Our Scandinavian sojourn

I’ve written before about how difficult I find leaving the house so it’s probably no surprise that going away for any length of time is quite hard. Before children we had plenty of room in the car for a suitcase. My husband would pack his camera bag and model planes and I would pack a big bag stuffed with sewing supplies. Holidays were relaxing. All that has changed since the arrival of the children. Now our bag is the smallest, Big Brother and Little Sis have their Trunkis and any available space is filled with nappies, a steriliser, formula and bags of toys for the journey and beyond.

So forgive me for looking back at the good old days when it was just the two of us. Before kids we even had a sporty little MG so we could potter around the countryside with the roof down. We’ve had some lovely holidays but my favourite was definitely our honeymoon. I hate flying and we didn’t fancy sitting on a beach for 2 weeks so knew our honeymoon would have to be active and different. So we headed to Scandinavia in October, and did I mention I had a broken toe?

Over 2 weeks we planned to visit as many places as we could. We flew into Copenhagen in Denmark and after a couple of days took the train to Malmo in Sweden. After a hectic day exploring Malmo we took an overnight train to Stockholm, explored and then flew to Oslo in Norway. We then took a train north to Trondheim before boarding the Hurtigruten along the coast to Bergen and took a trip through the fjords and the train back to Bergen before flying home. All in 2 weeks. And did I mention I had a broken toe?

Some of the highlights of the holiday were:

• seeing hundreds of bicycles outside the railway station in Malmo
• experiencing sunshine in Bergen – famous for always raining
• eating in the Hard Rock Cafe in Copenhagen, Stockholm and Oslo
• riding the funicular up the mountain of Fløyen over Bergen and admiring the view
• eating a fantastic curry and drinking beer al fresco under blankets in Malmo
• trying the famous apple pie at the Frognerseteren Restaurant before believing my husband who said he could navigate us back down the hillside to Oslo just using his iPhone – there was no mobile reception and did I mention I had a broken toe?
• taking the Norway in a nutshell tour back to Oslo and seeing the stunning fjords

This is my entry to the Tots100/Al Fresco Holidays competition.