As we had anticipated, we took some 5 days in Stockholm, taking advantage of some seriously cheap Ryanair flights.

View Gioia and Matteo’s Stockholm trip, November 2009 in a larger map

So what are our suggestions to fellow travellers to the Swedish capital city? Here they come.

Money

Bear in mind, Stockholm is overall more expensive than London, thus likely more expensive than anywhere you are. But if you are a bit careful, you might be able to avoid splashing your cash. The two most expensive things you will notice are drinks and accommodation: 11£ for a pint and a half of lager is clearly a bit too much, in the same way about £60 for a room in the city hostel. But, while you will need a place to stay, you can surely do without a few pints for a couple of days, can’t you?

Food

We did our homework and studied beforehand the best places to go and have proper Swedish food. We basically only left 2 meals to chance in the 4 days, and got fairly lucky, too. Our suggestion is, no matter where you are staying, do check out the City Backpackers hostel suggestions page for your stay. Their tips are awesome overall, not only for the food, but what we enjoyed the most was:

• Tennstopet, the oldest pub in Stockholm, with very good value for money and “local” atmosphere
• Pelikan, apparently the best meatballs in town. Meatballs are indeed awesome but heavy as hell! They come in portions of 4 and they are about 4 times larger than the Ikea meatballs, so keep this in mind!
• Östermalms korvspecialist, amazing sausages booth, fantastic for a meal on the go. Strömming is another booth where they mostly do fried herring sandwiches, which we strongly recommend.

We also happened to have lunch at the restaurant within the Nordiska Museet, which is a good option if you wish to spend your  morning in Skansen as it’s very close.

Museums

There’s plenty of things to see in Stockholm, and a good selection of museums, too. The most popular tourist attraction is Skansen: bit of a park, bit of a museum, bit of a zoo. Originally intended as a open-air museum to showcase life in Sweden pre-industrial era, it is also home to several Scandinavian animals, such as moose, bears, reindeer and many others.

The Nordiska Museet, on Djugarden, is the museum of Swedish cultural history. It is well worth a visit on the way back from Skansen and it has a nice restaurant. Exhibitions include interior design and trends throughout the centuries, as well as fantastic samples of Nordic textiles.

On Gamla Stan (the Old Town) you have the Nobel Museet, which showcases the history of Alfred Nobel and the prize that he set in his will. They seem to regularly have pretty good temporary exhibitions too: we got to see one about Galileo’s telescope, in its 400th “birthday”, which is on until January 17th.

There’s also the Historiska Museet, of course, which has very rich exhibitions on Scandinavian prehistories, the Viking period, textiles and golden artefacts.

Public transport

Buses and the Metro work very smoothly and are an affordable and reliable way to get around town. I’m not sure whether they run overnight or till a certain hour but I highly recommend them. Bear in mind Stockholm is not a huge city: the city centre is perfectly walkable and mostly flat, so keep this option in mind, if you want to save some cash (although prices are reasonable).

The overall feeling

Stockholm is a beautiful city. I think it could give different impressions depending on when you visit in the year, specially considering the daylight: we visited in late November, and at about 3pm it started getting dark, and eventually got dark by 4.30pm. But, even in the morning, the sun is never high so it always seemed like it was setting… Weird…

And, last but not least, a big thanks to Melina who suggested Chokladkoppen, on Stortorget.

Hi guys, Sorry for the recent silence. Rest assured life’s been treating us nicely, we’ve just had Gioia’s family visiting to celebrate her graduation and we are about to take a little break for a few days in cold Stockholm. We are really looking forward to it, we will fly tomorrow (Friday) in the afternoon and head back to London on Tuesday.

Some little updates on our end: we have given the notice at our estate agent to confirm we will move out early in January next year, so we’ve dived into some serious flat-hunting, although we haven’t identified any good candidates so far. Still some 7 weeks to go, we’re pretty positive.

I have also taken up refereeing again after a break since we moved to London. I was a qualified football referee in Italy and got my “license” transferred to the UK so now I’m a qualified referee for the FA, too. In 10 days’ time I’ll be assistant to the ref at a South East Combination womens league game, I’m really looking forward to it.

Anyways, speak soon when we’re back!

We are joining Blog Action Day 2009 to help raise awareness on climate change. It might seem weird, given that this has been talked about for decades now, but there’s an awful lot to do to help our future children and their children live in a better world, and give ourselves a decent chance for some healthier years ahead, too.

What are we doing to help stop climate change?

Personally, we do not travel with private transport. Within London, we commute either on foot or by bicycle and, if we need to go somewhere further than usual, then buses or tube. Green or public transport. It is not easy to see the immediate effect of this of course, but London is a pretty “cycling city” (not at the Dutch or Danish levels, but better than most big cities in Italy…) and more and more people are cycling, so please consider switching to a bike rather than driving to work. Many companies offer schemes to help you buy a bike and spread its cost on 6 or 12 months.

Unfortunately recycling is a bit of a mess round where we live, and people seem to throw away stuff any day of the week without any apparent logic, but we’ll soon be moving (more on this to follow) and will get back to recycling in a proper way. Also, recycling seem to work differently borough by borough, so make sure you check with your local authority to avoid surprises.

Also, water plays big part in our life, right? So make sure you don’t waste it. Limit as much as possible the flow of water whern you don’t need it: washing-up and brushing your theeth are obvious examples, but think about your toilet flush, too. You can place a solid body within your box so that it gets filled with less water, thus reducing the waste.

What about you? Are you doing enough?

Tell us about your efforts towards a hopefully better future, we’d love to hear them, as there’s never too much greenness in one’s life.

Hey people, it’s about time we tell you about our 4-days break in Algarve, right?

Yes, we think so, too. We headed for a little holiday last month, right after I submitted my dissertation (which I passed by the way!! yuhuu). We did the same last year when we went to Paris, immediately after Matteo submitted his, and found it very regenerating. So off we went, Friday to Monday in mid September, on the sunny shores of Algarve, on Portugal’s southern coast.

View Algarve Sept 2009 in a larger map

The background

We wanted to take a break so that I could just forget about everything and realise the Master was really over. We had a few options for a 4-days trip and eventually decided for Portugal over Denmark. The reason was mainly to take advantage of the last days of Summer in a warm place, rather than potentially freezing in Copenhagen. So we opted for going there (and to Sweden, too) when we are sure it’s going to be cold anyway. Hope this will be the next trip we can write you about.

Before leaving, against all odds, we did plan the trip pretty carefully. A good friend of ours is Portuguese and used to spend his Summers in the Algarve region, where his gran-parents are from, so we had the chance to go straight to the source rather than randomly perform searches on the web. We got to learn where to go and, more importantly, where NOT to go: we avoided Albufeira completely, as he told us it’s probably the main destination for British tourists. Not much for the tourists themselves, but to have a better overall experience in terms of food and tradition. If you are looking for a more party atmosphere, where signs are written in English, and English Breakfast and Fish and Chips are on the menu, then Albufeira may be the best option for you. We just wanted to be lazy and look at the ocean kissed by the sun, and we got it all.

How to get there and around

Algarve is very convenient to reach from London: we flew into Faro (RyanAir and EasyJet both fly there from Stansted) and hired a car from one of the many companies you can find at the airport and book in advance. We did not get a sat nav (not really a choice, more of a misunderstanding due to the website we booked from) but it is very easy to get around. We drove directly to Lagos, where our friend suggested to go straight away, without even stopping at Faro. He said waking up in Lagos would have been much nicer.

In Lagos we stayed at the Pensao Mar Azul, which is in the hearth of the pedestrian area of the city centre and we strongly recommend it for short breaks in the area: if you plan to travel a bit around the area, it’s a very good place where you only really need to sleep. It is clean and affordable, and the staff are very friendly. Of course you need to consider that being in a pedestrian area during the week end there’s people hanging around till early in the morning so I woke up several times by people laughing and speaking loudly, but for the price and location we couldn’t really complain.

The first night in Lagos we went out for a beer in a really cosy restaurant-bar and we asked for a Sagres beer, but they were just serving Bock ;(. We tried to have a Sagres in every place we stopped by but we never managed to have what we thought to be the most popular Portuguese beer. Shame…

Saturday: Carrapateira and Sagres

The first full day we were there was a Saturday (we flew Friday evening) and we spent it on the western coast of the region. We drove about an hour or two heading to the Praia do Amado by Carrapateira. We got there towards late morning, and the beach was still quite empty. It is pretty popular with surfers and there’s a surfing school, too. We decided to lie on the beach for a couple of hours and just enjoy reading and people watching.  It wasn’t the best of plans to get a sunburn on the first day, so we stopped there only for a short while and headed for lunch instead. The man at the bar suggested we went to a nearby fish place where we had a wonderful cataplana, a dish made by mixed boiled fish in a tasty sauce with boiled potatoes. This is very typical from the region and was on our list of meals to go for suggested by our friend. I made some notes on my Molenskine, where I had a full suggested menu in case we got lost with the Portuguese language!

We left Carrapateira and drove down to the Cabo do Sao Vicente, Sagres and Praia do Martinhal. Cabo Sao Vincente was far more impressive than Sagres, to be honest. It wasn’t possible to get to visit the lighthouse but we got really close. The landscape is breathtaking but you really have to be careful since there are no barriers between you and the cliffs… In Sagres we visited the Fortress and the vegetation was quite particular. It was a long walk though and we didn’t find the place where they produce the Sagres beer so we opted for a stop at Praia do Martinhal before heading back to Lagos for the evening.

Sunday: Lagos and Portimao

On Sunday we stayed in Lagos (at Praia de Dona Ana) in the morning. It is a lovely, cosy beach where lots of local families go. Fishermen stop by the seashore to pick up tourists or whomever wants to get around for an hour tour. For 10€ you get an hour tour on a small boat, that’s lovely. We didn’t do it because we wanted to go to Portimao too, but if I could chose again I would go for the tour as well.

We then headed to Portimao at the Praia da Rocha where we only stayed for a short while because the wind was far too strong. We never managed to get to swim in the ocean, not used to the cold water. Then back to Lagos where before dinner we went to the Praia da Batata. It’s easy to walk to Praia de Batata following the Marina and it’s another cosy spot to go to before getting changed for the night.

For dinner we came back to the cosy restaurant-bar where we went for the beer the first night. We were brave enough to try another cataplana with some short pasta on it but less fish. I’m a big fan of Cataplana now and I strongly recommend it. It was nice to have a cold glass of wine, a dessert and some fresh air eating outside enjoying being on holiday, finally.

Monday: Tavira and Faro

On Monday we were flying late in the evening so we had time to go to Tavira in the morning, where the weather wasn’t great so we ended up visiting a Portuguese supermarket and find out what they sell and buy in Portuguese shops. Supermarkets are similar to Italian ones, food smells nice all around, salami, cheese etc, and there’s a good variety of options for breakfast and not so many pre-cooked food. In London I got bored since there’s no much choice and I end up choosing the same biscuits all the time.

We head back to Faro, where we  had lunch in the historic centre (at Taberna Santo Antonio) before visiting the Capela dos Ossos within the Igreja do Campo, since it was closed during lunch time. Capela dos Osos is worth a visit even if it is very tiny so it doesn’t take long to visit, but it is impressive for sure. It’s a chapel made entirely by monks’ bones, and it has some 1200+ skulls!

I always love to find a tourist information point. Once there you can get a map, a booklet about the city, its  tradition, basic words in their language and many more things so there is no need to buy lots of guides and you get a nice collection at the end of each trip.

We had some more time to kill before flying back so we took advantage of the proximity of Praia de Faro to the airport so we spent some time there.

Tips and suggestions

We had a wonderful time in Algarve, and it’s a great place to go to if you are looking for a nice and relaxing short break. Renting a car was a great idea, since we’ve been able to see as many places as possible in such a short period of time. Our suggestion is to go local: look for typical dishes and go where the locals go. Ask your friends around the world before going and visiting their countries, it is much more fun. I asked my contacts on Twitter what they would recommend as a must see in Algarve, and this is how I got to know about Capela dos Osos and many more things to do. Try to avoid political election time, since the landscape around all the region was propaganda everywhere
People are very friendly, and most of them speak English, even people of a certain age, which was surprising for me. Faro is in the same time zone as London, so you don’t have to change the time on your clock if you’re flying from the UK.

Finally, the word “obrigado” was a like a passepartout. We heard that all the time and not sure if it is used only to say thanks or even hi, goodbye etc..

Hope there will be another trip soon Adeus

Yes, we won BritBowl XXIII!!!

What a weekend it was! We drove towards Doncaster on Saturday, leaving Finsbury Park around midday. A big, double-decker bus, plus a trailer for all our kits and bags and, needless to say, the London Blitz in their best shape. We spent the night by Barlborough, having some rest, dinner together and the very final meetings to recap what we’d been studying for the last 2 or 3 weeks, to be 110% ready to take on the Coventry Jets.

In the morning we had a last walk-through of the game-plan and a nice brunch, then the whole of the team squeezed into a tiny room to watch this video:

And the second part

This was incredible, you could see tears in the eyes of many of us, and this is what I think made us all realise we were there, ready to go, ready to win.

We finally got on the bus to Keepmoat Stadium in Doncaster. The feeling was incredible, 70+ guys all dressed the same, all focussed on a moment only a few hours away, all focussed on a game to win and a trophy to hold.

We did so. We beat the Coventry Jets 26-7 (the only 7 points we conceded them in the 3 times we played them this season), obtaining a well deserved revenge after last year’s final. We practised hard all season, we won games and stayed focussed. We won, and we celebrated.

I’m so proud of being part of all this.

Team. Pride. Blitz. Family.

(you can see, and buy, Dan’s pictures pre-, post- and in-game)

Hey guys, we’re back from Sardinia. That’s not big news cause some of you have already met us in the meanwhile (and yes, we’ve been back a while).

AperiTWeat 3.0

Most likely at AperiTWeat 3.0. We’ve had our third London twitter aperitivo at the fantastic Viva Verdi, by TATE modern. It was a very pleasant and enjoyable night, and we are very proud and thankful to all of you who attended (and Lovebox, of course) for having helped us raising funds for Endometriosis UK. £150 were raised on the night, and will generously be matched by the FT, adding up to £300 for the charity.

A big thank you to our friend Niamh, and a goodbye too. She’ll be flying to New York in some days, and we wish her a big good luck for this new adventure! We’ll come and visit you just to make sure you don’t mess things up!

Blitz are 8-0 and at the playoffs

In the meanwhile, the BAFL Premier League regular season is now over, and the London Blitz won all their home games too to make it 8-0! We conceded only 36 points in the whole of the season so far, recording 4 shutouts too! We will now head into the playoffs, with the semifinal at home on Sunday, the 6th of September, at Finsbury Park, where we will be facing the Farham Knights.

And, holidays

On a side note, I’m very pleased we went on holiday without any laptop. Yes, we did have our iPhones, but still… But of course we got ourselves a little busy anyway. Ready?

Gioia e il papa' Sergio

This is a picture we took of Gioia and her dad Sergio at the market where he works as a butcher. We had an idea and some brainstorming and the result is we created a blog for his butcher shop! You can check it out: Macelleria Sergio Serra. He’ll be posting some traditional recipes based on bovine meat, which is what he’s specialised in, alongside some comments about the Serie A and the Cagliari games. Make sure you visit them at the Mercato di San Benedetto, in Cagliari, he’s upstairs, at the stand 29!

Hi fellas, just a quick update to let you know we’re going to take a break from the London life and enjoy some sunshine in Sardinia. We will think about you all the time, I promise.

Especially while we’re here…

See you in a week!

(img courtesy of TomStardust on Flickr)

It’s now only two weeks to go before AperiTWeat 3.0 takes place at Viva Verdi, behind TATE Modern, on the South Bank. We would like you to know that we added a special extra to our event, by joining forces with the guys at Lovebox.

We spoke with Kaushik, Darshan and Michael, who were more than happy to join us to support research for endometriosis. With the help of Lovebox, the next Aperitweat will help raise funds for Endomteriosis UK, the main charity in the uk in support to research.

We are really working hard to make this event a success: the cause is really close to us and we would really love to play our part and, possibly, make a difference.

Come along on Tuesday, August 18, after 6.30pm, at Viva Verdi, the lovely Italian wine bar we chose for Aperitweat 3.0. You can RSVP here to let us know you’re coming. If you want to help us raise funds and awareness for endometriosis research, great! If you cannot make it, but would still like to donate, you can visit this dedicated page at Lovebox, and spread the voice!

We’d really appreciate it.

Hope to see you there!

What’s up with you guys?

We’ve been a bit busy with work/freelancing/dissertation/things to go to (events, Oasis gigs…) and of course the blog suffered a bit. Sorry about that. But we come with bells and colours as we announce that we finally managed to meet and plan for the next AperiTweat!
AperiTweat 3.0 will take place at Viva Verdi, on the 18th of August 2009.

Viva Verdi is a very lovely wine bar just behind TATE Modern, between London Bridge and Southwark tube stations. It’s also easy to get to from Blackfriars (bear in mind the tube station is closed till God knows when, but rail station is open!) by crossing the bridge and turning left in Southwark Street. For the digital geo-junkies in you, the full postcode is SE1 9AN. Type it, get there. As simple as that. You can also see it on OpenStreetMap when you search for the postcode.

As usual, expect quality drinks (the Prosecco is awesome, ’nuff said) and free food to accompany your drinks and chats. Cause we’re there to chat, right? Of course, the atmosphere is perfect for your networking needs, and if we’re lucky with the weather, there’s also some room outside. The room outside is there anyway, even with bad weather, it just might be not as interesting!

What I personally love about the place is the ham slicer, aka “affettatrice”. It sits at the centre of the bar, and it’s surely the most scenic one I’ve ever seen in my life of ham aficionado. And it’s not just the slicer, the ham, or “prosciutto crudo” is amazing too. What’s the point in having the coolest slicer if the prosciutto is not good? The guys at Viva Verdi thought the same.

We will have some surprises in the next days and weeks, but in the meanwhile please have a look at the official Aperitweat blog and also please join us and RSVP here.

We hope to see you there!

Spread the voice, share this post!

]]> http://www.twoexpats.com/aperitweat-30-coming/feed/ 0 http://www.twoexpats.com/english-picnic/ http://www.twoexpats.com/english-picnic/#comments Thu, 09 Jul 2009 16:51:57 +0000 Matteo http://www.twoexpats.com/?p=374

With the Summer season hopefully not over yet, it’s time to picnic.

We have already introduced the picnic topic in the previous post about the Ray Davies gig at Kenwood House, Hampstead. We had prior committments during the day (namely: Tweetcamp) so we didn’t go there prepared. We do plan to go to Kenwood again though, this weekend, to see the Gipsy Kings, so we thought you might want to knwo how we are getting ready for the English picnic experience.

What you will need:

• waterproof blanket
• some additional towels
• a basket
• food
• drinks
• umbrellas
• appropriate clothing
• rubbish bags

The blanket and the towels

We realised that last time. You DO need a waterproof blanket. These blankets usually are treated on one side to get them to be waterproof, so that you can lay it on the grass even if it had been raining. They usually fold and you can roll them for ease in carrying them. We suggest some additional towels cause the waterproofing might just not be as good as you wuould have expected. They are usually not very expensive.

The basket

There’s a lot to be said on the traditional wicker basket: it surely is the stand-out item in this list. There’s a lot of choice in terms of whether you might want just a basket or a proper picnic basket. Picnic baskets usually come in sets with cutlery and all sorts of things, with the traditional strings to keep things in place when you carry it. Prices vary a lot because it’s an incredibly popular item, therefore you obviously can find cheap/practical baskets or very fine/designer sets. They usually come in sets for four people, but you can also find options for fewer/more people.

There are, of course, more modern camping alternatives, that usually tend to position themselves in the “practica” spot rather tha the posh one: backpacks with plastic cups and crokery are usually easy to fins and often come pretty cheap.

Food and drinks

You will need them. It’s not a picnic otherwise. Don’t bring anything that needs heating, ’cause it’s not camping either. Everything else just works. Pre-prepared meals, sandwiches, salads (with dressing), bread, crisps, fruit. All sorts of sizes of tupperware will surely come handy when you will need to actually put the food in some container. Napkins will prove useful too.

As for he drinks, we feel we can suggests bottle(s) of wine and plastic flutes(very easy to find). For the wine, cooling bags are clearly a must, as is a corkscrew. Some baskets provide some space for up to 3 bottles so it might be worth considering them for this feature.

Umbrellas, and clothes

Let’s face it, it might easily rain. In fact, it was literally pissing down when we went to see Ray Davies. We were in “regular” clothes, jeans, shirt, and a jumper. Gioia did have a jacket, but I didn’t. We only had one, fairly small, umbrella. Even if it’s supposed to be sunny, we suggest you consider carrying with you some waterproof clothes, and a spare pair of socks to be kept in a dry place (I personally hate wearing wet socks). All-Stars are a no-no in these cases, get some boots instead. You can get pretty decent jackets (and pants, if you want) in any outdoors store, and it’s probably worth spending some money on them, as if you get a good one it will keep everything else you’re wearing dry. Bring at least one umbrella per person, you will need it, unless you have an extremely oer-sized one.

Rubbish bags

You liked the green when you arrived there, right? Leave it as you found it. There might be stewards responsible for cleaining after campers in certain areas (there were manyat Kenwood), but that’s no reason not to be considerate.

Do you have any other suggestions? What’s your picnic gear? We’d love to hear from you!