Gothenburg; Saturday, 17 September, 2016

The fact we had a gate still didn’t mean we had a plane. That didn’t arrive until after midnight and by the time they had gotten everyone off and all of us on it was already 00:30 before we finally pushed back, just missing the five-hour delay mark by a couple of minutes. On the plus side, it was the shortest taxi I’ve ever had at Gatwick and we were airborne within five minutes of pushing back.

A thankfully uneventful flight landed us at a near deserted Gothenburg airport around 3:15 in the morning. By the time I’d picked up my luggage and walked through the empty customs hall to arrivals it was gone 03:30. The other thing that was gone was the taxi driver. With no sign of them I had to join the very long queue, so by the time I finally arrived at the hotel it was fast approaching 5am.

Thankfully, the hotel I had booked did a very speedy check-in and their beautiful comfy bead had me drifting off within a couple of minutes of my head hitting the pillow.

I woke up, feeling fine around 4 hours later at 9 and decided that I might as well not lose any more of the trip so I got up, had a lovely shower and a very filling breakfast before heading out into the city.

My first stop was, naturally, the open-top bus tour which, due to it being the end of the season, was only running on the Saturday, and then only 4 journeys. I did two full circuits, one on each side, taking in the sights of the city – which was much prettier than I expected the city to be – given it’s the largest port in Scandinavia.

Back at the starting point I wandered over to the Trädgårdsföreningen a series of gardens run by the local garden society that includes a pretty impressive palm house and a large rose garden. On a warm sunny Saturday, the whole area was very busy but also still lovely and peaceful.

I had a long look around the gardens and then walked on down to the Centralstation where I picked up the heritage tram that runs through the city centre to take in some of the sights from a museum vehicle.

After doing the circuit of the tram route I headed down to the harbour area to have a look around, and after purchasing a 24-hour travel card, took one of the ferry services that runs down the Göta älv, the river running through the heart of the city, to take in the views from the water. I’d timed it just right as on the journey back the sun was starting to set lending a beautiful orange hue to the buildings.

Back in the city centre I found a restaurant for a quick dinner. Whilst sat down for dinner the lack of sleep and busy day really started to catch up with me, so after finishing dinner I grabbed a tram back to the hotel for a well-deserved early night.