Country #2

And we're off to Sweden! The first stop in Sweden was to downtown Stockholm. We stayed for two nights in a hostel-type hotel. It was awesome. The rooms were divided by glass walls that you could pull curtains across for privacy, but they didn't reach the ceiling so the rooms were open at the top. A little noisy one of the nights but still fun and definitely worth the experience.

It was also an amazing location and great for the price. We were in "old town" which is so cool and historic, but super close to downtown so we were able to walk to the train station as well as shopping, which we did paaalenty of. (I never ever imagined seeing so many H&M stores.) The picture below is of the original city wall, that is now part of the hotel we stayed in. History is neat.

Besides shopping we also did some walking around the city, took pictures of teeny tiny streets, watched the changing of the guard,

and climbed some tall towers. The bells!

 There's our hotel! ...somewhere near there anyway.

After Stockholm we hopped on a quick three hour ferry to the magical island of Gotland.

We stayed in the most amazing place. A tiny little guest house tucked in a fairy tale forest. I fell in love.

We spent an entire week here exploring the island and the major city Visby, still protected by an ancient castle wall, and trying our best to live like the locals.

There were hikes along the coast line. Josh was a little upset that I made him stand on the cracked rock for this picture, especially when we made the hike to the bottom and realized just how precarious the cliff actually was.

 Our hosts gave us two brand new bicycles to use that they had just one in a "zip code lottery" so we took several trips on them, seeing the sites, and feeding some sheep.

There was, of course, meals to be had. Some better than others.

And others more homemade.

There was ancient church exploring.

Lots of church exploring.

I think this one was my favorite. Picture perfect with a blossoming tree planted right in the middle of what once was a church, and framed by the arch on the last remaining wall. 

I found my gotland animal friend.

And we discovered some pretty cool trees.

 

Including a "rock tree." Look at that thing! It looks just like a pine tree!

And this other one looks like a giant sat on it.

We took funny sign pictures.

Found some awesome sheep hats. So tempting...

We explored more of the coast, including two drives up to "sheep island," once to say we did it, and again to attend a concert we were invited to. There were tons of rapeseed fields and windmills along the way, but not as many sheep as one would expect for "sheep island."

A fishing village on sheep island.

 And the goblin valley-like rocks just a little further up the road.

 

 We spent a full day in Visby, just riding our bikes around, exploring the ins and outs of the city. It was a gorgeous day and the city was AMAZING. I think I said "holy cow" every few minutes the whole day. The castle/city wall was the most amazing thing. So cool and old. We probably took 50 pictures of just the wall, so sorry if you're overloaded. :)

Just someone's yard, backed up against the wall. Cool.

There are those eyes again.

Who would not want to live in this place?!

Have fun stormin' the castle!

They have giant cement sheep blocking off places where cars are not allowed. Can we do this in the US?

 

 If you look closely at the below pic you'll notice my fancy necklace. 

In the main square of Visby a street vendor (Christer, pronounced like Chris, but with an added ter) was selling super cool antique things he'd spent years collecting from different places throughout Europe. Josh and I loved looking through all of his fun trinkets, but even more entertaining was talking with him and his friend. They were highly entertaining, wanting to talk with us about anything and everything. Eventually we got on the topic of our religion, and Christer got so excited when he realized we were Mormon. He immediately told Josh he was going to call his Mormon friends and wanted Josh to talk to them. His friends turned out to be a missionary couple who were actually trying to teach him the gospel. They were so friendly and insisted we come visit them later that afternoon.We couldn't pass up the opportunity, and swung by their home for a few hours before ending our day in Visby, but not before buying me two necklaces from our new friend. :) They were awesome! Brother and Sister Herrey are native born Swedes and parents to the famous Herrey brothers who won Eurovision back in '84. If you don't know what that is you can look it up. It's a big deal in Europe. They had served several different missions on Visby, totaling 6 years I believe, and were just the nicest people ever. Sister Herrey tried her best to make us put on a few extra pounds in the few short hours we were there. And Brother Herrey took us to his basement to show us his seashell/fossil/rock collection, and sent us home with a sweet sculpture he makes out of them. (Josh and I both agree that Bro. Herrey looks just like Bilbo Baggins.) The following night they invited us to a concert that one of their famous sons was going to be singing at, hence that second trip to sheep island. Such a fun experience.

 The last few days on Gotland we spent seeking out some old Viking graveyards, relaxing in our little Stuga, 

and knocking on tiny doors. ;)

And thus ends an epically long blog post. Thanks for reading! Future countries still to come.