22 September 2023

Road Trip!!!

We thought we’d try out a new country today! Sweden has been very kind to us, but, with the help of Linnea and Gustav, it was time to leave and move a little further south.

Our pit stop for the day was in the town of Ålmhult, home of the iconic IKEA. Really!!! It was a slight detour from the E4, (the main highway between Stockholm and Copenhagen) but well worth it for a few reasons. 1. THE IKEA Museum was situated here. Surely, the most iconic museum in Sweden! Mandatory visitation required, right? And, 2. IKEA restaurants serve their infamous Swedish Meatballs and this might be our last chance (a la IKEA style) to consume this culinary delight.

The museum, which was originally the very first IKEA store, displayed furniture and homewares from the 1950s through to the present day with a “vision of creating a better everyday life at home”.

Fun fact: The founder, Ingvar Kamprad, named his company, at the age of 17, from his own initials, the farm (Elmtaryd) and the village (Agunnaryd) where he grew up. Bet you didn’t know that!!! I didn’t either, until today!

We enjoyed our visit, and the meatballs were good too. However, we had another country to invade and it wasn’t that far away. Time to move.

As we drove further south, the countryside became less forest and more farm land. The wind turbines became more prominent and even the buildings took on a different construction style.

We crossed the very long and infamous Öresund bridge between Sweden and Denmark and paid an exorbitant amount for the privilege. We made sure we noted the midpoint and looked for any signs of “misadventure. We’d half expected to see a chalk outline of a human body situated half in Sweden and half in Denmark. Fortunately, the opening scene from “The Bridge” Scandi TV Series was not going to be re-enacted today.

The crossing consists of 8 km of bridge from the Swedish side to a small manmade island in the middle of the strait , followed by 4 km of tunnel before arriving on the edge of Copenhagen. Gustav coped brilliantly with the traffic and managed to block out all the fuss we were making as we crossed the border.

We checked into our hotel late in the afternoon and enjoyed our first view of Copenhagen from the 17th floor. (Not dissimilar to the view we got from our plane 6 days ago.)

Our arrival was marked with a margarita and lovely Thai dinner!! Go figure!!!

There’s an iconic melody ear worming its way into my consciousness right now. I think it’s almost ready to bust forth! Tomorrow.!!!