Växjö, Sweden

Sunday, August 10, 2003

On July 10 we set out on a trip around some of southern Sweden. We had rented a car for a couple weeks, so we had a chance to make more stops than we do in a train. We left after work on Thursday and headed south to Växjö.

At this point you might be wondering "How in the world do you pronounce 'Växjö'?" Well, I never got it quite right, but I can assure you that it's not VAX-JOE. It's more like VEK-FWOO.

We stopped for dinner in Eksjö (ECK-HWOO), and then continued on to Växjö. I didn't actually have a map to our hotel, but after a bit of wandering we found it: Hotell Teaterparken. The hotel room was one of the nicer ones we've stayed in.

We went for a short walk before bed. The city has about 70,000 people -- smaller than Linköping, but still a decent size.

It also seemed a bit busier than Linköping. (Since Linköping is a university city, it has been pretty dead during the summer.) Växjö has a nice lake with a fountain near the center of town. It also has a couple of museums that are supposed to be pretty good, but we didn't visit them.

The next day we started our sightseeing.

Växjö's Domkryka (Cathedral) is a bit different than the other churches we've seen in Europe. The architecture isn't quite the same, and the interior features a lot of glass art -- this region of Sweden is known for its glassworks. It's not really my style, but it was interesting to visit.

Outside the church is a nice garden, including a cactus garden which is planted each year with a design representing some event from the previous year.

From the pictures you can easily see the larger cacti, but all of the small green spots in the close-up picture are tiny cacti too.

After this short morning in Växjö we drove out into the country towards Kalmar to see the local glassworks. I don't have any pictures up from the rest of out trip, but hopefully I'll get to it eventually.

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