I slept pretty well, waking for an hour or so in the early morning, then sleeping until 9. I had overnght oats and a yoghurt from the deli as well as coffee:
The room is windowless (there's a wall of backlit coloured glass), a double bed pushed up against one wall, there's even a fold down desk and a sort of padded bed-side table that doubles as a chair (didn't use it):
The only problem is it's windowless - in the survey I recommended an alarm clock that lights up gradually as the sun rises to simulate the outside word a bit!
They only clean the room every 4 days and if you need anything you can go to reception for it. I loved it at the price.
David and I went out to walk around and (for me) to soak up some rays and convince my body what time it is. We finishing up at Skeppsholmen where the "af Chapman" is. This is the youth hostel that Bev and I stayed way back in 1990. The plaque says "for years it *was* a hostel", wikipedia says it still is, but I couln't see any signs of it. The ship was built in about 1888, about 90 years after the Lady Nelson. It was owned by an Irish shipping company, then sold to a Norwegeon company and then a Swedish company who sailed it to N and S America, S and East Aftrica, Australia, and India. Then it was bought by the Swedish Navy as a training ship. After the war it was sold to the City of Stockholm for SEK5,000. They rented it to the tourist assoc. for accomodation which is when it became a hostel. We had a break and re-hydrated a bit and had fun checking out the rigging.
The next day we went to the Vasa Museum, taking a taxi (via Uber) to save my feet. An almost 98% complete preserved example of a 17th century warship, fantastic. A symbol of Swedish power that sank 1300 yards into it's first voyage. Of course, if it hadn't we wouldn't have it today! The third day we caught ferry 83 out to Voxholm to see the sights on a steam powered (!) ship. When I got back I found my key card wouldn't work. The front desk explained I should have checked out at noon! I had stufffed up the booking. So we rang Martin to ask if we could come early to the boat.
3 comments
Janet Paterson
Great story telling Chris. Loving the posts. X
Reply to Janet Paterson
FRankie
So why did it sink? And what was it's path to the museum? Did they recover it and store it straight away? Or did it sit there for ages until a museum esc person thought to recover it? Can you see why it sunk?
Reply to FRankie
Chris
Author
It sank on its maiden voyage in 16-something, in front of the assembled dignitaries (not the king I think he was off fighting somewhere). It got 1300 yards and healed over a little in the wind and water gushed into the gunports. It was all over in a few minutes. It ended up sitting on the bottom and the cold and the mud preserved it. It was found again in the late 50's which is strange to me because it was only in 32m of water. They raised it in 1961 put it in a dry dock to restore it. It took 17 years(!) of sprinkling parafin over it to displace the water out of the wood and preserve it.
Basically nothing has changed ever - the king was pushing for it to be launched and noone was brave enought to say it needed more stability!
3 comments
Great story telling Chris. Loving the posts. X
Reply to Janet Paterson
So why did it sink? And what was it's path to the museum? Did they recover it and store it straight away? Or did it sit there for ages until a museum esc person thought to recover it? Can you see why it sunk?
Reply to FRankie
It sank on its maiden voyage in 16-something, in front of the assembled dignitaries (not the king I think he was off fighting somewhere). It got 1300 yards and healed over a little in the wind and water gushed into the gunports. It was all over in a few minutes. It ended up sitting on the bottom and the cold and the mud preserved it. It was found again in the late 50's which is strange to me because it was only in 32m of water. They raised it in 1961 put it in a dry dock to restore it. It took 17 years(!) of sprinkling parafin over it to displace the water out of the wood and preserve it. Basically nothing has changed ever - the king was pushing for it to be launched and noone was brave enought to say it needed more stability!
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