Today we realized how incredibly tired we were from the trip to Stockholm. We had an alarm set around 9 am and we completely slept through it. Until almost noon!!

By the time we showered, ate lunch at the cafe downstairs and got out the door it was nearly 3 pm. Thankfully the sun doesn’t set until after 10 pm, so we still had plenty of daylight.

First we hopped on the metro. Some of the stations have really cool art. Our favorites so far are Kungsträdgården, T-Centralen, Stadion and Mörby centrum.

Kungsträdgården – The floor and walls are covered in coordinating patterns of green, red and white. The ceiling above the (longest!) escalator looks like a series of piano keys.

T-Centralen – At the bottom of the station, the walls and ceiling feels like a giant cave painted in fun patterns of blue and white.

Stadion – This is where we found the rainbow archways!

Mörby centrum – My absolute favorite. The walls at the bottom the escalators are tiled in pastel strips.

After stopping for a few metro photo ops, we decided to visit Ikea. Because, when in Sweden… right? We mixed up the stations and missed the bus we intended, but fortunately the bus runs a few times a day.

Ikea offers a free bus from Stockholm, near T-Centralen. The store here sells so much more than furniture, like bikes, and they sell the cheapest food you’ll find in Stockholm. We each got a full meal and dessert (really good!) for less than $5. Rosie got the meatballs plate and I got the veggie balls, which were pretty good! Here’s how to find the free bus to Ikea if you want to visit.

We finished up the evening grabbing dessert (what, you didn’t know second dessert is a thing on vacation?) in the heart of Gamla Stan at Chokladkoppen. The cafe sits right under the awning on the orange building! We ordered the apple pie with vanilla sauce because we’ve seen it on so many menus here. It was delicious. The pie crust was more like a crumb cake.

It’s pretty amazing that the sun sets so late. These last few photos were taken after 10 pm!