No matter how well-traveled, cosmopolitan and multinational you become, there‘s always going to be one place that feels more like home than any other. In my case, that place is Sangis in Northern Sweden. Growing up, I was proud to know that Sangis was the site of the northernmost known Viking burial site in Sweden. [...]
I’m an American. I’m not an Australian when I’m in Indonesia. I’m not a Canadian when I’m in Vietnam. I don’t sew another country’s flag on my backpack in an attempt to conceal my nationality. (Yes, I’ve seen that happen) I’m a traveling American woman and guess what? That’s OK. I don’t have [...]
The arctic circle is a latitudinal line that defines the top 1/8th of the earth as the Arctic. As you can expect, it’s damn cold up there. Beautiful scenery abounds, as there is far more nature than inhabitants. But, like I said, it’s damn cold. Most people visit in summer, when temperatures are more bearable. [...]
While the bipedal members of the seatsofourpants.com team have been frolicking around in the snowy north, Bacon has been busy planning the next phase of our travels. Using his savings (and our credit cards), he has been one mean, lean travel booking machine. The way Bacon has figured it out so far is that we [...]
Martin’s family lives far from everything – except the Ice Hotel, of course. So, what’s the Ice Hotel, you ask? Only the coldest, sweetest hotel this side of the arctic circle. We hit it up today and much to our surprise, it was actually amazing (though a wee bit smelly). Check it out…
I guess it was bound to happen. Since I’m a Swede, there was always going to be one post about IKEA on this blog. The stars were aligned, and now they deliver. About 3 years ago, Haparanda (33km from my home town) was a depressed, run-down border town with very few incentives to entice a [...]
It may not look the part, but this little Russian Orthodox church is actually a thumb-in-the-eye addressed to Sweden ,courtesy of Imperial Russia. To understand what I’m talking about, a history lesson is in order. The border where the church stands is now in the middle of a shopping center, but up to 1809 [...]
My Mom is here for two weeks, staying with us in the Engstrom family home. That could be a very scary thing, considering neither of the parents speak the same language. In-laws together, who can’t understand one another for two weeks? Possible recipe for disaster. Thankfully, they love one another – as you can [...]
Last time it was the “How to slaughter a moose” video. This visit it’s foxes strung up on a house. Northern Sweden is light years away from where I grew up. How did the girl from sunny southern California end up with a boy from northern Sweden? Fate really does have a fantastic sense [...]
I’ve had to wait a year to give my mom a hug – but the wait is over! I finally got that hug today. My Mom flew in today to spend two weeks in the winter wonderland with us. A year is the longest I’ve gone without seeing my mom – too long, if [...]
As I wrote recently, spring in northern Sweden is a dramatic event. In this I have been proven right: the day we arrived happened to be the last day of winter. Since then, the thermometer has been firmly in the red, with sultry temperatures making the snow melt at breakneck speed. In a perfect [...]
Today, my wife decided to re-live our oh-so-recent days of traveling in India. How? Why she decided to make a snow sculpture of the Taj Mahal in our front yard. I was employed as a snow-shoveller, complementing my wife’s artistic bent with my ferocious muscle (cough cough cough). Initially, I feared that we were [...]
Northern Swedes and Americans celebrate Easter in very different ways. They celebrate for an entire week. We generally gather on Sunday. They dress as witches. We dress (unfortunate) men as rabbits. They decorate eggs, then eat them. We decorate eggs, hide them then set children loose to find them. Either way you look at [...]
Palates are refined in youth. If you grew up eating or drinking something, chances are you’ll tie it to your childhood and not see it for what it really is. I’ll use the Swedish Easter drink, Paskmust, as an example. I find it repulsive. It smells like alcohol but it’s a children’s drink. It contains [...]
There comes a time in a woman’s life when she looks at herself in the mirror and says, “Bleh!” (Basically the opposite of what is pictured above) For me, that day was yesterday. We’ve been on the road for eleven months now and the personal beauty department has been closed for business. Au natural [...]
You know the saying, “to fly by the seat of your pants?” Well, that's been our philosophy for most of our adult lives – before and after meeting, falling in love and marrying. We're now taking that idea on an extended round-the-world trip. Follow us as we share the good, the bad and the downright nasty of life on the road.
