that would dive 30 meters on one breath. At a later time I talked to a American liberal fundamentalist. He was a little annoying because he seemed like he had poor knowledge but extreme views. I didn't argue with him too much, since most of the time I was trying to figure out what he was talking about.

The next day I went to the Chocolate Museum and the Diamond museum. The chocolate museum had good free chocolate, but I was upset with the diamond museum because they didn't give any free diamonds. It was interesting because they showed how to cut, turn, and polish diamonds.


Instead of spending the night in Brussels I decided to do a day trip there. I wasn't too impressed with Brussels as a tourist, but I think I would like it if I lived there. It seemed like a very modern city, but one that did not have many interesting things for a tourist. I decided to walk around a little bit, so I headed to a cafe and got a capacino and a beer. The beer had a really cool bottle with a metal hinge that pulled down the cap to close it, it reminded me of a soda bottle from the 1900's. Later on I got an order of frites and mayonase, aka french fries; these people eat the strangest food. When walking around the city you see tons of people eating fries loaded with mayonase, I guess they don't care for ketchup. That was the extent of my exposure to Brussels, I guess it wasn't too exciting, Luxembourg on the other hand was much better.

The next day I headed to Luxembourg. When I arrived I met a guy, Alex Taylor from Canada, heading to the same hostel as I was. After we got settled in the hostel we headed out to see some of the town. We couldn't see very much since it was night time and rainy. I got some dinner from the grocery store and then we headed back to the hostel and chilled out in its cafe. In the morning we really got to see how beautiful Luxembourg was. Luxembourg is a very rocky and mountainous area, but head a lot of rivers that have carved out vallies over time. It is interesting because the architects here did not avoid this area even though it would be difficult to build on. On the top of one of these slopes is a castle with a couple hundred meter wall that follows the ridge line, below in the valley is a small square with a few massive building, I think the buildings were part of a local school. Across the river on the opposite slope of the castle's slope is a fortress called the Casemates. The Casemates are a series of tunnels that were used as a military fortification. The total length of the tunnels are 23 km, but Alex and I were only able to go through about 1km. There were great views from the tunnels because they had the old cannon holes that overlooked the city and the surrounding areas. Alex liked photography a lot so both of us ended up taking a lot of pictures. I only spent 18 hours in Luxembourg, but really grew an appreciation for the city. Next I was off to Paris.