Travelog for: Chalon

We only knew since one week, that we will go on a holiday in Sweden and now it's the day to say goodbye to Bruchsal and sit in the car for hours.




Here we were passing Hamburg harbour




and driving in the Elbe tunnel. Sorry, it is a "bit" blurry.






We've seen the Kiel Canal, but it was difficult to take a photo with it.

Over night we stayed at a hostel. It was small, but we slept well. We had a lot of bags with us, so we hardly found a place to sit down.




We were rather thirsty and happy, that we had some Coke to drink. We had to share it with the humans, though.






We went on a small sightseeing tour:

St. Nikolai-Church with the market place is the biggest church of Flensburg. It is a gothis hall church. They started to built this church in 1390 so it is rather old.




The Holy Ghost Church is the main church building of the Danish church. It is also a gothic hall church, built in 1386.




These sailing ships are for tourist tours.

Finally we are on the road again. The night was a bit uncomfortable for us, because we had to sleep in the bag. Now we are happy to see the bridges, which lead over the Great Belt and the Öresund. It was so foggy, that we rather could see the water.






We had to pay for driving over the bridges.

We arrived at the holiday house in the afternoon and drove to our host son's girlfriend as soon as possible. She waited for us and of course especially for him. She worked in a library for half a year and we all decided to visit her there.




There was also an exhibition of old and new furniture.

Our house is in Bjoerkoeby, Djuvanaes and the lake is called Lillnoemmen. The weather is fine, so we decided to go out and see the lake and some horses, which belong to the farm, where we stay.








We've seen many anthills there.




This is our private little pier, where is also our private little boat. I hope to go out with the boat soon.




Smaland seems to be a land of heather. I love it.




While sitting here we watched some acrobatic flying, which they did for a wedding, that took place on the other side of the lake.






We chatted a while, but then we felt really cold and decided to go back to the house.

You surely know Michel aus Lönneberga, who originally was called Emil of Lönneberga. Astrid Lindgren began to write about him in 1963. Today we wanted to follow the way of Astrid Lindgren.

Hässleby kyrka was built between 1857 and 1859. First there was a wooden church before the was an ancient stone church. This could have been the church, which Michel's (Emil)'s sister had seen from the top of the flagpole. In the book she said, that she could see the church of Mariannelund.

Then we drove to Katthult, where Emil/Michel lived. Katthults real name is Gibberyd and have been in the same familys possession since the 19th century. It was a normal swedish farm until 1970, when a production team went up and asked for a premission to record a film a the sight.




Here I'm in the shed, where Michel/Emil carved his wooden figures.




I would have liked to buy these books, but my host told me, that they are written in Swedish and that I don't understand Swedish.




Did you know, that Emil was called Michel in Germany, because there was a book of Erich Kästner called Emil and the Detectives and they didn't want to mix up with the names?

The Rumskullaeken (named after the town Rumskulla) or Kvilleken (named after the hamlet Norra Kvill) is a common oak [Quercus robur] close to the National Park Norra Kvill in Småland in Sweden. It is between 900 and over 1000 years old.

With an extent of 13 to 14.75 meters in breast hight the Kvilleken is known as the oldest and biggest tree of Sweden and one of the oldest and biggest, if not the oldest and biggest oak of Europe.

The trunk is half dead. These parts are fixed with ropes to the rest of the trunk. The area around the tree is fenced.

The Kvilleken was first mentioned in year 1772 by Magnus Gabriel Craelius in his book Försök till ett landskaps beskrivning.
(wikipedia, translated by me)

Vimmerby is a city and the seat of Vimmerby Municipality, Kalmar County, Sweden with 7,934 inhabitants in 2010. Vimmerby had its charter as early as the fourteenth century. The main street, Storgatan, still has the shape in which it was built in the medieval time. There are also many old wooden houses in the city.

Vimmerby is currently a tourist attraction due to historical links with Swedish author Astrid Lindgren (1907–2002). When Astrid Lindgren wrote her books about the country boy Emil in Lönneberga she used much information from her own upbringing in the rural areas of Vimmerby.




Astrid Anna Emilia Ericsson was born here, at the farm at Näs in Vimmerby more than 100 years ago. Her father was tenant farmer at the rectory.




This is where Astrid climbed in the "lemonade tree", played with her siblings, jumped in the hay and listened to stories in Kristin´s kitchen.

Her childhood home is still intact. The house is open for guided tours all year round.

On our way to shopping in Vetlanda we stopped at a resting place called Föreda. There was a small small island connected to the land over a bridge and we walked there to see it. The rest of the day we relaxed and didn't take photos of it.

Today we drove to Växjö, which has a population of about 64,200, out of a municipal total of 83,000 inhabitants.

In contrast to what was believed a century ago, there is no evidence of a special pre-Christian significance of the site. The pagan cultic center of Värend may have been located at Hov, a village nearby.

Växjö got its city charter in 1342.

Växjö Cathedral (Swedish: Växjö domkyrka) in the centre of Växjö, Sweden, is the seat of the bishop of the Diocese of Växjö in the Church of Sweden. Saint Sigfrid allegedly lived and died in Växjö, and was buried in the cathedral at his death.







At an outside wall of the cathedral we found this runestone.







Then we drove to the Glasriket, what means Kingdom of Crystal, museum. Their history can be traced back to the 18th century at least. The glassworks have become part of the culture of Sweden.

This day stood under the sign of railway and trains.

At first we visited the Nässjö railway museum(Nässjö Järnvägsmuseum), which has the focus on regional and national history of rail traffic.


















Nässjö was for a long time only a rural village with agriculture as the dominant occupation. The turning point was the construction of the Swedish railway system. The southern main line railway, finished in 1864, passed through Nässjö. Later, other railways were inaugurated, whereby Nässjö, due to its geographical location in the country, became an important junction.

Nässjö is the only city in Sweden, where still six differnet railroad lines meet.

The Match Musem in Jönköping is the worlds only. It is located in the beautiful building that once was the first match factory in Jönköping.

In the museum, living match history is told. Encounter the people and machines that built up the match industy and developed it into a global operation.

Johan Edvard Lundström was born in 1815 in the town of Jönköping, Sweden. Johan Edvard is most of all recognized to have improved the safety match and made it possible to commercially exploit it.

I will show you parts of the old way to produce match sticks. It was really hard work, which had harmful effects for health.






















Here we were in front of the museum. It had been raining again.




We crossed this place and found a radio museum. We thougth, it would be a good idea to go inside and it was really interesting to see all the old radios, grammophones and more.

On our way home we visited the graveyard of Huskvarna.  The Huskvarna church was built in 1907/08. The church is built of wood in national romantic style, built in style of a stave church. The difference to old stave churches is, that they used the wood horizontal and not vertical.

Aneby is a locality and the seat of Aneby Municipality in Jönköping County, Sweden with 3,367 inhabitants in 2010. In the north of Aneby we saw the Stalpet waterfall, which is about 20 meters high.