Being a tour guide, meeting people all the time, I’m often asked questions…
This has been a busy summer. Lots of tours, lots of guests that I have had the privilege to show around my city and West Sweden. And every time I meet guests, we talk (duh!) And every time, invariably, as we get to know each other, at some point questions will be asked about why I’ve become a tour guide. So here’s the answer: storytelling.
From Training Executive to Author and Tour Guide? How?
Storytelling is an integral part of training, writing, consulting, and being a tour guide.
This might feel like a huge stretch, but actually, is not. I like to think of storytelling as the clip that holds it all together. When I first started out as a trainer, telling stories was a way to help me pass on knowledge to my students. Mind you, it is more complex, and I’m simplifying for the sake of this post. Storytelling has always played a major role in training and education.
The same is obviously true for writing books. Books are basically stories, and I won’t lie that I often view my books as lessons to humanity, stories about humankind. From there, the step to touring isn’t long. I love to tell stories about my city, not just about its interesting history. I use stories to explain the sights, anecdotes that can be funny, thought-provoking, etc.
Whether it’s the story about how Gothenburg was founded, the story of how it became the rich city with all the donations from the “founding fathers”, to the story of the challenges we face going forward.
Storytelling and then some…
Storytelling has always been at the core of what I do.
Besides, visiting a city, traveling is all about learning. When you book a tour it obviously means you are curious to learn about the place you’re visiting, the people living there, the culture, the food, its history, etc. And storytelling is really the oldest form of learning. It goes back to the very beginnings of humankind. I once explained that in a video for my consulting business, which is yet another way for me to use storytelling to help clients.
Do you have a question for me? Let me know. I’m sure I can weave a little story around it…
Welcome to Sweden and welcome to Gothenburg! Did you bring enough money? Credit card?
No, this isn’t about me. I’ll be happy to take (some of) your money in exchange for an unforgettable tour experience though. This is about a news cast I heard this morning and some things I’ve experienced with guests of mine: money, credit cards and tips. Let’s take the easy one first: tips.
Tips, unlike the US, are included in Sweden
Money, money, money
Most European countries include tips in their charge, e.g. in restaurants, cabs, etc. So you don’t have to whip out your calculator and crunch numbers. Here in Sweden, it’s customary to only tip when you’re particularly pleased with your server’s work, and we do that by rounding up to the nearest round figure.
E.g. if your restaurant bill is SEK 947:-, we’d round up to SEK 960 or 970, depending on how generous we feel. But you’re not obliged to do so and nobody will frown if you don’t. Servers here are paid a union salary and tips are added automatically. However, if you want to tip in cash, that is fine. I’ve yet to find a server who complains about a tip.
Please note: new Credit Card readers
Some of the new cordless credit card readers (or terminals) that the server or taxi driver will hand to you will include the option to add the tip on your card (so no hassle with cash.)
You’ll first have to enter the total amount (after the server entered the amount on the bill) before you proceed to enter your pin code or ask for a copy to sign. Be sure not to enter your pin as a total. There is a protection in case the amount you enter differs too much from the bill but it’s embarrassing to have your waiter see your pin as a total amount. #BeenThere
Other service providers are tipped using the same approach. They’re all on a salary and don’t need the tips to make their living! However, if someone does an exceptional job, they’ll gladly accept your tip.
Sweden is well in its way to be the first cash-free society
Regardless of whether you lament or applaud this development, fact is that about 90% of all payments in our country are handled either by Credit Card or Swish (similar to Venmo in the US.) Swish, in particular, has become an indispensable service for payments between people. Fast and free of charge (for now.) There are more and more stores, hotels and restaurants who no longer accept cash.
For visitors from countries where cash is still king, this can be a bit distressful. You’re hungry, order a meal but can’t pay for it. Trust me, we had the equivalent moment a few months ago in Hamburg, just the opposite way, having to leave three restaurants in a row because they did NOT accept credit cards.
Prepare for your trip to Sweden
Image: Bertil Ericson / TT
The good news is that you won’t need to run to your foreign exchange bureau and worry about what size bill you’ll most likely need or what to do with leftover coins nobody will take back.
But, you need to bring your credit card, and you’ll always have to carry an official picture ID with you (passport, driver’s license, national ID card.) You should also, if your bank offers it, get a card that offers an NFC chipped card.
The European Union has new laws coming into effect this month (on the 14th) which will require all EU citizens to be able to use their PIN-code to pay for their goods in stores. Signatures will no longer be accepted. Keep that in mind. If you travel from outside the EU/EES area, nothing changes, but you’ll need your ID to prove who you are (if you do not have a PIN-code.)
The new legislation also affects credit card payments online, at least for us living in the EU/EES. If you need more info, ask your bank or google “RTS/SCA” to learn more.
“Blipping”
NFC symbol. If you see this, you can pay contact free.
Contact free payments using the card’s NFC (Near Field Communication) chip are becoming increasingly popular and here in Sweden the amount is set to SEK 200. If you blip (as we call it) your card to the card reader’s NFC symbol, you will not need a PIN-code. Simply blip and you’re done. Very convenient. Other countries may apply different sums, e.g. €20. Apple and Google Pay et al are still not very commonly used, as we have better local solutions.
What’s better? To pay in SEK or my home currency?
I’ve seen this myself abroad: the store or restaurant where I pay offers me to either pay in local currency or in my home currency. Based on my experience, I’ve always fared better to use local currency and let my bank handle the exchange. Why? When you pay in your own currency, the store’s/restaurant’s bank abroad will apply the exchange rate and it is usually worse than the exchange rate your own credit card company applies. This could be because they (locally) have to buy your currency while your card provider would sell the same, and it could also be that it’s just a way to line their pockets a bit extra. I suggest you ask your bank before you travel which would be more advisable.
Please remember: currencies tend to fluctuate, and as we’re heading into more unstable economic times, things change daily. Keep an eye on exchange rates while you travel to avoid any unnecessary surprises. This is true for stable “safe harbor” currencies like the CHF or USD as well as currencies from countries which are considered less safe, e.g. SEK or GBP, usually for political reasons.
If you have questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us. We would be happy to try and answer your specific questions.
Whenever I have the pleasure of taking guests to show them my city I wonder: will they be happy to see things from the outside or would they rather go inside? This might sound like a weird question to you, but allow me to explain. One of the most frequent things I do is walking tours. I pick up my guests at their hotel and we go for a walk where I show them the beauty of Gothenburg.
Would you like to go inside?
Would you like to go inside? Is it worth it? Is it even possible?
There are so many great things to see in a city, but when you have a limited amount of time, we tend to simply scratch the surface. We walk past some of the most amazing buildings but don’t go in. We point out “here’s this museum, and this is City Hall, and over there is where the local parliament resides, and it’s a beautiful building.” We never go inside which is a shame.
There are two main reasons why: a) most buildings aren’t open to visitors, which is a shame. Our local stock exchange is one of the most impressive places we have to show, but it’s only open once every blue moon at specific times, which never suits visitors from abroad. I can tell them that their president or prime minister had dinner here with our king, but I can’t show them.
The second reason is time. Even if the building were open, if you have four hours for a walking tour, there’s not time to spend one or two hours in just one building.
You need a reason to come back…
Prosecco on St. Mark’s Square and live music at night is one of the “musts” for me in Venice, no matter how many times I return.
This is my MO for every place I visit: I miss something important, simply because I’d like to come back. And on a second visit, I may not have to do the “usual” again, but I can dive deeper. I’ve been to Venice countless times since I was a child, and while I have my “have to’s”, e.g. to drink a glass of Prosecco on St. Mark’s Square after dark and listen to live music, these days, my visits to this amazing city allow me to visit places most first-time visitors don’t see.
As a tour guide here in Gothenburg, I kind of see it as my responsibility to water my guests’ mouths, to make them want to come back for more. It’s a delicate balance and I always make sure to learn about hteir interests ahead of time, to make sure they experience exactly what they want, whether it’s walking past a building or going in (if possible.)
Gothenburg is a heavenly destination for foodies. I’ve always known that. Well, maybe it hasn’t always been, but the chefs here in town have a thing or two for fish and seafood and in the past decade or so, plenty of amazing restaurants serve superb food.
I recently came across this article on National Geographic where they point out Gothenburg as a top destination in 2019 to visit if you love food. Who am I to argue with National Geographic?
They particularly point to “Salt & Sill”, a restaurant about 90 minutes north of Gothenburg on the small island of Klädesholmen. I was there just last week and can confirm that it’s still an amazing place. I reviewed it on my TripAdvisor account.
But that’s not the only great place in the region
There are so many more great places to eat, even in the city itself. Some I’ve written about in my DIY-guide which you can purchase right here on the site. But let me just mention one of my personal favorites. Expensive, but amazing food: Sjömagasinet.
I was there last week and the food is superb. Below’s what my dessert looked like. And it was as delicious as it looks. So come visit Gothenburg, from food trucks to the best experimental cuisine, we’ve got you covered!
Amazing strawberry dessert with Swedish “egg-cheese” (ask me for a recipe) and meringues.
This week, my dad is visiting us. I still remember the first time he came to see me here in Sweden. To show him my new home town is always an honor, and slightly scary. Will he approve? We’ve just spent two days on the West Coast, and he liked it, despite the cold and windy weather, something even the best guide isn’t able to influence.
Nobody’s as honest and critical as family
If you think that guiding your family is easier than clients? Think again. And to think you get any favors? No sir. Guiding family (and friends) is not a grateful job, but it provides great opportunities to learn and grow, not to mention test new things, try new restaurants (or make sure known ones are still up to par), etc.
A trip to the West Coast
Dad has been here many times over the years, and yesterday and today, I took him back to some of the places he’d been to before, although it’s been many years. He’d mostly forgotten and this time the weather was better.
We covered Marstrand yesterday, a small island city off the coast about 40′ drive north of Gothenburg, and today we drove even further, although we ended up just a good 15′ boat ride north of Marstrand, on the island of Tjörn and its outlying isles of Klädesholmen, Åstol, and Dyrön.
Good food and amazing nature to round off a successful day
Our first stop for today was Skärhamn, a coastal town on the island of Tjörn. It is famous for it’sarts museum, focusing on aquarelle paintings. But it also sports a beautiful harbor and a smiling church.
After a quick coffee (it was cold) we took the ferry from Rönnäng on a short trip around to Åstol (beautiful on a sunny, calm summer’s day), and Dyrön. Afterward, I drove us back to Klädesholmen for lunch at Salt & Sill. That little islet is famous for herring canneries and boy, their lunch is good. Six varieties of herring as an appetizer, followed by a fish burger with mashed potatoes and pees. Yummy!
Enjoy some pictures of today’s trip:
Åstol
The harbor of the island of Åstol
Marstrand, looking north
Typical street on Marstrand
Typical house on Marstrand (and the color, the light blue is indigenous to the West Coast)
The Fortress on Marstrand
Entrance to the fortress
Another view of the Fortress on Marstrand
Lunch with a view: Salt & Sill on Klädesholmen
Practical Information
To visit Marstrand from Gothenburg (incl. Carlsten fortress) you’ll need about five hours, two of which you’ll spend getting to and fro the city. In the summer, with a lot of tourist traffic, you may need to allocate more time as parking is scarce and you may need to walk longer from the parking lots to the ferry.
Tjörn and its islands are also a good hour and fifteen minutes away from Gothenburg, further north, but there’s more time on the freeway, so you cover more ground. Again, summer traffic will add time, particularly as you cross the bridge over to Tjörn. We’ve literally spent hours in queues. Parking is a thing, too and you may need to leave your car up to a kilometer or more from ferries, harbors, etc. The town roads are very narrow and you share the space with walking visitors and locals. Be mindful and patient. Five to six hours is recommended. If you visit Åstol or Dyrön, be mindful of the ferry timetable. Summertime (June-Aug) you might find an open café or restaurant, but off season, expect to eat on Tjörn or simply bring your own lunch.
What I can promise you though is the unexpected. Something you might not have thought about, or even considered with regards to my town. Yeah, I claim total bragging rights here, I know.
Let your soul dangle for a bit
When people think about Gothenburg, associations vary. Most people probably haven’t heard of our fair city, that we are home of the world’s largest truck manufacturing company, AB Volvo, or that we were once a sneeze away from becoming the capital of all Nordic countries. It’s a long story…
We are a great many things, and we have much to offer. I’m sure you’ll have seen that Gothenburg sits right on the ocean’s edge, on Sweden’s west coast. But did you also know that we are one of the greenest cities on the planet? There are parks, forests, and meadows surrounding the city and permeating it everywhere.
That greenery can also be found on our islands. On Styrsö, where I live, we have some twenty plus kilometers of official hiking trails along beaches, through our villages and the forest. You’d never know you’re on an island. Today, I was out walking and stopped to just listen to the birds singing. It’s a 360º view of what I say, just so I could capture the song. Don’t get dizzy. Close your eyes and let that soul of yours dangle for sixty-one seconds:
Yes, this video was taken on a small island just off the coast of Gothenburg, less than 300 meters from the nearest beach, but you’d never guess. This is one of the secret hikes on the island, known only to locals.
No matter what it is you expect to see in Gothenburg, expect the unexpected.
That’s a promise! Feel free to contact us today for a personal quote for your tour of our fair city. We’ll make sure to meet your expectations, and yeah, surpass those…
Having moved here decades ago, I was highly interested in this country and the region. I’ve helped visitors discover Gothenburg and the west coast ever since. I know a thing or two about the area. While my specialty is to guide people with very distinct tastes and the highest demands, I understand that there is a market for other types of tours, from walking tours of an hour or two to hop-on-hop-off tours, etc. All good. Hence the Gothenburg DIY guide.
“I’m a backpacker…” or “I just don’t need a tour guide”
Spring is in the air, and the sun is shining.
I hear you. I’m not unlike you. I love to discover places on my own. Not always, but sometimes. A couple of years ago, heading to Madeira, we contacted a local guide who’d put together a list of his fifty personal favorites. With that list, we were able to prepare for an amazing vacation, all by ourselves. Perfect for our family vacation.
Therefore, I figured, why not provide a list of my personal favorites as well? And not just include sights, but also include a couple of personal favorites when it comes to hotels, restaurants, cultural places, and even sporting arenas. And I’ve been to all of them, so I know what I’m getting you into… Although, with sports, there’s no guarantee your team will win!
100+ places, and it’s yours if you want it.
There are over one hundred places listed. This list is updated regularly. Some you’ll see in five or ten minutes, and others might take you weeks. Some are within the city, some are almost 200 km away. Still West Sweden. It’s a large county.
Some are expensive, some are dirt cheap, free even. I think there’s plenty for most people. And here’s how it works. Download the Gothenburg DIY guide to the left.
The Gothenburg DIY guide is free! A thank you email or a tip is appreciated if you find it useful.
Easy! Many people don’t want to sieve through a ton of information, read tourist guides, etc. Also, they want to be able to ask questions and learn more about each site. Sometimes I don’t know the answer, but I know where and how to find it, in a timely fashion, while the guest simply enjoys their stay, a view, or a snack.
Most of my guests will simply tell me about their interests, likes, and dislikes and they trust me to prepare a tour that will satisfy those expectations and hopefully exceed them. Preparing for every guest individually takes time, and that time needs to be paid for somehow, hence a higher cost than for an off-the-rack tour which requires no preparation, as it’s the same, every time.
I hope you’ll enjoy this guide. As always, if you have questions, don’t hesitate to reach out.
Last week, I had the privilege of guiding a group of VIP travelers for a couple of days. Distinguished individuals, well educated and widely traveled, they were asking for a tour guide to show them Gothenburg the way an official guide never could: 100% flexible, with the ability to hold a conversation not just about historical details of a particular building or a king’s birthday, but also talk about the big political trends, socio-economic trends and things happening elsewhere in the world. Today’s global travelers expect nothing less.
Being a great guide isn’t enough…
While I pride myself in my work and can see how pleased my guests are with the service and the attention they get, entirely customized on their needs, my services have limits. I require partners to work with. I’m no restaurant (and even if I were, I’d just be one), I’m no limo or bus, no museum and I’m certainly no yacht. To provide my guests with a seamless experience, I need help, and last week was exemplary.
Arranged by their hotel, Sweden’s finest, the Upper House, the guests also had access to a driver for their time here and on Saturday, we took a tour of my home turf, the archipelago, in a beautiful yacht.
The best partners are the ones you don’t notice…
Traditional boathouses on the island of Brännö.
For a guest, the best partners a guide can have are the ones that go unnoticed. To be a driver means to take the guest from A to B as comfortably and safely as possible. It was a delight to work with Gothia Transfer. Our driver was probably the best one I’ve ever experienced. As a guide, sitting in the front passenger seat of comfortable and perfectly clean luxury vehicle, with my neck turned back to my guests, I didn’t even notice how we were crossing town, or what way our driver took. Suddenly we were there. Perfect. And the communication between ourselves to make the experience for our clients as smooth as possible couldn’t have been better. Highly recommended and I hope to work with them again soon. I’ll most certainly recommend my clients to work with Gothia Transfer from now on.
The company we used on Saturday, the Sealife, is a truly magnificent vessel. Clean, in perfect shape and a skipper family completely dedicated to their guests. They take the best possible care of their clients and just like I had with Gothia Transfer, to work with Gothenburg Coast Charter was a pleasure and perfectly seamless. Our guests were really happy with their tour.
Restaurants, museums, etc.
Guests need to eat, they want to see museums, and nobody knows their collections better than the curators who created them. I was really pleased to see how the people I worked with were welcoming us and did their utmost to be flexible and help me make sure the clients were happy. In my own travel, I’ve had far too many experiences when you end up at the guide’s cousin’s husband’s restaurant, making me wonder if we ended up there because it was good or because the guide got a kick-back. My take is different (I have no cousins in Gothenburg…) I will only take my guests to a place I’ve been to myself, where I can vouch for the quality of the food and service.
When can I show you my town and introduce you to some amazing partners? Gothenburg is open and welcomes visitors…
Eiffel Towers, Taj Mahals or Grand Canyons are all great, but sometimes, a sign is all you need to get excited
I live on an island, off the coast of Gothenburg. Administratively, we are part of the political city of Gothenburg. Yet often enough, the city feels far, far away. I walk a lot (part of my health regimen) and my island, Styrsö, offers miles and miles of treks through the forest, along our beautiful beaches, and through our four neighborhoods.
Just yesterday I discovered that the organization who looks after our forest walkways put up a new sign, a small gem. I hadn’t seen it last week. It made me smile. I love focusing on small details like that.
7,000 years of history on a simple wooden plaque
Why not lift your gaze and take in a horizon? Who knows what light spectacle that might await you…
The sign stood below a meadow in the middle of the forest. The meadow is well-known on the island. Open-air festivals and concerts have taken place for a long time. What I didn’t know was that this was the oldest place where we’ve found traces of human habitation on the island. 7,000 years ago, people took boats out to Styrsö to fish (presumably) and they left behind flint.
What surprised me the most is that back then (not a very long time in the grand scheme of Earth’s history) the meadow was a beach. Where I stood, reading the plaque, my feet would’ve been lapped by gentle waves coming ashore. My imagination had been fired up.
Putting the consequences of global warming in a new perspective
This illustration by Jan Slavik from a small book* on the history of the island portrays how a typical scene may have appeared to a visitor.
When those first (that we know of) humans visited Styrsö, the sea levels were twenty meters above what they are now. That’s a whopping 65.6 ft. I recently read that if all of Greenland’s ice were to melt, global sea levels would rise by seven meters. But there’s not just the ice on Greenland, let’s not forget about Antarctica.
Our house is elevated some eight meters (26 ft) above sea level. By the end of this century, during my son’s lifetime, we might actually lose our house to rising sea levels. That’s a scary prospect. Yes, over time, and that includes the huge shifts in tectonic plates, sea levels have greatly varied, but the changes that we are experiencing now, are unprecedented in terms of speed. The main reason why our islands have emerged from the ocean isn’t due to sinking sea levels, but rising land (as Scandinavia had been pressed into the Earth’s mantle during the last ice age. It is still rising to this very day.) It took 3,000 years for sea levels to sink ten meters, it might take less than 300 for them to rise again… Details on a walk, but mind-boggling in the great scheme of things.
One small plaque had me thinking for hours…
As a tourist, I tend (like most) to focus on the big things that a new destination has to offer. Yet oddly, it is often the small discoveries that will excite you the most. A flower, a tree, a facade or why not a wooden plaque informing you about an unexpected detail of a place’s history, whisking you away to a distant past, igniting your imagination, almost like a great book.
A great tour guide will be able to show you these small places, these details in the shadow of the grand tourist attractions that beckon us from afar. By all means, enjoy the towers, the monuments, but don’t forget to spend some time hunting for the small details. They might prove to be more memorable in the long run.
