Sakta vi går genom stan

I couldn't resist any longer: today was spent in Stockholm. I even dragged myself out of bed super-early, despite a heavy night of beer and something called "Riga Black Balsam" which one of my flatmates brought back from Latvia. Wikipedia describes it as a "herbal liqueur made with many different natural ingredients mixed in pure vodka." All I remember is that it tasted like wood. A very tasty and intoxicating wood.

I made it to Stockholm by 11, making very sure to sit facing the direction of travel on the train. The plan was just to "be" in Stockholm for a day, wandering the streets and people-watching, which after so many visits to this lovely city by the sea is really the only thing I can sensibly do.

Today I started in Kungsholmen, the middle class yummy-mummy island with its ecological bakeries and restaurants on pontoons moored to the lakeside. I took the metro over to Södermalm, the up-and-coming part of town which boasts its own little bohemian quarter, "SoFo." I'm not quite convinced it's as hip and swinging as the tourist board tries to make out, but it's the cheapest part of the city centre to live in and therefore draws a pretty arty crowd. It's also the only part of downtown not served by the tunnelbana, Stockholm's seven-line metro system.

After the obligatory oohing-and-aahing in the wonderfully ramshackle old town, I ended up in Östermalm, the city's richest district. Full of gilded old apartment buildings, designer boutiques and exotic food halls, this is the Nordic Kensington, and it's hard to resist spending a great deal of time (and money) in these streets.

For a shot of reality before I went home, I took the tube down to Enskede, a suburb of wooden houses and winding streets south of the city centre. Walking through the wintery dusk and seeing the cosy houses still adorned with their Christmas lights, it was impossible not to fall in love with Stockholm all over again.

When you get out of the city, the tunnelbana surfaces and wends its way through the rows of wooden roofs and terracotta apartment buildings, stopping at stations covered with freshly-painted wooden awnings running the length of the platform. It is this that I've included a picture of today, for a slightly different view of Stockholm - the one that only its inhabitants tend to see, and the one I like best.