Geyser

We were standing in the tourist office in Napa when we saw a postcard picturing California's 'Old Faithful' Geyser. We discovered that this geyser (which is quite a bit smaller than the more famous one in Wyoming of the same name) should be located just outside of Calistoga in the northern end of the Napa valley, and that it should erupt every half hour on average. We estimated that we had a decent chance of making it before sunset and set course for Calistoga up through the Napa valley.


It was quite easy to find the geyser, which is located right next to Chateau Montelena - the vineyard that was part of putting California on the wine list/map worldwide in the 1970's when their Chardonnay won a wine tasting in Paris beating a long list of French white wines.


We did make it before sunset, but in the late afternoon there wasn't all that much sunlight in the valley.

On the other hand it turned out that the geyser erupts a much more often in the winter time, just about every five minutes allowing us to see it a handful of times before total darkness fell.

Elephant seals

Our New Year's trip to California included - true to habit - a drive along a stretch of Pacific coastline and - likewise true to habit - a stop just outside of San Simeon. Here is a beach which is popular with Northern Elephant Seals (which have previously mentioned briefly).


Despite having stopped at this particular beach numerous times in the past this was our first time stopping there around New Year. We hadn't been there very long before we sensed that this was a very special time of the year: Excited cheers from the crowd of (human) onlookers and a sudden intensification of the activity amongst the gulls on the beach is apparently the typical way of welcoming a newborn elephant seal.


Newborn elephant seals weigh a 'mere' 60-80 lbs and their skins looks funnily wrinkled and loose, but over the 4 weeks of nursing they can grow to 300 lbs after which their skin looks much smoother ('filled out' in a sense) like on the adult elephant seals.


At that time the pup is left behind by the mother who mates again before going out to sea. In anticipation of mating the large males are busy during this time marking their territories on the beach.


After watching the elephant seals we seated ourselves in the rental car to eat a bit of bread before driving further. There was a bright gull who appeared to know that humans in car with bread meant there might be a chance of getting a bite - so we had company watching us intently through the windscreen from the bonnet until we started the engine and pulled out of the lot.

Revisiting California

When we left California we thought we would definitely be back soon - but as it turned out it would be almost 3 years before we made it. Over Christmas we were a little worried to hear about massive rain in Los Angeles. Fortunately the rain stopped before we flew in, so we were able to enjoy a bike ride on the beach in pleasant weather. At the same time we could marvel at the backdrop of snowcapped mountains.


In addition to sunshine and grand nature, California - as always - also had a few interesting signs to offer..

Dead Swedes' Society

To end the blogging of 2010 we would like to take a retrospective look at the year that passed - in particular which famous Swedes' tombstones we have seen throughout the year.


It started last winter when we went on a day-trip to Skogskyrkogården ('the Forest Cemetary') and found the stone pictured above...


...and continued when we had part of our summer vacation on Fårö. The most famous person to have ever lived on Fårö is of course also buried there. Our readers may notice two familiar names on the stone above, so we would like to point out that the Ingrid buried on Fårö was Ingmar's wife, while the more famous Ingrid is buried in Norra Begravningsplatsen ('the Northern Cemetary') near the Karolinska Institutet in Solna:


When we were on Norra Begravningsplatsen this past fall we naturally also had to see the tombs of some other very famous Swedes (click on the image for a larger version):


Gustaf af Geijerstam might not be nearly as famous as August Strindberg but they are said to have been friends - and we think his stone is pretty cool.

Happy Solstice

We would like to wish all of you a very happy solstice!

White Christmas anticipated

By now we are feeling pretty confident that we will be able to celebrate a white Christmas in Stockholm this year: it has been snowing most of the weekend that just passed and the forecast promises temperatures below -10 C most of this week.

Ice!

As we said: It is winter! There was drifting ice on the water between Lidingö and the mainland on December 1st.

Fall 2010

It has been interesting watching the landscape change during the fall season - see for yourselves how it has been at Laduviken:






And now it is apparently already winter:

Tallinn

Lisbeth has been wanting to cross the Gulf of Finland for quite a while, so when her job took her to Helsinki once again she booked a ticket to Tallinn with Viking Line.



Tue obviously wasn't with her in Helsinki but he was able to fly from Stockholm to Tallinn so we could explore the old town of Tallinn together.



The etymology of the name Tallinn is debated, but one of the most widespread theories is that Tallinn derives from Taani-linna which means 'Danish City' or 'Danish Castle' in Estonian. As is well-known the Danes took the city on June 15 1219 in the famous battle during which legend has it that Dannebrog fell down from heaven and inspired fighting spirit in the Danish troops. After this victory Valdemar II decided that this flag should henceforth be the flag of Denmark.



Keeping to the historical aspect of the city we may mention that Tallinn also boasts a pharmacy that has been running for at least 588 years.


In Estonia one uses the Estonian kroon (yes, that is essentially the same name as 'kroner' - the name of currencies widely used in Scandinavia) and it wasn't until our last day there that we discovered that they have coins. Notes are by far the most used as they have notes all the way down to 2 Estonian kroon (being equivalent of some $0.17 at the current exchange rate).

Beware of low-flying purse snatchers - Estonian mailboxes - the 'watering holes' of the city are easily recognisable

Some art in the cityscape

Fall trip to Germany

Last time we went to Germany we had already made plans for another trip. More specifically to go to Munich to visit Matthias with whom Tue shared his laboratory in California in 2004. That's quite a while ago by now, so a few things have happened since then for both parties: Most significantly for Matthias he has married his Gesche and they have two kids (and for Tue the most interesting part is that Lisbeth has come into his life since last time he saw Matthias).

The weather really wasn't all that nice during the October weekend we were in Munich, but to try to make for it somebody (and no, we do not know who) had put up a large Danish flag on the tower of St. Peter's church in central Munich. Despite the weather there were a lot of local surfers out on the man-made Eisbach river in The English Garden.