Moving and Meet Ups


Kungsträdgården cherry blossom.



One month in to my PhD and I'm settling into things here in Stockholm, especially since I moved from the AirBnB to the south of the city to my little studio apartment, 10 minutes walk from uni. 

The weather here has been exceptionally incredible since I returned from Norway; all the Swedes keep saying how unusual this is and warning me not to get used to it so I'm trying to make the most of the blue skies while they last!


Since my last post I've had plenty of chance to explore Stockholm and its surrounds with a palaeoglaciology field trip to the north of the archipelago and a sunny 4 day weekend for Ascension day.

Having just got back from Norway, I was straight back out into the field, just a little less extreme and a little closer to home this time. Some of the glaciology group were making a trip to Norrboda, an island about 2 hours north of the city to look at some glacial landforms, including a large boulder cave that a few of us managed to wriggle into. 
It was a very laid back study trip, a few car loads of us made our way up the coast, stopping off at geologically interesting locations along the way to discuss the possible interpretations of these features.
The view to the left is where we stopped for lunch before taking the car ferry across to see some hummocky landforms.

On a stroll around Djurgården.



I managed a couple of days of actually doing some work before I was off again, for my first 'red day', Sweden seem to have a fair few of these days off for various occasions. This time it was ascension day and as it fell on a Thursday no one bothered to come in on the Friday either.
This left me with plenty of time for exploring and making the most of my new 'MeetUp' app.

'MeetUp' is where you can sign up to groups with various interests eg. Outdoor club or Sunday Fika, and join events. So far I've been to coffee meet ups, Zumba and a hike around Gålö peninsula. It's a great way to find others who are new to the city or who have lived here for a while so can give useful recommendations.


My favourite MeetUp so far has to be the Gålö shoreline walk. Sara and Dan kindly drove the 8 of us the 40 minutes south to the start point. From here we walked a 15km loop, scrambling up and down the rocky shore and then back through fields and woodland. 
We couldn't have asked for a better day, it felt like a holiday destination, and our international group was lovely and friendly. 

 Sara is very knowledgeable on Swedish plants so taught us various names and showed us lichen flowers using her hand lens.

Lichen studies with Sara.



The photos here were taken by Greg, our photography enthusiast from Sweden.
I hope I can go on more trips with this group in the future.

In my other free time I've done some solo exploring; I took the boat to Djurgården where I found a national park with a cute garden café in the centre and I discovered my favourite kardemummabullar (cardamom bun) spot so far at Café Pascal. 
 In between all these holidays and trips I have spent some time actually working on my PhD. At the moment this mostly consists of sitting in my office reading, but I have had the opportunity over the past couple of days to attend some prominent lectures on our climate.
The first was by Veerabhadran Ramanathan, a climate scientist who advised Pope Francis about climate change. He believes climate change is reversible but a frightening amount needs to be done by 2040 to avoid permanent damage.

Dan, Caro, Me, Dave, Sara and Marc before our hike.


Today was the Cramfood Symposium which had a slightly less gloomy outlook and even included a rather scrumptious, sit down lunch and afternoon snack. 

 We celebrated two researches in particular who were being awarded for their work, one had linked CO2 to climate change and the other had been instrumental in the ban of CFCs to repair the hole in the ozone.

My little apartment.


 In amongst all of this I have now moved into my little apartment, pictured to the left. I'm so happy to have my own space and a vastly improved commute to uni.

I had the full Swedish experience on Sunday as I headed to Ikea to stock up on some of the essentials. Such a maze! But they did have some great, cheap veggie meatballs to keep me fuelled.

Waterfront 2 minutes from my new place.

The surroundings here are quite fantastic, I've been for a couple of runs along the water, in one direction I found myself in the middle of a farm with pigs, goats, horses and sheep and the other way I ended up in a botanical garden.

Overall, I'm feeling quite at home here in Stockholm, I just hope this fabulous weather lasts!

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