Let the journey begin

The day of departure (30/08/2022) finally arrived after much planning. 

Valeria boarded the train at 20.30, in Berlin. I joined her at 23.59 in Hamburg. It was time to say good-bye to the family and welcome the adventure. 

We were both quite exhausted after this emotional day. But neither of us anticipated that we would have such a unique night ahead of us. 

To begin with, getting to the bed was, at least for me, an adventure. We only discovered the leader an hour before we arrived in Stockholm, so I had to climb up. Furthermore, it was a little loud and constantly wobbled. After some time, we finally experienced sleep. Around 2.00, I heard someone pounding loudly on the doors and calling “Passport, Police”.  Obviously, we crossed into Denmark. After presenting our passports, we tried to sleep again. At 7 o'clock, we arrived in Sweden. There is no control this time, only a drug dog.  Well, up to that point, we were fully awake. Especially because we could explore the beautiful nature of Sweden, outside our window. We were grateful to be taking the train at the time because otherwise we would not have been able to have this experience. 

After all, we earned a breakfast. We used Swedish krone currency for the first time and thanked people with "Tack" (Thank you). First Swedish term we used in Sweden. 

At 14.15, we finally arrived Stockholm. Sadly, we were unable to secure our luggage (too big for the lockers). We carried everything around with us for the following four hours. 

We spent the majority of our time at the Taco Bar.  Sweden is so advanced that even bathroom use has to be paid with card. 

In addition, the café had birds from outside, but nobody bothered to take them out. 

One thing was obvious: 

In Sweden, people are really friendly.

After many different experiences, we finally boarded the train to Luleå. After successfully packing our luggage inside our cabin, we watched some movies. The hour for going to bed arrived. After a powerful sleep we enjoyed the last hour in the train while we watched a beautiful sunset and had breakfast. 

Finally, we reached LULEÅ around 6.45. Josh, our coordinator picked us up and welcomed us. 

In addition to being good for the environment, our journey allowed us to get to know one another better and experience a lot of things. By taking the train, we had the opportunity to meet new people and explore the nature. 

We think it is a worthwhile experience and could suggest it. It is also reasonably priced ;)

“Let us journey on our way, and I will go ahead of you." Genesis 33:12 MEV

-  by Alicia Köhler