Friday, March 27 – We wrapped up our visit to the Tanum area by doing a presentation for their Rotary club and enjoying some typically Swedish food called kåldolmar (which, if I understood correctly, is basically some minced meat wrapped in cabbage) – it was really good!!
After the meeting, we had a few minutes to do some shopping at a local store owned by one of our host families (Britt who hosted Alison) and we each found a few treasures to take home to our family and friends. I found a fun little serving tray that had a painting of the area that Britt herself had painted.
Our train ride back down to Göteborg started out uneventful but about 45 minutes into it, the train stopped in the middle of nowhere. Luckily, one woman figured out we were American and told us what the captain had announced. Apparently, the train’s compressor had overheated and needed to cool down before we could proceed. We actually arrived in Göteborg pretty much on time and (as has become the norm) meeting our new host families, saying goodbye to each other and getting our luggage loaded happened so quickly before we were on our way to the next adventure.
My hosts in Mölndal are Sven and Anita Hilmersson along with their cat (Mulan or something close to that – not real sure of the spelling). They live in the countryside and we enjoyed our evening getting to know one another by sharing stories and pictures.
Saturday, March 28 – this was a somewhat lazy morning as we really didn’t need to be anywhere until noon today. After being called to his son’s house last night to help with a plumbing problem and being up until 2:30 Am, I was surprised to see Sven surface relatively early to take me on a little shopping excursion to a local village called Kungsbaka. We walked around and stopped into a few stores - - I got a chance to buy Tyler some lingon berries to bring home to make pancakes with! We also had time to stop at another shopping mall and only bought some tulips for the dinner table before going to have a little fika treat and then meeting everyone else for the start of our day together.
Our only event as a group today was lunch and a tour based
out of the Mölndal Museum. We had a guided tour of the area and I later found out that Mölndal means the “Valley of the Mills.” During our tour, we enjoyed seeing the water falls or rapids that ran from the mill area and wound its way through many of the buildings that used hydro-power at one time for their production. (A funny story - - this morning, I was thinking about the things I had wanted to see in Sweden that I hadn’t had a chance to and a waterfall was one of the things - - the rapids weren’t exactly what I had in mind, but they were a great supplement!)
Back home, we enjoyed a quiet evening and I got a chance to Skype with Kevin and talk to him again for about a half an hour – Tyler was gone at band practice but I found out that he had quite an interesting week. There has been some serious flooding in the Fargo North Dakota / Moorhead Minnesota area this week. His band director pulled together a bus trip for the band kids to go to that area and help with the sandbagging - - I think this was AWESOME and I’m very proud of them all!! The floods in Fargo even made the news in Sweden - - I actually watched more TV tonight than I have in the past four weeks!
Sunday, March 29 – Well, right away this morning, as soon as my alarm went off, I realized that I had forgotten to “spring ahead” last night and was late to breakfast! At least I wasn’t the only one, Sven had done the same….
We met everyone at a place called Gunnebo Slott – it is
a manor that dates back to 1796 when it was completed. We were
given a dramatic tour of the manor where characters from it original owners told us the story of the manor. It once belonged to the richest man in Sweden – it was said that he even borrowed money to the King! After the tour, we enjoyed lunch on the grounds - - I can only imagine how beautiful the gardens are later in the summer!
This evening, we were invited to Tottie’s house – she has been the GSE coordinator for our stay in Mölndal and was a team leader to India about a year ago. She lives on the sea and has a FANTASTIC view of the water!!! We also took a little walk and ended up climbing up some rocks to see even
further out to sea!!! Of course, Alison and I typically have our heads down on, looking at the paths for cool rocks to bring home – if our luggage is overweight at the airport, we’ll have to blame the rocks!
After the meeting, we had a few minutes to do some shopping at a local store owned by one of our host families (Britt who hosted Alison) and we each found a few treasures to take home to our family and friends. I found a fun little serving tray that had a painting of the area that Britt herself had painted.
Our train ride back down to Göteborg started out uneventful but about 45 minutes into it, the train stopped in the middle of nowhere. Luckily, one woman figured out we were American and told us what the captain had announced. Apparently, the train’s compressor had overheated and needed to cool down before we could proceed. We actually arrived in Göteborg pretty much on time and (as has become the norm) meeting our new host families, saying goodbye to each other and getting our luggage loaded happened so quickly before we were on our way to the next adventure.
My hosts in Mölndal are Sven and Anita Hilmersson along with their cat (Mulan or something close to that – not real sure of the spelling). They live in the countryside and we enjoyed our evening getting to know one another by sharing stories and pictures.
Saturday, March 28 – this was a somewhat lazy morning as we really didn’t need to be anywhere until noon today. After being called to his son’s house last night to help with a plumbing problem and being up until 2:30 Am, I was surprised to see Sven surface relatively early to take me on a little shopping excursion to a local village called Kungsbaka. We walked around and stopped into a few stores - - I got a chance to buy Tyler some lingon berries to bring home to make pancakes with! We also had time to stop at another shopping mall and only bought some tulips for the dinner table before going to have a little fika treat and then meeting everyone else for the start of our day together.
Our only event as a group today was lunch and a tour based
out of the Mölndal Museum. We had a guided tour of the area and I later found out that Mölndal means the “Valley of the Mills.” During our tour, we enjoyed seeing the water falls or rapids that ran from the mill area and wound its way through many of the buildings that used hydro-power at one time for their production. (A funny story - - this morning, I was thinking about the things I had wanted to see in Sweden that I hadn’t had a chance to and a waterfall was one of the things - - the rapids weren’t exactly what I had in mind, but they were a great supplement!)Back home, we enjoyed a quiet evening and I got a chance to Skype with Kevin and talk to him again for about a half an hour – Tyler was gone at band practice but I found out that he had quite an interesting week. There has been some serious flooding in the Fargo North Dakota / Moorhead Minnesota area this week. His band director pulled together a bus trip for the band kids to go to that area and help with the sandbagging - - I think this was AWESOME and I’m very proud of them all!! The floods in Fargo even made the news in Sweden - - I actually watched more TV tonight than I have in the past four weeks!
Sunday, March 29 – Well, right away this morning, as soon as my alarm went off, I realized that I had forgotten to “spring ahead” last night and was late to breakfast! At least I wasn’t the only one, Sven had done the same….
We met everyone at a place called Gunnebo Slott – it is
a manor that dates back to 1796 when it was completed. We were
given a dramatic tour of the manor where characters from it original owners told us the story of the manor. It once belonged to the richest man in Sweden – it was said that he even borrowed money to the King! After the tour, we enjoyed lunch on the grounds - - I can only imagine how beautiful the gardens are later in the summer!
This evening, we were invited to Tottie’s house – she has been the GSE coordinator for our stay in Mölndal and was a team leader to India about a year ago. She lives on the sea and has a FANTASTIC view of the water!!! We also took a little walk and ended up climbing up some rocks to see even
further out to sea!!! Of course, Alison and I typically have our heads down on, looking at the paths for cool rocks to bring home – if our luggage is overweight at the airport, we’ll have to blame the rocks!
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