L.L. Diamond

When most people think of Sweden, they probably think of Oslo, but we took the opportunity to travel to Gothenberg for the start of our Christmas market road trip. Honestly, we didn’t see much of the town center since we flew in, traveled to our hostel, went to the Christmas market, picked up a car, and started our drive to Copenhagen for the next Christmas market—all in 24 hours.

We stayed at the Spoton Sports Bar and Hostel, which was my first hostel experience, but a good one. Our room was a generous size, clean, and comfortable. We ate lunch at the sports bar downstairs, which had great gluten free pizza. The best part of the hostel’s location was the proximity to the Christmas market. It was practically across the street!

My husband had experience with the Christmas markets in Germany, but Gothenberg’s was totally different from those. Instead of being spread around in the town center, this Christmas market was held in an amusement park that’s normally shut down for the winter, but reopens for the Christmas markets every year. Unfortunately, that meant an entrance fee on top of paying for rides, ice skating, food, and whatever fun goodies we found while wandering around.

 

Sweden wasn’t as cold as I expected that evening, but we didn’t do the rides since it would only make the cold weather colder. The temperature also dropped during the evening and the rides would have only become more unpleasant. Instead, we drank hot chocolate, coffee, and glog (In Sweden, it was a warm mulled berry juice) while we browsed the different shops and stalls and the children ice skated (tried to ice skate really).

One of my favorite parts of Gothenberg’s Christmas market was what we originally thought were gnomes. They were so cute everywhere and no one bothered to correct me until I bought this little candle holder and the shop owner told us those were Santas. Oops! I’m not sure why there would be a circle of Santas around a candle, but I still couldn’t resist buying one!

 

Overall, the Gothenberg Christmas market is beautiful and amazing to walk around, though quite expensive because of the entrance. My husband estimated that we spent almost $100 just to go in. It’s not terribly crowded though and was a lovely experience.

The next morning, we ate breakfast downstairs at the hostel before we picked up our car and started the rainy and sometimes snowy drive to Copenhagen. I wish the weather had been better. We drove through a good bit of rain and snow along the drive, but the scenery was beautiful.

From Gothenberg, the trip to Copenhagen took about 4 hours and included a short ferry ride. There is a bridge to Denmark, but we would’ve had to drive another hour south to Malmo before crossing and would’ve been a much longer trip.

 

Next up: Copenhagen!