Some things I saw while running in Stockholm

Entrance to the old town

Streets were pretty empty at 6am

Fast moving water

At the national theatre

Swans! Cygnets!

If you had one day in Stockholm

"You have to see the Vasa," I was told before I left Australia. "You can't miss it, if you're in Stockholm."
Nils, one of the Austrians at the hostel, put it more eloquently. "The ship is... fucking... huge."

He wasn't wrong.

My mum said she wanted some photos with me in them. Thanks for making her happy, random Swedish dad.

Nils also warned us to get to the museum early. "By ten o'clock the tour buses arrive and you have to wait in line for, like, an hour," he said. I walked in at 0840 and took a few minutes to process what I was seeing.  The ship is enormous. Sixty nine meters long and about thirty tall (the tops of the masts were removed when she sank) it fills the huge space and commands constant attention.

But it's not just the size of the ship that captures you. German and Dutch sculptors were paid to create the beautiful carvings which decorate the ship.

The gunports had lions inside each cover. No two recovered were alike.

Using thousands of samples from all over the ship, researchers have an idea of the colours used. The result would have been... gaudy. But impressive. There's a mish-mash of mythology; Roman Emperors, Bible figures, traditional Norse legend, all with their own message for onlookers.

Tasteful and subdued.

And all of it displaying lions, the symbol of power and ferocity. The massive ship in the center of the museum is impressive enough; with flags flying and painted sculptures she would have been a marvel.

Some of the ingredients of the paints

The story of the Vasa is pretty astonishing. She sank twenty minutes into her maiden voyage when a strong breeze blew her over far enough that water came in through her lower gun-ports. With four of her sails still raised she sank by the island of Beckholmen.
(Quick aside - the hostel I'm staying in has named all its rooms after islands in the lake. I'm staying in the Beckholmen room)

The actual Vasa literally never looked like this model, because this one has all the sails raised.

The reigning theory is that the Vasa was too narrow. She was trying to be too many things. The king at the time wanted a ship with two gun decks and a fast ship, meaning she was too heavy and narrow, with not enough space for ballast to prevent tipping. But as our tour guide said; lucky for us. The waters of the Baltic preserve wooden ships better than any others in the world, so now Stockholm has an amazing museum.

The queue when I left. Went all the way down the street.

You might think it strange that I've written a post about how amazing this ship/museum is and included very few photos of the ship itself. The difficulty comes from the sheer size of the thing. It was very difficult to find a shot which would show her adequately.

Shot taken from the gallery at the aft, best I could do.

I dunno, maybe see it for yourself?

I thought you'd be taller

"I was expecting everyone to be seven foot tall and blond," I said. "I still feel pretty tall."
"No, we're just like anybody else." Our host, Axl, was blond but wasn't a giant. He was teaching us how to make kroppkakor and telling us about life in Stockholm.

Potato dumplings with bacon and onion drizzled with melted butter and a lindenberry sauce. Doesn't count unless you cook it yourself.

Earlier that day he had sent me to his favourite cafe in Stockholm, a few blocks from the hostel. I asked the mustachioed barista if he knew what a flat white was.
"Of course," he said. "We were not born yesterday." One of their staff was from Sydney, he told me, and flat white training had become mandatory. When he brought it to my table he boasted, "That one is so flat."

Better than passable, it was really good coffee.

With a coffee and a sandwich to fight jetlag, I explored central Stockholm, following the mall until I reached a huge building with guards. It took a few minutes to find the signs; I had found the royal palace.

Just guarding the crap out of it

In a way Stockholm reminded me of Sydney; a city designed with the landscape in mind. It's built across a number of islands in the mouth of  Lake Mälaren and I walked along the water's edge, crossing any bridge I came to.

There are many boats in Stockholm. Here's one.

Not wanting to be late for dinner, I strolled back through the streets towards the city center. As I went I passed these guys.

It took me a couple of goes to see that their story was told around the statue.

The kroppkakor were good, the linden berries were fresh and tart and set off the potato well. I let the others tell me about what they had seen and done so far in Stockholm to get a sense of what I should do the next day. One thing kept coming up.

You've got to see the Vasa.

Viking 2012: Out of Brisbane

"Australia is a lovely place to live," Peter said. "It's just a pity it's so far away from everything else."
We all agreed with him.
Peter, an English water engineer, was born in London but now lived in Hervey Bay, and even a boy from Brisbane thinks it's the arse end of anywhere. He and his wife, Julie, were seated next to me for the first two of my three-leg trip to Frankfurt. We were sharing an exit row as far as Dubai, where they would stop for the night before heading on to London.
"To see the Olympics," Peter said. "And the kids, obviously. But really, the Olympics."
"What was it like in Sydney during the Olympics?" Julie asked me.
I didn't know, I wasn't there. I took a guess. "Hectic."
"London will be, too."
When we turned off our entertainment to make the descent into Singapore, Julie asked why I was heading to Frankfurt.
"I'm not, I'm just stopping through on my way to Stockholm."
"Oh lovely," she said. "Have you been before?"
"No."
"Is it just a holiday or are you going to visit someone?"
I told her why I was going.
"Well, that's fascinating," she said. "Our eldest son has just taken a year off work to write his first novel."
"Oh, what's it about?"
"He doesn't know yet. He's renting a house at the seaside and taking the time to figure it out."
Ah. That kind of novel.
"Good for him."
The Kenyan-born hostess sitting with us had family in Stockholm. "But I haven't been since I was a baby," she said. "I would love to go, but we don't fly there."
"I know."
She let me try on her hat but I had stowed my camera and my phone, so I don't have a photo.

Instead here's a photo my mum left on the camera of her living room.

When I arrived in Frankfurt I had been travelling for a hair under 30 hours. There had not been time for a shower in Singapore, but I had changed my shirt and socks in Dubai which meant I didn't smell as much like a gym bag.
"Purpose of the visit?" asked the German customs officer.
"Uh- to- uh- a holiday." I had slept four hours on the flight from Brisbane to Malaysia. My body thought it was 3 AM. There was no way I would stand up to questioning.
"When is your departing flight?"
"To Australia? Twenty third of August." Damn, wrong answer. I fly out the 21st.
He smiled at me and I think I smiled back. "Have a good holiday," he said.

The stunning view from my airport hotel. There haven't been heaps of great photo opportunities yet.

Reckon I will.

High tide at Mowbray Park

This is where I used to catch ferries.

 The tide's up, time to see how bad the damage is.  No word yet on whether this will be the highest things get today, but tomorrow's meant to be worse again.

A crowd has gathered at Mowbray Park to watch the pontoons race down the river.  There were a few barbecues going.  A lot of cameras. I hope a lot of reflection on how lucky we are.

The water has pushed giant slabs of concrete to the banks, the driftwood of giants, smashed the ferry terminals and drowned the jetties.  Today is the first day I have thought of the Brisbane River as 'dangerous.'

The ACGS boathouse.

Work has just texted to say nobody's going in until at least Monday.  Water's supposed to start going down on Saturday.

Please stay safe, but if you can get a look at this you should.

One for the school ties; Churchie and Bulimba

Army trucks hauling arse out of Bulimba.

The Skeptic said earlier today that the Flat floods if you give it a dirty look.

The Smith Fields are now an aquatic center.

Fisher.

Soon Bulimba will all be under water.

Brisbane, when it gushes

Good morning, Brisbane

I woke up at sunrise and, with no work to go to, decided to do some hill sprints up a the cliffs.  I figured I would take my camera with me, in case the river was doing anything cool.

This is where i usually run.

When I got up there, curiosity got the better of me and I instead ran from place to place, taking photos of the river.  I wasn't alone.  Every morning person in the city had come down to see how high the water had come overnight.  A crowd of us stood under the Captain Cook bridge and listened to the constant rush of water, punctuated by the hard crack of jetties slamming against pylons.

The Goodwill Bridge has become a debris collection point.

As I came down from the cliffs, the first thing I noticed was the smell; not foul or rotten, as the mangroves sometimes are, but silty.  Very silty, like snorting mud, until you get used to it.

These pelicans normally stand about a meter and a half out of the water.

Another crowd had gathered on the Goodwill Bridge, snapping photos.  Parents had brought their kids along.  They pointed and squealed at the jetties racing towards them, dashing to the other side to see them go, the world's biggest game of Poohsticks.

There is no Southbank.

In the city we could hear evacuation sirens competing for attention.  I had received multiple messages from work telling me not to go in today, and I am not alone.  Power was turned off at 7am.  I'm desperate to see photos from the CBD; I imagine it's a ghost town.

Photo speaks for itself.

A lot of people were simply going about their daily routine.  While I was taking photos, a half-dozen lycra-clad cyclists were turned back from bikeways several feet under water.

Why?

Oh.

The reappearance of the sun has brought with it the muggy air we associate with Brisbane summer.  I can only imagine what the mosquito population is going to be like once the waters go down.

The best game of Poohsticks ev- wait, does that jetty still have a boat on it?

I wonder how far it will get?

Around the corner, at Southbank, the promenade has disappeared. Shortly afterward the upper walkway also vanished under water.

I had no intention of crossing.

The closest I could get to the river at Southbank.

The Performing Arts carpark was a touch damp.

...probably not

I didn't try to get any further than the Cultural Center. I've seen a lot of photos from West End in the last few hours, and I think I did the right thing in turning back.

Water lapping against the Art Gallery and Museum.

Water levels are expected to peak at 3 this afternoon, so assuming I can still get in and out of my street I'll head back up to the cliffs then and see what I can see.  If you're reading this from outside the city, I hope this gives you an idea of what we're facing.  If you're in Brisbane, please stay safe and for the love of all things decent, stay off the roads if they're flooded.

High enough that the walkway has broken the sign.