July 25-- 1:10, 2:00, 2:30, 3:00, 3:15--the times I woke up on the sleeper train because I was worried my alarm wouldn't go off to wake us up for our 3:50 transfer at the Ange station. We got off our train and slept on the benches just inside the Ange station and waited for two hours for our 6:15 train to Sundsvall. I fell asleep on that train and when I woke up we were at our final destination. Grandma's cousin, Ove, (Anders's brother), was there to pick us up and he brought us to another cousin's apartment where we would be staying for the next few days while she stayed with her sister. We were greeted there by Ove's wife, Berit, and Barbro. The two of them had prepared a great breakfast for us, and the three of them were a riot together! They left us for an hour to nap and freshen up and then it was time to go.
We started off by going to downtown Sundsvall. It was so beautiful along the main road. Painted dragon statues lined the streets. Dragons are the town mascot and companies buy the statues and paint them differently and most of them are very funny. We took pictures with a lot of them and Berit called it dragon hunting. We walked through a mall and tried to convince Ove, a 75+ year old man, to buy pants with flames on them. Pretty funny.
After walking around the town, we drove to the North Mountain and got a great view of the whole town. We ate lunch there--a great Swedish buffet consisting of potatoes, smoked salmon, herring, beef stew, salad, and other side dishes. The restaurant overlooked the view and it was a really great Swedish experience.
Following lunch, we went to a church and saw the grave of J.P. Alund, my grandmother's father's dad--my great great grandfather. Weird. We piled back in the car to go to the house where my grandmother's mother grew up. Her mom's dad had built the house. It was very special for my grandma to see the house and we all met the current residents--a cute family with two sons who are restoring the house and updating it. That made my grandma very happy to see it in good hands.
We then went to the Tuna Church. It was a very neat church and it was where my grandmother's aunts were buried. We were pretty exhausted from the lack of sleep so we all went back to the apartment where Meredith and I fell fast asleep for an hour. When we woke up, it was time for dinner. Barbro had made a salmon quiche and an anchovy/potato quiche and Berit had made a taco quiche. Quite delicious!
Our final event of the night was going to Barbro's church's summer house for a little music concert and vintage car show. The singer and piano player were quite good although it was odd to hear only Swedish songs. The vintage cars were awesome! Barbro also bought us evening fika--tea, coffee and rhubarb cake. We went back to her apartment after the event, taking the long way so we could see the island, and we all pretty much crashed when we got back. Ove started imitating the rising of the sun and the older crew started doing "tai chi" or sun salutations--it was pretty hysterical. Amazing, action-packed, hysterical day!
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