European holiday

Ok, I’ll spill the beans on where I’ve been. You’ve been left wondering long enough!

The Gymnast and I waited until the end of the school year before jetting off to Zurich. The Reader and The Husband left a little earlier and flew to Amsterdam for a few days. We did some sightseeing around Zurich, and then The Reader and The Husband joined us.

One of The Gymnast’s requests for the holiday was to touch a glacier. Um, right. During our pre-trip planning, we managed to find a well-located one in the Swiss Alps, that involved a trip up Jungfrau to Jungfraujoch, and to see the Aletsch Glacier. It was a beautiful day with brilliant blue sunny skies. The sights were amazing, and we were so thankful that we were able to see it on such a day, when we could have just as easily had a blizzard!

The Swiss Alps, from Jungfraujoch.

We then caught a train to Basel and had a few hours exploring that gorgeous city and its Christmas markets before being picked up by my brother-in-law and taken to their place in Southern Germany. We had a few days there with all my family, including celebrating Christmas. This was actually the reason for the European holiday – Christmas with far-flung relatives!

Because they live not only close to Basel, but also to France, we took a little drive across the border into France with my sister to visit Mulhouse, from where a part of my family came, most notably Jean Gaspard Weiss, a flute virtuoso, teacher and composer. For embroiderers, Mulhouse is famous as the birthplace of DMC (as in DMC threads). DMC stands for “Dollfus, Mieg et Cie”, and my family tree includes both Dollfuses and Miegs. We didn’t get to visit the DMC museum as it is only open to professionals. Yes, I am a needlework professional, but we didn’t organise our visit beforehand, and I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t take unannounced visitors two days before Christmas.

The day after Christmas Day, we caught a train to Copenhagen. This was a long day, and we were looking out for snow all the way, but none was to be had. Towards the end of the day, we had a most unusual experience: the train went onto the boat which goes across from Germany to Denmark. We all alighted, went upstairs and enjoyed the journey on the boat, then shortly before arriving went back down to the train. The train travelled off the boat, and continued on its journey. Apparently it is one of the few places in the world where this happens!

We had a few days in Copenhagen. It was getting colder. We enjoyed a day at Copenhagen Zoo ostensibly to see the polar bear. (Another of The Gymnast’s requests was to see a polar bear, and Svalbard – her preferred location – was out of the question at this time of year!) We were greatly saddened to see that the bear seemed very bored. He kept swimming around his pool in exactly the same manner and path, over and over again.

The Gymnast meeting a polar bear at Copenhagen Zoo.

While in Copenhagen I couldn’t miss the opportunity to visit Greve Museum, home to one of the best collections of hedebo embroidery in the world! I had a wonderful few hours there, learning about the style. There didn’t appear to be anyone else there apart from staff, but it was a bitterly cold day with a biting wind, and probably everyone else was sensible enough to stay at home!

Greve Museum

We then caught yet another train to Stockholm, and it was on this journey that we finally saw our first snow for the holiday. Living in Sydney, Australia, we don’t get much experience of snow, so it is a real novelty to us. We arrived in Stockholm on New Years Eve, so were greeted by their welcoming in of the new year, with official fireworks, unofficial fireworks, church bells, and cruise ship horns.

During our few day stay in Stockholm, I announced one morning, “It’s snowing!” to great excitement from the girls. “Can we go outside?!” “Not yet, we need to finish getting ready!” When we did get out a while later, it wasn’t snowing very much anymore, and I hoped that I had not been a terribly mean mum and made them miss all the “snowing”. Thankfully, that wasn’t the case, and we enjoyed ice skating in a public park (both girls had requested this), during which the snow came down quite heavily. It snowed most of that day. Quite a magical experience! The temperature was getting lower and lower, the further we went north.

Iceskating in Stockholm

Making a snowman with very little snow. It had snowed the night before – probably the first of the season.

From Stockholm, we caught an overnight ferry to Helsinki. Our main reason for visiting Helsinki was to take a trip into the countryside to visit a friend of The Reader’s. (This was The Reader’s main request for the holiday, and for every holiday since we went to Ethiopia. Obviously this was the first time it actually happened!) They had become friends at school during our time in Ethiopia about 6 years ago, and had stayed in touch. While they knew each other well, we didn’t really know the rest of the family at all, and nor did they know us. However, we made new friends and enjoyed a day of warm and generous Finnish hospitality with them, certainly making up for the fact that it was -28°C (-18.4°F)! We spent a few days exploring Helsinki, learning that -16°C feels not nearly so cold as -28°C!

A promenade in Helsinki. It’s about midday in this photo. We were a long way north, in the middle of winter!

The photo in my previous post of the frosty trees was at Suomenlinna, an island in the middle of the harbour of Helsinki.

We also took a day trip across the water to Tallinn, in Estonia. What a beautiful city that is! It snowed for much of the day here too, which certainly gave it that special something!

Across the rooftops of the beautiful old town of Tallinn.

From Helsinki, we flew home to Australia, having enjoyed a wonderful holiday filled with many new experiences; some that we had expected and planned, and some that we had stumbled serendipitously across!

Along the way, I saw quite a bit of embroidery in Zurich, Mulhouse, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Tallinn, and Helsinki, and took as many photos as I could! This included whitework, my main love, but also other forms of embroidery as I appreciate most kinds!

Embroidered wrist muffs, from the collection of Nordiska Museet, Stockholm.

To those who guessed correctly, at least one or some of the places I had been, well done! You can feel all warm and fuzzy for the day. 🙂