Discover Stockholm: Ultimate Travel Guide to Sweden's Stunning Island Capital
Stockholm is very beautiful and the biggest Scandinavian city placed on the 14 islands, just where Lake Mälaren flows into the Baltic Sea. In my Sweden travel blog, we will discover the most awesome tourist attractions and interesting places in the city.
Welcome to my Sweden travel guide. This time we will visit the capital of this country, Stockholm. The city is my favorite from the whole Scandinavian area and there are so many things to do here, that I'm sure I won't be able to describe all of them. But let me try at least to show you the ones I enjoyed the most.
Old Town
Old Town in Stockholm, called also the Gamla Stan, is one of the most beautiful old towns in Europe and the best one in whole Scandinavia. You can spend a great number of hours just wandering through the old cobblestone streets and crooked colorful buildings.
Gamla Stan is fully filled with good restaurants, fancy cafés, shops, boutiques, and bars. The main streets are Österlånggatan and Västerlånggatan and this is the place you should start exploring, but do not keep the beaten track and find some Stockholm's hidden gems, as there are a lot of them in the city.
Interesting fact: Sweden was neutral during World War II, so even one bomb was not dropped on it. That's why the Old Town is so well preserved.
In the Stockholm's Old Town you can also find the famous Royal Palace, but about that in the next chapter.
The Royal Palace
Stockholm Royal Palace (is Swedish: Stockholms slott or Kungliga slottet) is an official residence of the Swedish monarch. It's located in Gamla Stan, the Stockholm's old town.
The Royal Palace was built in 1754 (construction time: 63 years) in Baroque style by Nicodemus Tessin the Younger after it was destroyed in a fire in 1697. Stockholm Royal Palace is guarded by a formation called Högvakten, which are royal guards of members of the Swedish Armed Forces. This formation is dated back to the beginning of the 16th century.
Nowadays the whole palace complex has more than 1400 rooms and it's one of the biggest royal palaces in the World that is still used for its original purposes. You can find here three museums: Museum of Antiquities, Tre Kronor Museum, and the museum where the king's regalia are kept.
Vasa Museum
The Vasa Museum in Stockholm, in Swedish called Vasamuseet, is a maritime museum located on the Djurgården island. This is very interesting place as you can find here the only almost fully intact 17th-century ship that has ever been salvaged, the 64-gun warship Vasa.
Vasa ship was built in 1627 when Gustav II Adolf (called the Lion of North) signs a contract with the Dutch master shipwright Henrik Hybertsson to build four new ships. Vasa was one of them and was the biggest and the best one. It was the most powerful warship in the Baltic, maybe in the whole world. And now you can watch it, just visit Vasa Museum While you are in Stockholm.
Viking Museum
Vikingaliv is a Viking Museum places on the Djurgårdsvägen Street 48, in the city center of Stockholm. It's a must-see tourist attraction for everybody who loves history or Vikings. IF you want to experience the Viking Age in a modern, interesting and fast way, this is a perfect place.
The adult entrance ticket costs 149 SEK (about 18 dollars), and the place is open from 10:00 to 17:00 (a bit longer on Thursdays). On the same island where Vikingaliv, just 5 minutes walk, you will find another interesting place: Gröna Lund.
Gröna Lund Amusement Park
Gröna Lund is an amusement park located in the city center of Stockholm. It is very old, as it was founded in 1883. You can find here tons of different attractions and rides, from normal carousels and bumper cars to the crazy 80-meters tall drop and amazing roller coasters.
There are many great attractions for children that are separate from the rest of the amusement park, so it's easy to handle your kids (if you have ones). So, your kids will find here such interesting places like flying elephants, a small roller coaster, tea cups, octopus and many, many more.
You, on the other hand, can enjoy a scary ghost train or haunted house with the real people that will try to scare you. There are a lot of different games here and you can even find a clown juggling. All of this makes Gröna Lund an awesome tourist attraction, not only for kids.
Skansen Open Air Museum
The first open-air museum and zoo in Sweden, located on the Djurgården island. It was built in 1891 by Artur Hazelius to show Stockholm's people other ways of life in the different parts of Sweden. It's also the oldest open-air museum in the world.
There are plenty of things to do here. Starting from singing, dancing, and concerts in the summer through the Christmas markets in the winter with dancing around the Christmas tree and different concerts.
Skansen in Stockholm is opened only from 10:00 to 16:00, so make sure to plan your trip and not get here too late. The adult ticket costs 125 SEK (about 15 USD).
Stockholm Public Library
Stockholm Public Library (in Swedish: Stockholms stadsbibliotek) is one of the most beautiful libraries I've ever seen. It was designed architect from Sweden named Gunnar Asplund in 1928 and the building is considered one of the most notable structures in Stockholm. It has an awesome rounded rotunda that can be seen in the picture below.
Stockholm Public Library is located on Sveavägen Street 73 and it is opened from 10:00 to 21:00. There is no fee entrance and it's a working library, but make sure to be quiet as not only tourists come here.
Metro Stations
Stockholm Metro is a unique structure. The city is not that big, but you can find here more than one hundred metro stations and all of them are used. The whole system was built in 1941 and opened to the public in 1950. Using those stations, you can get to almost every part of the city.
Getting into Stockholm Subway is like being in a mobile personal gallery of art that will allow you to experience incredible paintings, mosaics, sculptures and many different installations. There are no entry tickets, just the ticket for a metro, so make sure to look around on every metro station in Stockholm while traveling this way.
Pionen Data Center
As I used to work as a programmer and had a lot to do with computers, I couldn't resist and not to go to Pionen Data Center. It's a server housing center built inside a secured former nuclear bunker 100 feet below Stockholm. Those data center would probably withstand a hydrogen bomb. Sounds awesome, right?
The Pionen Data Center looks like some space station from the sci-fi movie, with inner waterfalls, jungle plants or the conference room with the floor that looks like a moon's surface. All of this makes this place incredible and very interesting tourist attraction to see.
Codex Gigas: The Devil's Bible
Well, it sounds horrible, but it's not that bad. The Codex Gigas (from Latin: Giant Book) is a manuscript that contains Old and New Testaments. But not only... There are some other texts about exorcisms and medical works. You will also see on one of its pages the devil's figure, and that's why it is called the Devil's Bible.
The Codex Gigas was written in the 13th century by an anonymous monk and for many, many years was stored inside the Benedicte monastery in Podlažice in the Czech Republic. Scientists say that the Codex Gigas was probably written about ten years, assuming the monk was written it 3hours a day, 7 days a week. Adding decorations took another 10 years, so the Devil's Bible was created for about 20 years. If you want to see Codex Gigas, you will find it behind the glass in the basement of the King’s Library in Humlegården.
Conclusion
I really hope you enjoyed my Stockholm travel guide with interesting places. I know that there are more great tourist attractions in Stockholm, but it's not possible to describe them all and those are my favorite. If you are planning your visit to Sweden, make sure to read my other article: Interesting places to visit in Sweden. If you have any questions about my travel blog or Stockholm, feel free to leave me a comment below.
