The magic homeschool airbus took us to Stockholm, Sweden this week. I know. It’s a bit cheesy to call an airplane the magic homeschool airbus, but I just could not resist altering the magic school bus into our own version. If you know me a bit, you know I have lived in Sweden before immigrating to the US. I still have friends there and when one of them invited me to her home, it was very hard to resist.
We poked around at the idea and when things started falling into place we realized it was meant to be. The idea is to give the children a taste of some of the places that have meaning to their mom, introduce them to some of the friends who have touched my life along the way, but also expose them to the gorgeous city of Stockholm – one of the most beautiful capitals of the world.
We will go to other places as well, chasing the northern lights in Kiruna, for instance, or playing at the original Legoland in Billund, Denmark and even check out Copenhagen for a day. But Stockholm is our base.
We spent Day 1 walking around Gamla Stan, The Old City. Think cobblestone streets, the Nobel Museum, changing of the guards at the Royal Palace, Storkyrkan (the Royal Chapel where Crown Princess Victoria got married), and old buildings dating back to the Middle Ages. It is from this area that the city of Stockholm grew. If you want to be really specific, it all started in Stortorget – the Great/Big Square.
Today, you can have icecream from a street vendor or a wonderful meal in one of the many restaurants with terraces around the Great Square or visit the Nobel Museum. But many centuries ago, this was the trading post which started the city of Stockholm. It all grew from this square where people met to buy and sell goods.
We ended the evening with a walk around the island where we are staying. Stockholm is an archipelago in Lake Malaren and many call this beautiful city the Venice of the North. It was fun to dust off my Swedish vocabulary and interact with the locals in their native tongue, although most Swedes are fluent in English. The kids can already say hello and bye in Swedish.