To Junibacken: Fun with the Grandkids . . . someday

If my grandchildren were here, we would go to Junibacken!  But it was also fun when Elder Torrie and I went yesterday.  It's the 5th most visited tourist attraction in Stockholm.  Our cousin, Heidi Lawrence, suggested it, and it was very cool, even without grandchildren.  Junibacken is an indoor theme park based on the children's stories of Swedish author, Astrid Lindgren.  Did any of you read her Pippi Longstocking books?  I never did, but LeRon remembers reading some of them.  She wrote many other fun books too, and Junibacken is themed around her various books.  There's fun, child-size houses to explore, and tunnels and all kinds of climbing things.  Then there's a Story Train that takes you in train cars through many scenes from the books as the story unfolds.  The dioramas and scenes are quite amazing and super well-done.  Sadly, we weren't allowed to take pictures of the scenes in the Story Train and I was obedient even though no one would know.  I need to go see it again after I've read some of her books.  I also need to go see it again because almost all of my photos were corrupted.  

Here I am outside of Junibacken.  Such a fun place.  Makes me wish I was a kid again.  Well, almost.

I'm flying!  We took lots of pictures of us flying and waving but most of the photos were corrupted so I can't include them.  It was very fun and I want to go back, just to get the pictures.  And in one picture I am holding up a horse!  You may not know it, but Pippi Longstocking was the strongest person in the world and she could pick up her horse and move it wherever she wanted to put it.  Wish I had that picture of me holding up a horse!

Fun houses for children to play in.  My real camera died about this point so that's the end of those pictures.  And then, as you know, my phone camera went bonkers.

Junibacken is on an island, so it was fun to walk right down to the water.  Being from the Alberta prairies, we find bodies of water quite interesting.

Architecture here is lovely.  When buildings in the West are as old as these, we tear them down.  Glad these are still here for us to enjoy.

The Nordiska Museet (Nordic Museum) is in a beautiful building.  Of course it's closed right now due to the pandemic.  We'll go there sometime.

The Vasa Museum is right next to both the Nordiska Museet and Junibacken.  Note the green, green grass!  And remember that we are in the far north.  Crazy.

Love the cemeteries with the flowers and shrubbery.

Nothing like a cemetery to remind us of our mortality.  I'm grateful that my time on earth is now, even during the pandemic.  I've been privileged to see life in over 40 countries.  So interesting to see how others live and to realize they don't have to live in the West to be happy.

I'm also grateful to know that my life won't end when I die.  And that the next life will be more wonderful than we can imagine.  We've always remembered what our friend from Taber told us. His son had passed away very young and Jim often had dreams of him.  One time his son told him that "you can't believe how much love there is here in heaven." Heaven will be much more wonderful than our most wonderful dreams.

The old and the new.  On the left are ancient Viking ruins and on the right is a tall tower of some kind.

Interesting housing that some creative architect dreamed up.

I thought this was a sugar factory at first, but then, noticing that it's sitting near a port, we realized that it's a grain terminal.

And here is a huge ship in the port.  In our day to day travels, it's hard to remember that we are right by the Baltic Sea and that Stockholm is actually on about 14 main islands and that there are 30,000 islands in the Stockholm Archipelago.  There are so many tunnels and bridges that we don't always remember we're floating!