Drottninggatan

It sure was a fine day. I parked the bike at Sergels torg and went for a stroll along Drottninggatan. Queen Street in central Stockholm. It is the busiest pedestrian street in the country with shops, restaurants, cafés, apartments and much more. Here are my photos in reverse order. Had to stop halfway down the street to take of my jacket, which I count as a good sign of Spring. In one of the photos people were queueing for a free soda.

The King's Garden

Last year I caught a virus and was out for three weeks during the Cherry Blossom mania at Kungsträdgården. Better luck this year. This is from last week, before the real color explosion. Expect way too many photos to come. I am a week or more behind when it comes to photo editing though so it could be a while.

From a building site to a vibrant inner urban area

Hagastaden is still growing. A very busy new neighborhood in both Stockholm an Solna. I borrowed the title from the web site I linked to. My original title was counting cranes.

The relay runners

One of several sculptures outside The Olympic Stadion in Stockholm. Made by Carl Fagerberg back in the 1930s. He was an athlete and a sculptor.

Tourist season

Tourist season in full swing in the old town. Quite a few people at Stortorget in Stockholm on this sunny Spring day.

Citizen's Square

It was a fine spring day. All the restaurants were filled to capacity at the square. As where the park benches. I nodded to the guy playing the guitar, and he nodded back before I took the photo. His friend looked more surprised. The dogs looked cool enough also.

The anchor ring

This photo that I had hoped to take during my previous visit to Riddarholmen was a bit tricky. It is three photos stitched together as I wanted a blurry City Hall as a backdrop. Shot with the 85mm lens. The stitching in PS was tricky. I had to manually place the bottom photo, with the anchor ring where I wanted it to be as it was impossible for the software to do it automatically. But it turned out precisely as I had hoped. It is sometimes called a Brenizer Method photo. More photos using this technique in my Bokeh Panorama album.

A very unique spire

The unique cast iron spire at the Riddarholmen church. Only one other in all of Europe in this style. In Rouen. It is 24 meter high. It weighs 125 tonnes. It consists of 2000 cast iron pieces. And it is coming down for a three-year-long renovation. It was designed by Erik Gustaf Göthe in 1838 after the original tower was destroyed in a fire a few years earlier. Most parts are newer as there were another renovation in the 1960s. But back then they used PCB and asbestos so that needs to be replaced now.

Apatébron

The pedestrian and bicycle bridge crossing Sickla canal at Hammarby sjöstad. This was the winning contribution to an international architectural contest some twenty years ago. It also won a couple of awards. Designed by Erik Andersson, Jelena Mijanovic and Magnus Ståhl. In the background the Sofia church at Vita Bergen on Södermalm.

Don't look at the camera

On a sunny Spring day at Nybrogatan in Stockholm.

At a square

Four photos from a little square at Hammarby sjöstad. Fredriksdalstorget. Close to the water of course as is everything in Stockholm. I did not use the stairs here as I arrived on my bike, surprise, surprise but when I saw the guy walk up I decided to take a few snaps of him. You might have seen the whale sculpture, called UrVAL by Tom Nepomuk Brand on the blog before, but at two other locations. So it gets around. There are two swings at the square that was designed by Nivå Landskapsarkitektur. They look better at night photographed from the other side as you can see in a local paper. The glass building is on the North side at Norra Hammarbyhamnen on the other side of the busy canal. It is known as Katsan. It was designed by the architects at White. If you have a very good memory you might remember photos of the Concrete Pier. It is also part of this square.

That Old Tree

Warm and sunny, or so I thought when I jumped on the bike earlier yesterday. But just a few kilometres later I realized I should have dressed differently, so I turned around, heading for home after a quick visit to the old tree. Had the wrong camera and lens, so this is a nine photo panorama of the Swedish Whitebeam.

Uphill climb

I walked up the Hammarbybacken ski hill, again. Because of the views over Stockholm and the surrounding areas. Most of the artificial and natural snow gone now. The man-made hill is very popular with super-fit runners. I spotted this guy three times during my visit.

Nature is strong

That is what it says on this headstone that I photographed at Skogskyrkogården a couple of days ago.

The Irishman

Brian is a Flickr contact since a few years. Originally from Ireland. Later he moved to Australia where he lived for many years. Then he met a Swedish woman, married her and moved to Sweden. He is often out snapping around Stockholm, just like me. I knew that he would be at The King's Park yesterday as he had left a comment about that the day before. So when I spotted him snapping away I walked up for a chat. It was the first time we met IRL. We talked for something like twenty minutes about photography, different camera models and lenses, as one does when one meets a fellow photographer. Brian also told me an interesting story about how he and his wife swapped apartments with another couple. Long story short, don't ever do that as there will be a lot of problems and issues, but as of today the move was finally done. We were at the park to check up on the Cherry Blossom, but we were probably one week too early so it was fun to talk to Brian instead of photographing the flowers.