Stories from Gothenburg
When I chose Sweden as the country I would like to visit on exchange, one of the main factors would be that my mum was actually born there, and lived there as a child in the beautiful city of Gothenburg. Having this heritage, I have always been interested in learning about the culture and lanugauge. Of course, I also wanted to spend time in the city my mum spent her childhood. Luckily for me, I was able to spend a whole week there with one of my great Swedes, Marcus, and meet some of my relatives.
Throughout the week we were able to explore Gothenburg and see the hustle and bustle of city life, while also taking the chance to check out the beautiful nature and forests. Living in a smaller town, I have grown to love the outdoors and getting away from the man made world. This meant that our first full day in Gothenburg was spent exploring slottskogen and the botanical gardens. Slottskogen was gorgeous and had this safe feeling about it. It was also nicer when you reached a little further deeper into the forest and got away from the noise of traffic. There were numerous walking paths throughout the forest, and Marcus and I were able to find a great lookout over the forest and looking towards the city. Slottskogen was very pretty and I really enjoyed it there.
We then moved on to the botanical gardens which is actually just across the road from slottskogen. Here we were invited in by rainbows of colour from all the flowers decorating the gardens. The garden was broken up by cultures, so we were able to visit gardens that used plants typical of the country. This made it very interesting as the gardens morphed into different arrangements and looks. Along the way we found cool caves to walk through, flowers in every shade of colour, stepping stones across streams and beautiful waterfalls. The botanical gardens were definitely worthwhile checking out, and I'm sure it would be easy to spend a whole day adventuring through all the different gardens they have!
Our next big adventure took us to Liseberg, Gothenburg's theme park. We went on a Friday, and this worked out really well because most people were either at work or school until later in the afternoon, so there were only very short lineups. One of the major rides I went on actually took longer to walk through the queuing area than it did to actually wait in line. Having such accessible rides meant we were able to try out everything we wanted, and also have a shot at some of the arcade games. This included some basketball games, car racing, spin the wheel and those games with a claw and you try to grab the toy/chocolate. I'm not quite sure what we call those games, but I hope everyone knows what I mean. We had a pretty lucky day, winning 2kg of chocolate, and 2 cute toys. Apparently, these games are actually possible to win. This day was really great because it has been such a long time since I was able to visit a themepark and go on so many rides. It was a very beautifully set up themepark and I could definitely go back again.
Next up was a visit to my mu's best friend and her son - Anki and Daniel. We took a trip around Gothenburg on a very interesting tour and I really enjoyed it. The tour was a bit unusual as it had a 'time travel' theme and everyone was required to wear a piece of clothing from the olden days. We were then all placed into old fashioned cars, and driven around the city. It was funny to see the people in the city stopping and staring at the old fashioned cars, taking pictures as we drove by. We learnt about the city history, and how Gothenburg was first believed to be a city with a major focus on cars. For this reason, Älvsborg bridge was built for the masses of expected cars, and the strength was tested by large trucks that were filled with sand. The bridge is now the main connecting city from south to north of Gothenburg. The tour guide taught us a range of new things and it was great to learn some history about the town we had been exploring. We then all went to have pizza together for lunch and said our goodbyes.
Finally, it was back to nature with a stop off to Delsjön. It was a very nice park by the water with a bunch of walking tracks. Really great for swimming, picnics, walks, kayaking and just relaxing. It took us a little while to find the place, and we actually found ourselves on the wrong side of the water at first. However, we were then able to walk to the main park. It was nice to be able to relax on the rocks with the sun beaming down on us. While in Gothenburg, I was surprised to see how the locals dressed so warmly in comparison to Marcus and I. We thought the weather was gorgeous and warm while the locals seemed to think winter had arrived. Walking around Delsjön was really fun, and I thought it was the perfect temperature. We had been quite lucky with the weather throughout our time in Gothenburg, especially since it had been forecast to rain every day. I believe we had sun msot days with maybe some cloud coverage, but practically no rain.
Our adventures came to an end here, with a train ride back to Piteå. It was exciting to take part in the city life for a week, however, our tendency to return back to nature seemed to shine through even in our travels. I guess small towns just grow on you!
Throughout the week we were able to explore Gothenburg and see the hustle and bustle of city life, while also taking the chance to check out the beautiful nature and forests. Living in a smaller town, I have grown to love the outdoors and getting away from the man made world. This meant that our first full day in Gothenburg was spent exploring slottskogen and the botanical gardens. Slottskogen was gorgeous and had this safe feeling about it. It was also nicer when you reached a little further deeper into the forest and got away from the noise of traffic. There were numerous walking paths throughout the forest, and Marcus and I were able to find a great lookout over the forest and looking towards the city. Slottskogen was very pretty and I really enjoyed it there.
Our next big adventure took us to Liseberg, Gothenburg's theme park. We went on a Friday, and this worked out really well because most people were either at work or school until later in the afternoon, so there were only very short lineups. One of the major rides I went on actually took longer to walk through the queuing area than it did to actually wait in line. Having such accessible rides meant we were able to try out everything we wanted, and also have a shot at some of the arcade games. This included some basketball games, car racing, spin the wheel and those games with a claw and you try to grab the toy/chocolate. I'm not quite sure what we call those games, but I hope everyone knows what I mean. We had a pretty lucky day, winning 2kg of chocolate, and 2 cute toys. Apparently, these games are actually possible to win. This day was really great because it has been such a long time since I was able to visit a themepark and go on so many rides. It was a very beautifully set up themepark and I could definitely go back again.
Next up was a visit to my mu's best friend and her son - Anki and Daniel. We took a trip around Gothenburg on a very interesting tour and I really enjoyed it. The tour was a bit unusual as it had a 'time travel' theme and everyone was required to wear a piece of clothing from the olden days. We were then all placed into old fashioned cars, and driven around the city. It was funny to see the people in the city stopping and staring at the old fashioned cars, taking pictures as we drove by. We learnt about the city history, and how Gothenburg was first believed to be a city with a major focus on cars. For this reason, Älvsborg bridge was built for the masses of expected cars, and the strength was tested by large trucks that were filled with sand. The bridge is now the main connecting city from south to north of Gothenburg. The tour guide taught us a range of new things and it was great to learn some history about the town we had been exploring. We then all went to have pizza together for lunch and said our goodbyes.
Finally, it was back to nature with a stop off to Delsjön. It was a very nice park by the water with a bunch of walking tracks. Really great for swimming, picnics, walks, kayaking and just relaxing. It took us a little while to find the place, and we actually found ourselves on the wrong side of the water at first. However, we were then able to walk to the main park. It was nice to be able to relax on the rocks with the sun beaming down on us. While in Gothenburg, I was surprised to see how the locals dressed so warmly in comparison to Marcus and I. We thought the weather was gorgeous and warm while the locals seemed to think winter had arrived. Walking around Delsjön was really fun, and I thought it was the perfect temperature. We had been quite lucky with the weather throughout our time in Gothenburg, especially since it had been forecast to rain every day. I believe we had sun msot days with maybe some cloud coverage, but practically no rain.Our adventures came to an end here, with a train ride back to Piteå. It was exciting to take part in the city life for a week, however, our tendency to return back to nature seemed to shine through even in our travels. I guess small towns just grow on you!
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