Sweden and Denmark

In May of 2025, I had the privilege of taking my family on a much needed vacation! This was a wonderful trip, and as a fun anecdote, I actually drove the car for a bit in both countries, and before this trip, I had never driven a car outside the state of New Hampshire. I hope you enjoy some of the photos here. I took 2,638 photos on this trip, but I can't share them all unfortunately.

We started out the afternoon of the 13th, taking a bus into Boston airport. After going through the usual airport bologna and waiting, we made our way onto our first plane, the "Sigrid Viking" an Airbus A330-300 operated by Scandinavian Airlines. This particular flight was overnight, leaving Boston (KBOS) at about May 13th, 1730 Local Time and landing in Copenhagen around May 14th, 0730 Local Time. This particular aircraft was pretty comfy for economy seats, I had no problem with the leg room, and the food was quite good. After quickly moving through Copenhagen airport, we hopped onto a smaller Embraer 195 to get to the Gothenburg-Landvetter Airport. Loved the 195, very quiet and comfy, with personal air conditioners, and the staff was great! We stepped foot in Sweden just a bit before 0915 on May 14th.

As you can probably imagine, we were a bit hungry after this night of flying, so we picked up our rental car, (a blue Volvo V90 hybrid) and set off for the city! Our first stop in Gothenburg (or Göteborg in Swedish) was The Haga District, one of the older sections of the city with lots of food and shopping. In addition to getting some snacks, we wondered around a bit including a walk over to Hagakyrckan, or "The Haga Church" to stretch our legs a bit. After this, we went to our rental house and went to a local grocery store and just relaxed for the rest of the night, enjoying the incredible spring-time weather in the quiet little neighborhood.

Real quick, before I continue with the itinerary, I want to stop and mention a few things that I loved in general about this trip. First, in typical New Englander fashion, I have to talk about the weather, and it was fantastic! Sunny or just a little cloudy in between 15-19C. It only rained two days of the whole trip. Public transit as well as pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure was incredible. The trams in Gothenburg are not only fun, but comfy and convenient. I appreciated how clean everything was, in addition to the fact that the Gothenburg transit fleet was almost entirely hybrid or fully electric, it made the whole experience smooth quiet, and clean. In general, all of the food was utterly fantastic and I would consider it to be the best food I have had in my life, and I absolutely miss it. Even basic grocery store items had a noticeable, superior quality to their American counterparts. Gifflar and knäckebröd are my two new favorite snacks/breakfast things and great examples of typical grocery store things being amazing. Pear jam is a great topping on knäckebröd, and I highly recommend trying these things if you ever get a chance. Marabou Chocolate is as common in Swedish grocery stores as Heresy is here in the US, and even though I was only limited to the white chocolate, we all agreed that it is leagues ahead and even better than the expensive brands here in the US. Finally, I was shocked at how many kids are just running around the cities and towns on their own or with their friends, it's quite the culture shock to see a city so friendly towards humans as well as being so safe that people and kids can just roam around outside in the fresh air with little to know worry. Finally, the standard showers, electrical sockets, and toilets are so much better than American ones.

Anyway, with all that out of the way, lets continue! May 15th was our first "full" day in Gothenburg, and fully rested from our plane trip, we set out to explore. Our first stop was the World of Volvo, and I have so many photos from here, but I will just share a few highlights. We also drove past the Headquarters for Räddningstjänsten Storgöteborg, the Fire/Rescue agency covering Gothenburg and a very large portion of the municipalities around it.

After spending the morning at the World of Volvo, we moved on, heading over to Inom Vallgraven, a very cool shopping/residential/restaurant district. We stopped for lunch at da Matteo Magasinsgatan, an excellent bakery/coffee shop that also did lunches and such. We got a variety of food to share, including cinnamon buns, a vanilla bun (which was outstanding by the way, pictured below), and even a pizza...my dad got a salad, and since he is gluten free, I got his sourdough, and it was amazing, just like everything else. Side note, this coffee shop can make a better pizza than any pizza place in New Hampshire could ever even try to make.

The Gothenburg City Museum (Göteborgs stadsmuseum) is located in a building that originally housed the offices of the Swedish East India Company and was built in 1762, the museum later established here in 1861. This museum was a treasure trove for a nerd such as myself, with all sorts of cool exhibits.

Returning back to our rental, we had dinner, hung out, and went to bed, ready for the next day. May 16th was our "island day" in Gothenburg. We started out by walking less than a minute to the bus stop outside our rental and heading into the city center, where we switched onto a Tram and took that all the way to the coast, where we then switched to a ferry and headed out into the Archipelago. The Gothenburg ferries were pretty great, boasting comfy chairs, giant windows, an onboard cafe, clean bathrooms, and WiFi. We got of at the islands of Styrsö and Donsö which are connected by a bridge. Cars are generally not allowed here, and transportation on the island is done by bicycle, moped, or golf cart. There are a few exceptions, those being emergency, construction, delivery, and small public transit vehicles. Styrsö is the larger of the two islands, with many really cool homes, a nursing/retirement home, some shops and restaurants and obviously 2 ferry ports. Donsö is the smaller island, home to the fire station and fire boat, the ambulance ship M/V Rescuer, more restaurants, a grocery store, boat and ship repair shops, a hardware/garden store, and even a hotel! Both islands also have schools on them. Interestingly there was a giant group of young kids (chaperoned by 2 moms) riding their bikes around after school, getting ice cream and riding the ferry between the islands. We also saw the crew of the M/V Rescuer and her Ambulance ripping through town on their bicycles and taking the ship out (I assume to a call, they were in quite the hurry). After our multi-hour exploration of the islands, we took the ferry, tram, and bus back to our rental, had dinner, and went to bed.

On May 17th in Gothenburg, things did not quite go to plan, as we got stuck outside the city for a while thanks to the Gothenburg Half-Marathon, which was actually pretty cool to watch. We did eventually find a way in and so we walked around Haga again, and watched the race for a while. We then took a brief hike to the top of Skansen Kronan, for a lovely view over the city. After this hike we went down to the neighborhood around Linnègatan, a lovely street with tons of restaurants and shops, and really cool architecture. This includes briefly stopping outside the Oscar Fredrick Church and a quick stop for some Gelato. To end the day off, we stopped at a small little family owned pizza place for dinner and enjoyed it back up at the top of Skansen Kronan overlooking the city. It may not look like much, but this pizza was truly one of the best I have ever had in my life...all 3 pizzas we had here in Sweden were for that matter. We then hiked back down to Haga and headed back to the rental. While our plans got a little derailed, this day still turned out to be pretty great.

Ahhh, May 18th, our final day in Gothenburg. Gothenburg had no trouble becoming my favorite city on this trip (sorry Boston, your number 2 now), and it is no doubt going to be a destination for me in the future, as there is still so much there that I want to see. Our first stop was The Gothenburg Museum of Natural History, home to the only taxidermy blue whale in existence. This museum was incredible, especially the bird section. After the museum we walked around in the neighboring Slottsskogen, an absolutely massive park in the middle of the city, including ponds, an animal reserve/petting zoo, and more. We were there the day after the half-marathon, so there was a celebration going on with live-music, food vendors, and more. The walking around was great, because we soon had a bit of a drive ahead of us as we made our way south along the coast.

We made our way back to the car, and off we went! As we made our way south, we stopped at a few places including Varberg, (Vawr-berry) a small coastal city home to Varbergs Fästning - The Varberg Fortress - a great place to stop and stretch our legs and grab a snack.

At around 1930 Local Time, we arrived at our next rental location, a small coastal town called Arild. We were staying in a relatively new neighborhood in town, and it was really nice! Unlike the previous photos in the blog which were all taken the same day, these photos are scattered over a few days.

Alright, after taking the night to recover from our car journey, we spent May 19th exploring the peninsula of Kullaberg (Coo-la-bear-ee), including the nature preserve. This particular region of Sweden is estimated to have been inhabited since 7000 BC! The Lighthouse is also attached to a little museum/ science center, with a small aquarium of native sea life and a bunch of nerdy science information...I was yet again, in heaven on earth.

After the nature reserve we went out to Mölle, a town of about 715 people to continue our exploration. Unfortunate a lot of things were closed, but it was still a nice little place to explore. One of the cool things about the Swedish coast, is all the uniquely painted houses! My personal favorite was here in Mölle, the black, yellow, and red one. Mölle also had an old fire station (Brandstation) that was turned into an Ice Cream shop! Unfortunately, it was closed.

Alright, May 20th was a very special day, because we went back up north to visit the tiny town of Torekov. We first started on the outskirts of town at a nature reserve and site of an old fortress. after we spent some time here, we moved on to the town itself!

What made Torekov a must-see destination for us, and why it's so special, is that it is where my Great Great Grandfather was born and raised, before immigrating to the US. Torekov is absolutely beautiful, quiet, and just a good place to be. It was not peak summer tourism season yet so there were still a lot of things closed, however it was still a great place to walk around and explore. Torekov has a small, maritime museum built into half of a ship which is pretty cool. I also wandered out onto some of the docks to take a look at a pair of rescue boats, which I later found out belonged to the Swedish Sea Rescue Society (Sjöräddningssällskapet) a non-profit, volunteer rescue organization that supplements the Coast Guard, financially operating solely on donations and optional memberships. SSRS also closely works with the Swedish Maritime Administration and their helicopters. Torekov happens to be one of their 70 stations, and is the primary station for this particular area of the Swedish coast line. "Gripen" is an 11.8 Meter Victoria-class rescue boat with 2, 500 horsepower diesel engines. "Annie" is an 8.4 meter Gunnel Larson class rescue boat, with a single engine running at about 300 horsepower.

After Torekov, we went to Båstad, a slightly larger town nearby to explore some more and get dinner. We had pizza at Da Roberto Båstad, another family owned pizza joint that makes New Hampshire pizza places look like a poorly funded school cafeteria. I also wandered off to find the local fire station...because of course I did. Interesting to note, that fire departments in Sweden are not based in towns, but rather they are regional (like in the Torekov/Båstad area, they have a fire/rescue agency that covers multiple municipalities) or municipal. Stockholm is the one exception to this that I know of. With that said, this station in the town of Båstad handles the fire/rescue emergencies within the municipality of Båstad of which Torekov is a part. Municipalities in Sweden are comparable to counties here in the US as a frame of reference.

New day! On May 21st we took a quick trip south, first stopping in Höganäs to visit on of the retail stores for Kosta Boda, a Swedish Glassworking company that has been operating since 1742. I wanted to bring home a real souvenir, something made in Sweden, that I could not get here at home, and so I did! I got the 45cl tumbler from the Kosta Boda Line Collection, handmade in Sweden since 1982. This collection was designed by Swedish glass artist Anna Ehrner. This particular variant is not sold in the US, so it was definitely a really cool thing to be able to bring home with me.

This marks the end of our time in Sweden, and I am sure I will be back! I had an excellent time. With that, we move on to Denmark! May 22nd was our travel day, briefly stopping in Copenhagen again, where it unfortunately rained on us. Denmark is vastly more expensive than Sweden, but even still, it was a great experience.

We briefly stopped in the city of Nyborg for dinner, at an ironically American themed steakhouse which we were not expecting at all. Food was fantastic though, so I can't complain. We eventually arrived at our final lodging destination: The LEGO Resort! We stayed in one of their wild west cabins. It was small but cozy. This brings us to May 22nd, where we went to The LEGO House, a museum and activities place all rolled into one. This was such a cool place to visit and I have hundreds of photos here.

After wandering around the museum portion for quite awhile, I headed back upstairs. The folks at the LEGO house are clearly a talented bunch, because the displays they have are awesome! As time goes by, the displays cycle different lighting and modes, such as night time, day time, storms, etc.

First, the farm!

Next, the countryside/ski mountain/mine.

Finally, the main city area.

We also had lunch here at the restaurant inside the LEGO House, and for a toy company, they sure know how to make food!

Here are a few miscellaneous pictures from around Billund, the LEGO HQ, our trusty V90 we had for this trip, and a brief view of LEGO Land.

I got very lucky at the end of the day because I went out to investigate some sirens I had heard. I eventually found the source of the commotion, a fire alarm activation at the waterpark nearby.

I returned from my brief bout of nosiness and after chilling for a bit we discovered a pair of ducks had decided to come by and wish us well on our trip home the next day.

May 24th was our final day in Denmark, as we had an afternoon flight direct to Boston. This time we were once again onboard a Scandinavian Air Airbus A330, the "Helge Viking". Service was just a tad less great than the first 2 flights, but overall it was good. My brother and I had the very rear starboard seats and so we had extra leg room (because our bags fit underneath us), and we could actually recline our chairs all the way back, making the return trip pretty comfy. We had dinner on board, another selection of food that was pretty good for being in an airplane their carrot cake was actually amazing. We were treated to a view of Greenland as well on our way back, full of snow covered mountains.

That's it! This concludes our trip. We took a bus from Boston back to NH, loaded the car and returned home. We were extremely fortunate for this opportunity, and I am so glad we did it.