Kara and Nate Buchanan spend their first full day exploring Stockholm (on a sunny Sunday with unusually warm weather), visiting the Old Town, participating in a fika at a recommended historic cafe, and trying Swedish meatballs. They note long daylight hours (sunset near 10pm), the well-preserved historic center (buildings dating back to at least 1920), and comment on local prices (a small plate of eight meatballs cost $20). The vlog mixes travel impressions, cultural explanations (fika as a social coffee break), food tasting, and light technical/behind-the-scenes notes (microphone testing).
Questions this video answers
Sunday; about 75°F.
They report it did not get dark until around 10:00 PM (they observed traces of sunset at midnight on one night).
1920.
About $20.
Beef, lamb, and veal (hosts say the sampler had four meats but list these three explicitly).
Chapters
All right. I said 1 and 2. All right. 1, 2, 3, 4. Here we go.
All right.
Come on.
It is our first full day in the beautiful city of Stockholm. It is Sunday. It's sunny, 75 degrees and all. All of the Swedes keep reminding us that it is never like this at this time of year. So we feel super lucky to be here during such beautiful weather.
We're off to a bit of a late start today. It is already 3pm, but apparently that doesn't matter here in Sweden, because it does not get dark till like 10 o' clock last night when we were coming home from the Epidemic Sound party. It was midnight. We walked in the room and I could still see traces of the sunset out the window. It's crazy.
It is insane. And so we have tons of daylight left to explore. First we just have to leave our really nice hotel. This is our roof.
We're going to the old city.
I cannot believe how good it feels right now.
We've made it to the old town and it is totally adorable. Everybody is outside just enjoying the nice weather, like on their bikes or eating at cafes on the sidewalk. I just love it. Apparently we're in the middle of the best weather that they get, like all year long.
The old city here is really cool because from what I've read on the Internet, it's one of the most well preserved old cities in all of Europe. Sweden managed to stay neutral during World War II, so Stockholm was never bombed. So the buildings that you see here are actually like authentically old, unlike other cities that you see in Europe where they've like recreated the buildings to look on.
Apparently we have found the most popular street in all of Stockholm.
I am so excited about this. 1920. This place has been here so long.
Oh my gosh, look at that.
I am so excited right now because we are about to participate in our first ever fika. Apparently in Sweden, fika just means you can have coffee and food at any time of the day and it's acceptable. Let me tell you exactly what the Internet says. Fika is considered a social institution in Sweden. It means having a break. Most often a coffee break with one's colleagues, friends, date or family. The word fika can be used as both a verb and a noun. So let's fika.
Hi.
To take a fika, it means that you alone or with someone else, take something to drink or something to eat, like a coffee with a cinnamon bun or a cake, and you just enjoy your time together.
We ordered the Swedish coffee and cheesecake.
Yes, nice and strong. Delicious. We came to this cafe because somebody on Instagram told us the best fika spot in all of Stockholm. It's really old. They have an orange tree. There's oranges everywhere, and it just smells like coffee. And a bakery. Here we go.
Best local tradition ever.
Why didn't we come to Sweden a long time ago? This is amazing.
So there's several things that we miss from home when we go travel. And we've talked about a couple of them here on the vlog before, like family and Mexican food. But one thing I don't think we've ever talked about that we miss from home is free refills. Almost everywhere you go in the US if you go to a restaurant, you order a glass of some kind of drink, you're going to get a free refill on that glass. But it seems like nowhere else in the world does free refills. Except apparently here in Sweden on coffee. Such a good surprise.
The guy at the restaurant told us that since we just completed our first fika at his restaurant, we can sign his wall.
So we're doing it right here on the doorframe. So if you come to Stockholm, come and take a picture of it and.
Send it to us.
That was cool. Our first speaking experience was super fun. And now we're going to explore more Stockholm.
We have come to what we've heard is the hit part of town. This confirms that we have made it. It starts with an S. It's where the epidemic sound office is. We've heard there's really good food here. We're searching for a specific restaurant now. When you think of Swedish food, what is the food that comes to mind? 3, 2, 1. Meatballs. We've heard this is the best place to get them.
Here we go. We're about to try our first Swedish meatballs. I got, like, a sampler platter. So we have four different meats. Beef, lamb, veal, and four. And it came with some gravy.
Okay, that's so good. Really? My expectations were not that high. For some reason, it just looks like normal meatballs, but they're so tasty. It's like the savoriest meatball I've ever had. And it had a little juice from these pickled onions on there.
The meatballs were absolutely delicious. They definitely lived up to the hype, but also so did the price. One of the reasons that we've kind of avoided the Scandinavian country so far in our travels is because everybody told us that they were really expensive. And that small plate of eight meatballs cost $20, which for us is kind of like a huge shock because we just came from Turkey, where you could get a proper meal for like four or five dollars.
But they were really good. At least you're buying overpriced quality.
I mean, they were like, almost worth it. Woo.
There's a sun.
This is crazy. It is almost 9 o' clock and it's still perfectly light outside and the.
Buildings are actually blocking all the sunlight right now.
This is, like, could be really bad for us because, like, our normal routine is after the sun goes down, that's when we go back home and work. But, like, we just.
The vlog's not coming out on time tomorrow.
All right, I said one and two.
Testing audio. 1, 2, 3. Hello. Hello. New microphone. Go.
How funny is our new mic? I had no idea how gross an old man. Dirty hair. Our first mic looks until we got a new fresh baby hair one. So soft. I mean, look at that difference.
I don't think I captured any of them.
I was kidding.
Look at this. These meatballs cost like $4 for, like a thousand meatballs.
