Today was SUPPOSED to be a lovely and relaxed day. Pace-wise, I think we met that goal. Physical activity-wise, we had the highest-stepping most distance walked in a single day!
We woke up and ate a buffet breakfast at this amazing hotel. Lucky we tanked up, because we didn’t realize how demanding the day would be. Now today is Sunday. In Sweden, so many things are shut down on Sunday. Here’s one thing that’s shut down: the state-owned beer and liquor stores. That’s right. In Sweden the laws are such that you must go to the nation’s alcohol monopoly store in order to buy the beer that you might want to drink on your lovely waterfront balcony later. There’s only one other problem…they close at 13:00 on Saturdays and they are closed on Sundays. A minor inconvenience though, as we sat at the rooftop bar and had some well-earned drinks as we watched the sunset over Denmark and the Øresund.
Anyway…back to our explorations. The first thing we did was go and visit a medieval castle keep, which sits at the center of the city. It offers supreme views of the city from high on a hill! It was built in the 1300s by a Danish king. Wait a minute! We’re in Sweden! Why would a Danish king build a castle in Sweden?! Welp, the short answer is that all of this area was ruled by the Danes until 1658, when all of Skäne (the region we are travelling in) was returned to Sweden in the treaty of Roskilde! The tower feels massive, and it has survived multiple proposals to blow it up from military officials. After each request the king of Sweden did not respond, and the tower lived on. In the mid-1800s the tower was crumbling. It was a complete hazard to the public, and the whole area was not the best place to hang out. A huge restoration project began, and the tower was renovated and partially restored by 1903. A grand stairwell leads you up to the castle keep past a beautiful fountain in the center of the stairwell on a platform. The keep rooms themselves are fun historical exhibits about the 13th century operation of such a castle. You ascend through each level of the castle on your way to the roof, and the view is COMPLETELY worth the climb. You can look out over the entire city from the top. Now, when we arrived at the tower this morning, the weather was rainy, dark, and cloudy. By the time we got to the top, the skies had cleared and the sun came out. It was gorgeous!
We took a bunch of pictures and descended the tower. It was time to go grab some lunch , and we knew that we wanted a picnic lunch today! The reason for that was that we planned a lovely afternoon at Fredriksdal, an 18th century manor and gardens. Basically a very wealthy person owned 36 hectares of land in Helsingborg, which eventually became open to the public. The property is covered with gardens, pastures, farm buildings, an outdoor theater, and even a windmill! We toured the rose garden, the orchard, the kitchen garden and so many more gardens! We were chased by a large black horse, who spotted us walking by and trotted over! He wanted food. We are wise enough NOT to play that game. I sincerely hope that no one but his handlers give him food. The Swedes are rule-followers, so I’m hoping that the horse was not taught that humans have snacks by rude foreign tourists. There were cows, chickens, and pigs as well. Farm buildings are scattered about the whole property, and there are period-historically preserved dwellings and utility structures that you can tour as well. On site (though closed) is a printing museum and what appeared to be a mock up of a small industrial town in the 1960s. Jessi and I enjoyed our picnic lunch of Korean Fried Chicken and dumplings. Then, we walked for miles and miles around the gardens and farms, taking all kinds of pictures as we went. The skies were a beautiful blue with puffy white clouds. The air was heavy with the smell of clean fresh air and flowers. The sun was shining so hard that I got a bit of a sunburn on my face! Given how the day began, we were NOT expecting the kind of beauty that we found today weather-wise!
After our garden/farm touring, we wound our way down to a gothic church in town. Saint Mary’s church lies just down the hill from the Kärnan. We used electric scooters to move about for most of today, so we took two scooters to the brink of the hill, parked them (in a designated place) and then walked the remainder of the way to the church.
The church is like many other gothic style churches in architecture and construction. It was originally a catholic church from the 1300s, and is thought to have been built over an existing 1100s church. After the reformation, it became a Lutheran church. When we walked in, the rich smell of candles burning was overwhelming. That’s the smell of a church, to me. The interior smelled of those candles and old wood and brick…old brick. Tombs of previous parishioners line the floors of the church with inscriptions in numerous local languages, including German. The pulpit was a very detailed series of wood carvings depicting the creation, the bible myth of Adam and Eve, and the life events of the christian Jesus myth. There was a really cool painting in the church that depicted the Kärnan castle complete with the town of Helsingborg outside its walls and all of the churches in the area plotted. Jessi noticed that there were ships hanging from the ceiling of the church. She told me that she learned that they were donated to the church by merchants and seafaring folk.
We finished up our picture-taking there and made our way past our hotel out to the parapet for a glorious view of the Øresund. The parapet is the sea wall for the Northern portion of the city, and there are a few amenities there. It also makes up the marinas, where people dock/anchor their boats. Jessi went down onto the “tropical beach” (they planted a few palm trees) so that she could dip her feet in the Øresund. I walked out to the end of the sea wall and watched two huge ferry ships pass each other on their way in and out of port! It was such fun standing out there in the salty wind. It almost knocked us both over a few times. Gulls flew overhead, and their distinctive calls made me feel like I was living in a movie.
That done, we made our way back to the hotel. We grabbed some döner kebab and pizza (takeout) to eat on our room balcony overlooking the port. After that we went up to the rooftop bar for dinks and sunset. It was an unexpectedly great day, given how the weather looked when we set out.
Tomorrow, we are off to Malmö, Sweden for two days before returning to Copenhagen, Denmark. Jessi and I have a few agenda items for Malmö, but we are looking to maybe add a surprise day-trip to another Swedish city into the mix! We’ll keep you posted!
