By land, by sea [but not by dirigible].

I hate flying. I’m not scared of it, and I don’t get motion sickness. I just hate it. I hate having to travel two hours to get to the airport and then spend another two hours sitting around waiting to board, and dealing with security measures that don’t even seem to be that effective, and spending a small fortune on airport food and a bottle of water, and the weight limits on the baggage that then more often than not gets lost anyway, and all the stupid extra little fees, especially from the low-cost airlines [really, RyanAir, charging for the restrooms? yeeees, let’s charge $10 for a bottle of water and make people pay to go to the bathroom so that they’d rather just do without and then become completely dehydrated and have their blood thicken up until it lands them in the hospital with thrombosis – nice], and not being able to sleep a wink, and and and.

So to get from Sweden to England, I decided to take it slow and keep closer to the ground. It was significantly more expensive and time-consuming than flying, admittedly, and you’ll soon see how many different segments there were in just the one trip, but – I didn’t hate the experience. What a concept! [Okay, I hated it a little because Sweden had given me a cold and I was miserable most of the time, but that’s not the journey’s fault. I know I would’ve enjoyed it – seeing so much of the countryside, taking it easy, etc. – if I had been healthy, whereas flying I don’t enjoy at all, even when I’m healthy as a horse (is that the right phrase? are horses that healthy? and why do dogs always have to be the sick ones?].

1. Train from Uppsala, Sweden, to Stockholm, Sweden. Subsequent chilling for an hour or two in the Stockholm train station.

2. Night train from Stockholm, Sweden, to Lund, Sweden. I was in one of the two topmost beds of a six-bed sleeper compartment. Despite the cold, I managed to sleep for a few hours before getting into Lund about 6:30 a.m. I had originally planned to switch trains in Malmö, but I realized a few days before [thanks to facebook – say what you will about facebook, but it has its upsides] that Tim was studying in Lund, and he was nice enough to wake up ridiculously early, despite his own cold, to meet me for breakfast. Tim’s one of those people with whom I hang out in a different country each time. It’s nice to see a consistent familiar face in all those different places!

3. Train from Lund, Sweden, to Copenhagen, Denmark. Had a fair amount of free time, but was sick and tired and didn’t feel like dealing with the luggage lockers, so I just found an internet café and tried to be slightly productive. But I’ll be back, Copenhagen, just you wait!

See, I actually was in Copenhagen! The Axelborg proves it! [I don’t know what happens in the Axelborg; please don’t ask.]

4. Train from Copenhagen, Denmark, to Esbjerg, Denmark, and then a pleasant walk to the port.

5. Ferry from Esbjerg, Denmark, to Harwich [pronounced “hair itch”], England. It was an overnight, 18-hour journey, so it included a hotel-like room. After we had set sail, I went out on the deck, but not for long, because it was much too windy. Then I had dinner and, because I was still sick and miserable, took a nap until I had to wake up around midnight for a conference call. I was actually feeling alright, but the wi-fi area had the air conditioning on way too high, and by the end of the call I was sneezing and sniffling to beat the band [you know, the one band, The Sneezing Snifflers]. I ran back to my room and slept more until it was time for breakfast, ate breakfast, and slept even more until we reached land. I wish I had been healthier, because I do actually enjoy boats, and I would’ve liked to see what kind of entertainment they had on board and so on and pretend I was on a real cruise, maybe take part in the kids’ treasure hunt [okay, not that, but I would probably quietly pretend to myself that I was a Danish pirate]...next time!

My cabin on board.

On deck.

6. Train from Harwich, England, to Manningtree, England. When I got there, there were announcements that my connecting train was twelve minutes late...then fourteen…then sixteen – every couple of minutes they added two minutes to the delayed time. But the sun was out, so I just stretched out on my backpack, rested my eyes, and soaked up the sun until the train finally showed up.

7. Train from Manningtree, England, to Norwich, England. Just about two days after I left the loving arms of Ansti in Uppsala, I ran into the loving arms of Ella in Norwich.

I had made it, and, for one of the first times, the traveling part of traveling wasn’t so bad. It might sound crazy, but I’d totally do it again – minus the sneezing.