Stockholm in January 2005
As you may already know, Chuck's job involves a fair amount of travel to encourage collaboration between researchers in other countries and in the US. However, he's still got something to learn about scheduling these trips -- one of the most recent was a trip to Stockholm, Sweden, in mid-January. We can' find any travel books or web sites that recommend Sweden as a January travel destination; but there we were.
Stockholm (which we had previously visited in August of 2001) is, of course a beautiful city -- and the Swedes a very modern and advanced people. However, during this most recent visit the weather was uniformly cold and rainy (they had had a lot of snow in November, but none in December or while we were there in January). And, remember, Sweden, being very far north, has very short periods of daylight in the winter.
None of this stopped us from finding the trip both profitable (Chuck) and enjoyable (both of us). Chuck (as well as a colleague, Jim DeCorpo) visited two of the major laboratory sites that are part of the Swedish Defense Research Agency. He and Jim met many scientists and engineers they hope to be able to "hook up" with US researchers in a number of interesting technical areas. In fact, they are planning a follow on visit, with several additional colleagues, in mid-March. (We are also unable to find books that recommend visiting Sweden in March; I guess scheduling will continue to require work.)
Kathi accompanied Chuck (and Jim's wife accompanied him, too) and the four of us were able to do a bit of sightseeing over two days. Of course with ship-designer Chuck along, we had to visit the Vasa museum -- a truly great museum dedicated to a 16th century Swedish ship that capsized and sank on its maiden voyage, and was raised about 40 years ago, preserved and put on display. It's a spectacular museum. We took a few long (and wet and windy) walks through the business/shopping area, watched ice skaters enjoying a rink in a public park and found a really good, fun restaurant in the Opera House, where we sat on stools at a bar and ate delicious traditional Swedish food.
You can see a few of the pictures from the trip at: http://chuck.smugmug.com/gallery/386937
Stockholm (which we had previously visited in August of 2001) is, of course a beautiful city -- and the Swedes a very modern and advanced people. However, during this most recent visit the weather was uniformly cold and rainy (they had had a lot of snow in November, but none in December or while we were there in January). And, remember, Sweden, being very far north, has very short periods of daylight in the winter.
None of this stopped us from finding the trip both profitable (Chuck) and enjoyable (both of us). Chuck (as well as a colleague, Jim DeCorpo) visited two of the major laboratory sites that are part of the Swedish Defense Research Agency. He and Jim met many scientists and engineers they hope to be able to "hook up" with US researchers in a number of interesting technical areas. In fact, they are planning a follow on visit, with several additional colleagues, in mid-March. (We are also unable to find books that recommend visiting Sweden in March; I guess scheduling will continue to require work.)
Kathi accompanied Chuck (and Jim's wife accompanied him, too) and the four of us were able to do a bit of sightseeing over two days. Of course with ship-designer Chuck along, we had to visit the Vasa museum -- a truly great museum dedicated to a 16th century Swedish ship that capsized and sank on its maiden voyage, and was raised about 40 years ago, preserved and put on display. It's a spectacular museum. We took a few long (and wet and windy) walks through the business/shopping area, watched ice skaters enjoying a rink in a public park and found a really good, fun restaurant in the Opera House, where we sat on stools at a bar and ate delicious traditional Swedish food.
You can see a few of the pictures from the trip at: http://chuck.smugmug.com/gallery/386937
posted by Chuck and Kathi Calvano @ 3:46 PM
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