Hiking in Tyresta National Park

Fall scenery at lake Stensjön. Today we traveled south of Stockholm to Tyresta National Park. A truly magnificent park that promises a great experience for advanced hikers as well as beginners. Tyresta consists of primeval forests and an impressive biotope - there is plenty of wildlife here; martens, deer, owls. Around dusk we encountered several deer families grazing nearby our trail.

View from one of the peaks at Fornborgsslingan. Some steep cliffs leading straight down to the lake. The trail around the lake presented hikers with a spectacular view over the southern part of the national park.

During primeval time, when the water level was higher, this land was part of peninsulas and islets used by early inhabitants of northern Europe.











Pictures from out camp site at lake Stensjön. Tara is keeping warm by the fire. Kim is boiling coffee. It was around 32 degrees Fahrenheit when we set out at 7.50 in the morning. We think it never reached above 40 degrees at noon, so the sunshine was much appreciated. Sunrise at 7.30, sunset at 5.24. Since we did not want to get caught in the middle of the park at nightfall we decided not to head for the coastline but instead come back some other time and try out the other trails. Read our hiking description below!


Map over hiking trails in Tyresta National Park. (Click on image to enlarge.) We hiked the southern path of Bylsjöslingan (white dots) and continued onto the trail marked as "Tyresta by - Stensjödal" on the map. At Stensjödal, just south of the lake system, we sat down by the camp fire and had lunch. After resting for an hour we walked up the hills on Fornborgsslingan (white dots east of the lake Stensjön) and then headed north on the trail marked by yellow-dots: "Stensjön-Årsjön". At the intersection north of Årsjön (which was pretty much located in the middle of a swamp where the trail only consisted of logs to walk on) we headed south on Sörmlandsleden (orange) to come back to our starting point at Tyresta by (read big dot). All-in-all a neat little hike of about 25 km (16 miles). Some of the paths were more difficult than we had expected. In some cases "the trail" was nothing more than a clearing made by a chainsaw. And the elevations in the area around Stensjön were quite demanding.

Recipe for something sweet

Kim is bored beyond belief. Kim wants something fun to do. Kim makes Tara some Swedish treats with a name that has stirred up a heated debate during the past years. A majority of Swedes still call this candy Negro balls. ("Negro" used to be considered a neutral word in Sweden - Read more about the controversy here.)
Recipe
1 1/2 c (0.4 L) quick-cooking oatmeal
1/4 c (59 ml) sugar
6 Tbsp (89 ml) butter, softened
2 Tbsp (30 ml) cocoa powder
1/2 Tbsp (7 ml) vanilla extract
1 Tbsp (15 ml) coffee (cold)
coconut or pearl sugar for rolling in

Combine butter, sugar, oats (mind you don't use the instant packets), cocoa powder, vanilla, and coffee until it makes a perfect dough. Roll into balls about the size of a meatball. For decoration: Roll balls in coconut/oatmeal flakes or pearl sugar. Refrigerate for an hour, or freeze the candy in order to create a harder consistency.

Remembrance of things past

Links to the past. It is rainy today, so Kim is waiting for Tara to come home, while listening to some songs from the past.

Fishtank (click on the song link), by the band This Perfect Day. Wow! I have not heard this song for over a decade! Great pop tune with synthesizer-driven melody! Important fact: Kim's brother once destroyed a sweater after he went to their concert in the mid 90ies, together with Kim. A rock club can easily turn into a sauna if you're wearing warm clothes. The best concert we ever went to was probably The Soundtrack of Our Lives in 1998. The concert ended around 3 AM and I got about two hours of sleep before I had to get up to catch a train to my work in Växjö, 2 hours away by train.

Shoreline, by Broder Daniel It was 1 AM and the band refused to get on stage until they got more booze. Then they trashed the downstairs apartment at the Blekingska Nation. About half an hour later they entered, almost too drunk to know what way was up... It became an interesting concert. Shoreline, however, was not written until several years later. A nice guitar-based riff in the opening, and some basic depressed BD-lyrics. It's such a great classic punk/rock tune! (Kim went to the same school as the singer, a year shy of the same age.) "I'll be gone" and "Whirlwind" are streamed here. Again, the band is using their trademark openings of guitar-chord progressions to create punk/emo-inspired rock. Lovely!

The National Gallery

We visited the National Gallery today, and went through all the exhibitions where we encountered hundreds of Renaissance paintings and other important treasures from the art galleries.
Carl Larsson (The Norman Rockwell of Sweden) has made two impressive paintings which are hanging on the third floor of the entrance hall. "Midwinter sacrifice" (above) spans 6 x 14 yds. and depicts an old Viking ritual; "Gustaf Vasa's entry to Stockholm 1523" (below) is not quite as huge but still pretty impressive.
In the entrance hall, visitors will also encounter "The funeral transport of Charles XII" (below), depicting the deceased king Charles XII being brought home to Sweden from war in Norway.

DN Classical Music Consert

The Swedish Royal Philharmonic Orchestra attracted 35 000 people to the fields outside of the Naval History Museum in Stockholm on this late summer's day. Their potpourri of classical pieces could be enjoyed under a sparsely clouded sky. We were happy to be able to once again listen to Drottningsholmsmusiken, which we used in our wedding ceremony both in Sweden and the US.

Vacation in Båstad/Skummeslöv

The Bjäre peninsula, view from Båstad beach, near Pepe's Bodega.











Tara enjoys the summer's last raspberry cider at the tiki bar in Sweden (!) in August.
Kim is having fun watchin the thunder circle around the bay area. These shots were from the last days of our week in the summer cottage. We had some incredibly hot and sunny days, although the ending of the week was rather gloomy.

As usual, Tara wanted to snap some shots of houses in the area that she would like to buy when we get old. Here are the results.


This fence, made of branches, is a trademark of the region. Chances are that the we will work on getting ourselves something like this if we get a house of our own.








Below: At the beach in Mellby. Sand dunes, sun, the ocean and a chess board. Can a vacation be more perfect than this? (Last time we played chess by the sea was in Key West, right next to the Gulf of Mexico.)

Tall Ships' Race

Stockholm's inner harbor was crowded with schooners, sloops, barques, frigates and other versions of sailing ships. The Tall Ships' Race was in Stockholm this weekend. More to come...

Picnic in Hagaparken

Joakim's colleague had invited some friends to a picnic at Hagaparken (see map here), right next to Gustav III's pavillion (the yellow building) with the copper tents up on the hill. It was a beautiful weekend and we both enjoyed the afternoon in the midst of the park. While we walked through the park we went to see the Queen's pavillion, the ruins of the unfinished castle, and Gustav III's outdoor dining hall - the Temple of the Echo (below).

Visit to Drottningholm

On crown princess Victoria's birthday we visited the home of the Royal family - Drottningholm. We arrived at the palace by steamboat and walked through the French and the English gardens, took a quick tour through the palace and got ourselves a peek of the Chinese castle.

By the waterfront. It was a truly magnificent day. Drottningholm, which has been put on Unesco's World Heritage list, is a Versaille palace in miniature.

Pictures from the park and the gilded gates leading up to the entrance of the palace.

Hammarby Sjöstad! Here we come!

We finally moved to our new apartment in Hammarby Sjöstad. Here is a virtual tour of the neighborhood.
Approaching Hammarby Sjöstad by ferry from Barnängskajen on the island of Södermalm. The trip takes less than five minutes and the ferry runs every 15 minutes until midnight.

Close-up of the ferry's approach to the dock at Hammarby. "Jimmy's Steakhouse", one of many great restaurants in the area, is located right next to the marina.

The boardwalk in the local marina. Here you find sun decks and cute restaurants along the waterways.
Hammarbybacken, our local ski slope. Although not comparable to the Rockies, it is all right for an afternoon of fun. Plus, it is great exercise to run uphill in the summertime!

Typical houses in the middle of Hammarby Sjöstad. Notice the little stream of water, running right across the neighborhood.
View from one of the many bridges inside the community of Hammarby Sjöstad.

Our living room/study/TV room. From the windows we have a great view over the bay. Two new IKEA Billy book cases help us keep things somewhat organized. Tara was responsible for putting together the one on the left.

Our kitchen. With a dishwasher! Great stuff!

Another night at the Opera

Tonight we took Martin and Ida with us to the premiere of Rigoletto at the Royal Opera house in Stockholm. (To thank them for all the work they put in during our wedding.) It's about a week since we went to the opera, but the difference from the last performance was astounding. Swedish radio broadcasted the opening night (live) and it seemed to inspire the singers' contribution on stage. A great night and a lovely version of Rigoletto. (Joakim last enjoyed Rigoletto in 1993 - funny enough with the same tenor in the role as the Duke of Mantua.)

Media Seminar

Joakim, speaking at the Open Society Conference at the Helsingborg Campus.
(Lots of Popperians with dissenting views were present.)

More photos here(thanks to Danyael).

A night at the Opera

Today we went to see the season finale of Verdi's Il Trovatore, playing at the Royal Opera in Stockholm. A nice performance, although not as grand as we expected. It almost seemed like the singers we tired of the librettos.

Honeymooning in Florida Keys

Top center: Tara sitting by the Mexican Gulf, at the "Piña Colada" Beach, downtown Key West.
Left: Palm trees at Smathers Beach.
Right: Kim at Smathers Beach with his latest purchase from the Hemingway house - To have and have not.

Newlyweds at the Sunset celebration at Mallory Square, Key West.












Left: After enjoying a tour of the Keys at 80 knots.
Right: Tara finds another art gallery downtown...

The Blessing of our Marriage!!!

Tara and Joakim Nilsson

Polk Street United Methodist Church
Amarillo, Texas
May 12, 2007

Thanks to everyone who attended the ceremony as well as the reception in the Panhandle Plains Museum and made this such a wonderful day for us!

Our warmest gratitude to our parents, our brothers Dwayne and Martin, and Matron of honor Debra, who organised things and helped us with all the details.



We would also like to thank pastor Gale "Rev" Williamson for performing a wonderful ceremony, including the communion for the attendents.

Organist Norman Goad did a great job playing the prelude "Imperial March (Darth Vader's Theme)" by John Williams, as well as the Allegro (as interlude) and Vivace (as postlude) movements from The Drottningholm Music by Johan Helmich Roman.


(These are only some of the preliminary shots from our day. Please check back in a few weeks. Better quality, high-res versions are soon to come. Click on images to enlarge.)

Our Wedding!!!

Tara and Joakim
Nilsson
Dalby kyrka, Sweden
5 May 2007

Thanks to all our friends who attended the ceremony/reception and made this such a wonderful day for us!
(The Newlyweds together with parents, brother of the groom and Matron of honor gathered outside of Dalby kyrka, Sweden.)The grandparents of the groom together with the newlyweds.

(These are only some of the preliminary shots from our day. Please check back in a few weeks. Better quality, high-res versions are soon to come. Click on images to enlarge.)

Wedding update! To all our guests

Today we are happy to be able to present a few new posts for our guests to the wedding in Sweden and the blessing in Texas.

(We have updated the wedding/blessing itinerary, since our original posting included a few errors. The hours on the invitation cards are correct.)

To the right of this column, you will find our permanent wedding links with useful information for both of the events (accomodation, travel tips, sightseeing and more) .
As of today, you will find that we have added two more links: Swedish wedding registry and American blessing registry. (No list is exclusive, and guests who are attending the blessing in Texas are welcome to sign up for the Swedish registry. The toastmaster will hopefully be able to help you with such an arrangement. Look under each heading for more information.)

About Tara and Joakim:
We know that we move around alot. And it is sometimes hard to keep up with old friends. To make it a little bit easier for all of you to stay in touch with us, if only virtually, we have created this blog where we continue to post pictures and stories from our life together.

Please feel free to browse through our archive directory (can be found on the right) for postings from previous months. Here you will find photos from our summer vacation (our three day hiking experience, the Swedish west coast archipelago, the Swedish Open Båstad tennis tournament and more), November festivities on both sides of the Atlantic (Thanksgiving in New Jersey, Mårten Gås at the Swedish summer cottage), Christmas in Lund, pictures of our moving project to the capital of Sweden and our sightseeing trips around Stockholm. (Also a thing or two about getting to know Swedes...)