THE WORLD'S SMALLEST WORLD

Once upon a time a young man travelled to Canada to visit his mother. This was way before internet, way before dubstep killed the clubs - even before yours truly was born. And back then, times were simpler. People didn't need big advanced technology to keep themselves entertained. And the young man, back in the 70's, visited the tiniest, smallest things of them all and were very happy with his day.
Twenty years, three kids and one divorce later the man wasn't so young anymore. His kids has grown to be adults themselves and were always desperate to be entertained (aren't all of us 90-00's kids?). So the man brought them on a trip back in time, to a place that, despite its name, grown bigger in the last decades:

MINIATURE WORLD 

AFTERNOON IN VICTORIA

DAY FIVE 

MASTERING STROLLING IN VICTORIA

The sky was clear, more azure than cornflower blue. The temperature was hot, but not unpleasantly. North America, especially South Canada, has been under a massive heat wave the last couple of days, but whereever we've been, the perfect middle temperatures seems to have followed. 

TRAVELING ACHES AND ABANDONED PIANOS

DAY FOUR
ARRIVING IN BRITISH COLOMBIA 

A day of traveling is usually not a good day. Everyone is tired, there's ferries to catch and stuff to be packed and brought.

GRANVILLE ISLAND

DAY THREE 

Last day in Vancouver, the first turn, we checked out Granville Island with all of it's markets. We met the cousins and aunts by the Water Park and then continued on to the Public Market, where we got some food. I'll let the picture speak for themselves.

STANLEY PARK-ING

DAY TWO
Apparently, you can't visit too many parks...

With little to none say in schedule-making, I nicely followed where my parents led me. And actually, quite glad I did. Stanley Park was next park in what seems to be the eternal amount of parks in this city, and what waited us outside the car when we finally found a parking lot was quite amazing.
On one side, we had the bay with the impressing silhouette of gas town. On the other, we had totem poles making an outdoors gallery for everyone to enjoy.

QUEEN ELIZABETH PARK

DAY ONE

The weather was bright, the sky was clear, the family behaved... 

After sleeping from 9 o'clock in the evening, the jetlaged forced us to wake up by 5 in the morning. Nethertheless, we were eager to see some Canada and asked our hosts where to go. Just down the block, or sort of, there was a park, they said and gave us directions. 

ONE IDIOT & FAMILY TRAVELING NORTH AMERICA

It's time again to cross the big ocean, in the other direction this time. This time for the cause of a wedding. For almost 4 weeks Felicia and her... let's call it unique family are going to check out the land of maple syrup and free healthcare, as Barney Stinson would put it.

We'll start in Vancouver to check out the city and meet up with relatives. After a few days there we'll take the ferry to Vancouver Island and fulfill mum's dreams of going somewhere English in British Columbia (why not just take a one hour flight to London then, one might ask...). After that we will drive the little car we've rented over to the land of hamburgers and crazy people... and stay for almost a week in Seattle.

TIME IS FROZEN AT FLICKORNA LUNDGREN

As last entry fortold, every summer, we try to go to our aunt in Skåne and live the countryside dream for a couple of days. This year, work was eating all our time and even with rescheduals and countless tries to get some extra free days, we still only manage to stay for 2 nights this summer.

During these days we did have time to go kayaking, ziplining and tobogan-ing, as well as celebrating our aunt's grandson's 2nd birthday - but we didn't have time to visit the best café in all of Sweden:

Flickorna Lundgren på Skäret. 

So this entry brings you back to a sunny, wonderful afternoon last year in july, when we drove the minivan to Skäret, a tiny tiny village in southern Sweden, and enjoyed an nostalgic Astrid Lindgren-like afternoon with a piece of Princesstårta and freshly brewed coffee.

TOBOGAN AND ZIPLINING IN HALLAND

So we went south in the most wonderful way possible - we went to visit Felicia's aunt in the tiny community Kvidinge in Skåne. Tagging along were also Felicia's sister Julia, 19 yo, and her brother Victor, 15 yo.

Coming from a somewhat stressful, modern city like Gothenburg, going to Skåne makes it feels like you're going back in time, or that the time has stopped. All three of the Axelssons have always visited Skåne during summers and family bithdays, so that might be a reason for the nostalgiac feeling.
Last year, we invited Jonathan to this tradition and soon it became a must even for him.

When arriving at aunt Cina's idyllic house that is pretty much equipped with everything you'll ever need in a Swedish summer, like an outdoors hot tub, a strawberry garden, a glassed-in porch, it was hard imagining finding a reason for even leaving the grounds.

Luckily, Cina is a master at finding things to do and we left for Kungsbygget, a ski slope that turns in to a tobogan/zipline in the summer.