Wednesday, June 17, 2015

Beaches and Castles: Hola Spain!

Hola! :) So.... when you realize you have a free weekend and the town airport only flies to two cities, what do you do? Um, you hop on a plane to Alicante, Spain! That's how Jonathon and I spent our weekend after getting back from our wonderful trip to Bremen. (PS, I'm sorry about how late this post is! Life has been pretty hectic, and I'm actually finishing this post from an airport on my way home :) ) 

When we got on the plane in Växjö we were wrapped up in our warm raincoats and shivering while waiting to get onto the plane. A couple hours later, we were on the sunny beaches of Spain. No coats needed! 


We spent our first day in Alicante exploring the beach and city. Well, that was after it took us about an hour to find our hostel, haha. Streets are confusing without a data plan on your phone! Yes, I am definitely spoiled. Traveling without the internet has been difficult, but maybe I'll learn how to navigate better :) maybe.... 



Jonathon took me on a secret adventure to go look for this church that I had admired on a painting :) 

On Saturday, we got to spend a whole day doing nothing but laying out on the beach and soaking up the sun. It was wonderful! (My pet peeve about Sweden is the weather - I miss the Texas sunshine!) I attempted to go for a little swim several times, but it was cold and I'm a weenie :O 

We explored the streets and there were waiters outside of the restaurants vying for our attention. One of the guys talked us into lunch, so we sat outside with a view of the ocean behind us. It was stunning! Then we got to spend all day on the beach, with our toes in the sand and ice cream trips on our mind.

Saturday was a bit chilly for the beach, so we explored the city. It was a lot of fun, and we got to do some bargaining on the street. Our next adventure of the day was to climb up to the castle that you could see from the beach! It was great! 


We had a wonderful time in Spain! Below are some more pictures from the castle:







Well, that's it! Thanks for reading this blog post :) I actually have quite a few to catch up on, so.. If you like Sweden, Italy and France, be on the lookout ;) 

Sincerely,
Laura.

Friday, May 29, 2015

Polar Bears and Roland: Exploring Germany with Marion!

Hallo! :) 

It's been quite a long time since I've posted, but you gotta give me a break, things have been crazy here! Jonathon and I have been lucky enough to do lots of traveling the last few weeks. Then we've got all of our big final projects. It has been hectic, though worth every moment of working hard and staying up late so that we can go explore new places. After visiting Norway, we ventured to Tyskland (Germany in Swedish) and had the most amazing time with our wonderful friend, Marion! 

Jonathon, me and Marion! 
Now, let me brag on Marion a bit... She's pretty much the best roommate a girl could ask for. She's sweet, caring, and maybe a little bit crazy, which is great. :) Haha. She's an amazing golfer who makes SNU proud, and she's a great friend, too. I've really been blessed to have her in my life these last couple years! Anyways... On top of all of those things, she's also a fantastic tour guide. After we arrived in Bremen, (and after the hugging and squealing after not seeing her for five months), we were off to explore Germany!

She has the sweetest grandma, and she made sure we ate good while we were there. I may not be the biggest fan of Swedish food, but German food, oh goodness. It was delicious! Although we couldn't communicate that great, (we should've brushed up on our German skills before going ;) ) we definitely felt loved and cared for. We also got to visit her sister's restaurant one day, another "oh my goodness, so good" moment in our German adventure. Her whole family and friends were so great to get to hang out with, and we enjoyed getting to know them!

Then, we got to be tourists. She brought us to Bremerhaven, which is a city along the North Sea. The first thing we got to do was visit the zoo! If you know me, you know how much I LOVE zoos. They are my favorite place to go. I love zoos. 




Can you see the polar bear? :D

After some wonderful adventuring in the cute zoo, where by the way, I pet the largest rabbit I have ever seen - in my entire life, we went to this little Italy-style mall! Of course we had to check out the ice cream shop with Marion's recommendation ;) 


Aren't they wonderful? Check out Jonathon's ice cream - it was spaghetti style!

Then, she took us to the climate house. This place was so impressive! Basically, they have a selected longitude line and they bring you to a remake of people's homes along different latitudes of this line. Some rooms you're dying to take your jacket off in the heat of the desert, while other places you can't get it back on quick enough! It was incredible how they could really recreate these cultures and climates. Along with letting their guests experience these locations, they also help them to learn how to better take care of this amazing planet that we call home. 


Inside the Bremerhaven Klimahaus

Later, we got to watch Marion do what she loves - play golf! Germany is SO green, and the course was gorgeous. Plus, she's a pretty amazing golfer ;) so that was a lot of fun. We also got to meet and watch a friend of hers, who was super friendly and great at English! :D


Look at her go :D

Our last day we truly experienced Bremen as a tourist. This city was just so beautiful! The architecture was incredible; each moment I was in awe of how beautiful the buildings were. 


This is Roland, :) he protects the city's trade and liberties



We like selfies :) 


 Rubbing the donkey's feet is good luck!

The town musicians are also a big part of Bremen, at least for us tourists ;) these animals are from a Brothers Grimm tale. 

Overall, we had such a great time in Bremen, Germany! It was wonderful to get to hang out with our good friend in her hometown and country. We got to eat yummy bakery bread, learn more about the German culture, and meet new people. It was a sad day to leave, but we'll get to see you this fall! ;) Next up on my blog: Spain!

Sincerely,
Laura. 


Tuesday, May 12, 2015

Glaciers and Oslo: Norway

Hallo! 

How are you doing? I’m fantastic! Jonathon and I just got back from a wonderful trip in Norway. Let me tell you, it was SO beautiful. The whole trip our view out of the window was as beautiful as the picture perfect postcard, all ranging from green hills and fjords to snow-covered mountains and glaciers. 



The trip started with a bus ride to Oslo, the country’s capital. It was a bustling town with many cafes and sites to see, so we started with a tour around town. We got to see the opera house (where you can walk all the way up to the roof), the official palace for the royal family, a wonderfully architected Van Gogh Museum, and more. 



The Opera House


Van Gogh Museum


Royal Palace


One thing we learned here was how expensive Norway is! Apparently, it is the most expensive country in the world. :O Whoa. One of the times Jonathon and I bought a fast-food gas station burger and fries each with one water and a bag of chips and it cost us about $35 USD. 



More Oslo pictures

After Oslo we ventured Northwest to Jostedal, which was covered in deep snow, even during the start of May. We stayed at these cute little cabins alongside a river, and we all cooked our meals together. We went on this trip with VIS, or the Vaxjo International Students, with a group of fifty people. We got to meet new people and they helped make our time in Norway so great!



Jostedal cabin

Our big adventure was a hike up one “arm”, which was called the 9 farms glacier. Our guide explained to us that the glacier is built like an octopus with one large head and 27 arms. This glacier, Jostedalsbreen, is the largest in continental Europe, and the small section that we saw of it was stunning. It was a beautiful blue, and crawled down the valley just like an octopus.




To get to this amazing hunk of ice, though, we had to hike through knee-deep snow for a long ways. If you left the guide’s path by even one foot you sometimes fell through to snow as deep as your waist! Once on the glacier we all put on cramp-ons, which are spikes for your shoes, as well as harnesses. We hooked together and climbed up to a high point with a view of the valley that was amazing. 

Then, we rappelled into a cave within the glacier for lunch! We got to sip on hot chocolate in the drippy ice cave on continental Europe’s largest glacier – wow. 


Finally it was time to go back, but not without a few ambush snowball attacks on the other groups. Then, we made our way to a lake below created from glacial runoff. We then kayaked back (as far as we could) and hiked to the vans! My jacket pocket with my phone in it was hanging out of the kayak for a good five minutes before I realized, but luckily I have a handy fiancé and it now works. We may have gotten ourselves stuck in the snowy lake a few times. Then, the hike back was much more difficult, because we were all so tired, but we made it! 

Sadly, our trip was about over. The next day we spent in the bus, from 7 am to 12 am! Finally, Monday we went to class and then packed for an early morning on Tuesday – GERMANY! Yes, there will be a blog post on that trip too ;) It’s extra special because we will be visiting our wonderful friend, Marion, in her hometown! 
See you then,
-Laura. 

Nature Walks and Fireworks

Hej hej! Today marks exactly one month until we come home! We’re definitely excited to get back home, but we still have so much exploring and adventuring to do here. We’ve made some great friends and I know that it will be a bit difficult to leave. 


These last two weeks have been kind of a blur, because we've had so much going on! This blog post will be a short one about our week in Sweden before going to Norway, then I will post another for Norway shortly after, and yet another for Germany by next week. Ready for this? :D


On Thursday night, April 30th, we celebrated the start of spring with the Swedish holiday Walpurgis. There was a gathering in town where choir groups sang and ceremonies took place, though I’m not quite sure what they said – sorry, not fluent in Swedish yet ;) ha, not even close. We then followed a bunch of children holding a fire :O towards the lake and lit the bonfire! There were beautiful fireworks on the lake, and so many people came to view them. It kind of reminded me of a mini version of the Fourth of July at home.




Photo Credits: Jonathon Orwig

The next morning, Jonathon, Sinead, Greig and I all ran our first half-marathon! Whoa! It was about 35 degrees Fahrenheit with rain and wind the whole way, but we all finished in under two hours, woo! It was a difficult race though, and I’m not sure I want to do that for “fun” again xD



Photo Credits: Sinead Broderick

Even though our hardcore run left us sore the next few days, we went with a friend of ours and her friend family to a nature walk with some of the other families. (Insert fact about Smaland being the rocky place of Sweden) I guess Swedes love their quiz walks, because we did another one while on this nature trip. Then, of course, we had to finish with fika! Mmmm. 





Exploring the Swedish countryside

May 5th was my sweet Jonathon’s 21st birthday! Sadly, it rained all day, so we got some Chinese takeout and celebrated inside.  

Sweden has been fun, but the past and next couple weeks we have been/will be traveling around Europe; we are SO excited to see all that it has in store for us! Next up, a post on Norway!
-Laura.

Wednesday, April 29, 2015

Barbeques and Quiz Walks

Hej! Guess what? It's finally becoming spring here in Sweden! Yay! We've gotten to enjoy the outdoors some more, though it is still a bit chilly and rainy some days. I am REALLY looking forward to a beautiful Texas summer and days on the boat with family and friends! But until then, here are some pictures of the last couple weeks in Växjö. 


We met some friends for a picnic at the lake before some geocaching and this cute duck kept following us around! He had come quite a ways by the time I started recording - too cute!




Jonathon and I went to meet some of his friends at a grill near the lake for a barbeque. We got to visit the vegetable market in town that morning, so I made a beautiful kebab :D he, of course, had to have hot dogs. Haha. 



We've been training hard (ish) haha, for the upcoming half marathon. I had to stop and take some pictures of the forest while we were out practicing the course! Look at Jonathon and Sinead go ;) the race is this Friday, ahh! 


My beautiful self-portrait pizza ;)


Jonathon's lovely portrait!

It seems like everything we do revolves around food...so We had a Picasso pizza night: self-portrait edition! Our buddies and some friends on the floor came over and we each made our own pizzas. They weren't so cute...but they tasted yummy! :D 



Photo credit: Jonathon Orwig

Sunday we went on a quiz walk in the woods with our friend family. It was a cold, drizzly day, but we ventured into the forest and tried to decipher Swedish quiz questions. I've never seen this done at home, but basically you go on a 3k or so walk and look for questions. You're given an answer sheet and you record your answers to the trivia questions, then walk until you find the next one and so on. A friend that we made got all of the questions right, whoa! I only got 7/12 haha.


Beautiful trees on the way to town!

Everything in Växjö seems to be blooming; there are colorful flowers everywhere and blooming trees as well!

While most of our experiences here have been great, we have had a couple of not so fun ones. Last weekend my bike was stolen out of the bike cage, and then this weekend Jonathon's was! We've both gotten new ones since, as it is difficult to get to class without them.

In a couple days it'll be Jonathon's birthday! I know he's missing his friends and family, so if you see this, please send him a nice birthday message :)

In a week we will be headed to Norway on our first big travels here so far! After that we will go visit my sweet roommate at SNU in her hometown of Bremen, Germany! I'm sure I will have lots of pictures and separate blog posts for those travels. We are definitely excited for them!

We are getting ready to come home, as we miss all of our friends and family. Only one month and a little less than two weeks! I hope we'll be ready for the Texas sunshine ;D

Sincerely,
Laura. 

Sunday, April 12, 2015

(Half) Marathon Training and Kanelbullar Baking

Hello again from Sweden!

How are you? I hope well :)

These last two weeks have been full of reading at the library and studying... Sounds like a lot of fun, right? Ha, not really! See, the school system here is focused on "self study" which means that the professors expect that you spend about 20 hours/week studying for each class. :O Wow. You also only have one grade per class! That means you better ace it, hence the studying. Okay, enough with the boringness! I did a few fun things amidst the nose-in-a-book times :) 

I had a couple fika breaks with my fantastic buddy and another lovely friend. Those are always great! Maddie and I have been taking turns baking for our fikas together, so that means lots of lovely scones and coffee cakes! Mmmm! I think my scones have gained a fan club too ;) we have a group getting together to learn next time I make them, yay!

I went into town with Maddie to explore a little bit and came back with some great souvenirs. We visited some cute Scandinavian shops, a paper shop, and a coffee shop! The paper shop was so whimsical! They make paper onsite; it's got a wonderful texture, but what is even better are the beautiful cards in the shop. The cards are each handmade by special needs people in the shop and are astonishing. We also got to spend some time talking to the coffee shop owner and smelling coffee beans :) ahh. Haha! He helped me pick out a wonderful coffee and after taking the freshly grounded beans home my whole room smelled like heaven. 



Maddie, Jonathon and I got together for a cute dinner with pasta and chocolate cake! 

I promise we do more than just eat and bake, though... Have I mentioned that me, Jonathon and some floormates of ours are training for a half-marathon? Yes! This will be all of our firsts, and we are so excited! We've been training here for the past couple months. It's easy to want to run here, aside from the icky weather that sometimes shows up. So many people run; you see them running around the lake all of the time! The paths here are very well-kept and are all beautiful, whether you're running around a lake, in the woods, or both. 


This Saturday, Jonathon and I got to do our long run around Södra Bergundasjön - it was gorgeous and challenging!

Okay so back to food... Haha! I got to end my week by baking the amazing Swedish kanelbullar (cinnamon buns) with Antonia! It was quite a task; we kind of were extreme bakers. If you know me well enough, you know that I can't really do anything in a clean matter... So, after dropping some dough on the ground (eww) and getting butter and flour all over myself, we were well on our way to having freshly baked buns! We also watched Mulan while waiting for it to rise! :D (Mulan is one of my favorite movies. Yes, I sing along annoyingly.)



We had to take at least one serious "we're intense" picture, then of course smiles.

They turned out so yummy! It's going to be a struggle to not eat them all tonight... Wish me luck.

Oh, and here's a picture that sums up how I think Swedes raise their kids: 


Start them out young, right?! People here are so fit! :O 

I guess they have to counteract the fika with being so active! I seriously wish home was like this! Haha, by the way, I really miss home! I'm not sure how I still have two months (exactly) left; I feel like I've been in Sweden for so long now! Oh well :) I'm having a good time here and am cherishing the moments I get with the wonderful people I have met! 

Thanks for reading my posts :) I appreciate you! Have a wonderful week!

Sincerely,
Laura.