We woke up early enough to take advantage of the free breakfast at the hotel - hard boiled eggs, breads, jams, crepes, bacon, oatmeal, fruits, and veggies. It was a decent selection, with coffee and tea as well. In fact, it reminded me of what we experienced last week - I guess it's not crazy that Icelandic breakfasts would be similar to Nordic/Scandinavian ones.
After we finished eating, we headed out across the Vallgraven towards Liseberg, which was southeast of where we were. As we walked around, I couldn't help noticing the classic architecture everywhere, and also the lack of people wandering the streets on a Saturday. It was a rainy day, but it was almost as if we had the whole city to ourselves.
As we got closer to Götaplatsen, we saw a few more people - but those were probably other tourists. Outside Göteborgs Stadsteater, a theater for performing arts, we noticed some posters that seemed to feature a person dressed up like Trump - it turns out Swedes aren't fans of the American president and use him for comedy acts! What's funny is that the person impersonating Trump was a female comedian - even better! We stopped in the Museum of Art for a browse around the gift shop, then continued walking towards the Universeum.
I had originally thought that the Universeum was a museum of science and history, to give us insight into Swedish culture. Unfortunately, it turned out to be more like an interactive museum for kids, so we had to switch plans until it was time to go to Liseberg (I wanted to arrive closer to 3:00, when the sun would start to go down, to appreciate all the Christmas lights). On a whim, we figured Johanneberg might yield something interesting, based on Google maps showing a collection of buildings with nearby shops.
We passed through lots of surburban areas, then realized that what we saw in Google was actually a university campus - Chalmers University of Technology. It definitely helps to learn the local language - it's been pretty difficult to understand what we're looking at sometimes without knowing Swedish. The people speak English, but the signs are all in Swedish.
One positive part of our excursion to Johanneberg was the lunch we had. As we headed back towards Liseberg, we had to stop to eat, rest our feet, and get some respite from the rain. We stopped as soon as we smelled food and found a little shop called Domi - where there was an extremely hospitable owner. She patiently explained everything on the menu to us in English and then prepared us 2 incredible heaps of salad, exactly what we needed to replenish our energy for the rest of the day.
From Domi, we decided to go straight to Liseberg - no more detours! As soon as we entered the amusement park, we saw the Christmas decorations - everything was aglow in lights and dusted with fake snow (unaffected by the incessant rain). It was beautiful! We walked around the Christmas market, which featured tons of different vendors selling everything from candy and ornaments, to meats/fish, to clothing and accessories. It was fun checking out all the booths and the shops. We got to taste traditional glögg and apple glögg (both served with almonds and raisins), admire all the lights around the park, then we had to find shelter from the rain - good thing we had waterproof clothes, but even then, it was starting to get chilly.
Once we warmed up a bit, we checked out the choir - they had hourly performances of traditional Christmas songs and sang both Swedish and English classics acapella. The harmonies brought back memories of high school choir days, and a warmth to the air which was still damp from the rain. The choir sang for about 20 minutes, then closed with "We Wish You a Merry Christmas".
For dinner, we wanted to see if we could try some traditional Swedish Christmas dishes so we headed to Lisebergs Wärdshus - a restaurant within the park, right beside the ice rink. We got lucky with a waitress who was very friendly and willing to translate the Swedish menu for us. We ended up ordering a Christmas appetizer that was a combination of caramelized onion, Grebbestad's anchovies, and bread crumbs - pretty good combination with a healthy hit of salt from the anchovies. Our main meals were fried kingfish and wild boar stew - both were excellent and served with potatoes and veggies.
Completely stuffed, we finished our visit to Liseberg with an ice skating performance of Dickens' A Christmas Story, a stroll around vendors with locally made products, and a purchase of some chokladbollar for a late-night dessert. It was perfect and put me in a wonderful Christmas mood.
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