Day 15 - A final day in Stockholm, Sweden...

 

Cruised into Stockholm, Sweden early this morning, our last port-of-call for this trip.

Took a special tour of the popular Vasa Museum, walked through the Royal Garden to a local restaurant for lunch, then boarded a water shuttle to take us back to our ship.

Last dinner this evening at one of the two specialty restaurants on board.

Disembarking and flying home tomorrow, if all goes well we should be back home late tomorrow night.

And so ends another glorious buck list trip!

We spent several hours this morning crusing through the Stockholm archipelago, thousands of islands and islets leading into Stockholm proper.

Another view.  Per the ship Captain’s brief this morning, we will have a lunar eclipse tonight and be able to see the international space station fly by... assuming we stay up that late...

Another view.  This photo was taken from our cabin balcony...

Cruising into Stockholm harbor.  We had mostly sunny skies and no rain for our entire two-week cruise, just incredible!

Outside the Vasa Museum. Per our tour guide, it is ranked the 12th most popular museum in the world.  Not so sure about that but there sure were a lot of people visiting!

The Vasa - a 64-cannon Swedish warship that sank in Stockholm harbor on its maiden voyage in 1628. Total distance traveled - about 1300 meters. Researchers speculate that the ship was top heavy and/or had too little ballast.

Angela and a new friend admiring the Vasa...  The cold Baltic Sea water and mud preserved the oak ship almost perfectly. 

Posing in front of the Vasa’s incredibly ornate stern...  Swedes started looking for the ship in 1953, found it in 1956, were able to refloat it and bring into dry dock in 1961. Museum was built around the ship, it opened in 1990.

After the museum tour we took a short walk over to a local restaurant for lunch - lingonberries, pickled cucumbers, Swedish meatballs (what else), and potatoes with gravy for lunch with a chocolate truffle and coffee for dessert! Yum!!

After lunch, another short walk to the pier to catch a harbor shuttle back the ship. Just enough time left to pack and enjoy our goodbye dinner...