Pildammsparken, the coldest day so far and the Chamber of Gross Secrets

Today (3-Jan) was the last day before I headed back to work, so I wanted to go out for a walk.  We'd seen Pildammsparken (Pildamm's Park) on the map a few times and it looked pretty impressive.  Plus it had a stack of sculptures for our Bingo game.  Perfect.

When we left the house it was -3 degrees C, and through the day it hovered between -3 and -5 degrees, our coldest day since we have been here and the coldest temperature we've even been in (excluding quick trips into industrial fridges or freezers).  We made sure the kids rugged up and then we headed out.

The previous night I'd ducked out the catch the new Star Wars movie and it was freezing waiting for the bus home at midnight.

Evidence of how cold it was - yes they are icicles on the sculpture...

So, after everyone had gloves, beanies, snow jackets, snow pants, warm pants, jumpers and snow boots on, we headed out to brave the temperature.

We had a 5 minute walk from the bus stop to Pildammsparken so we caught a few sculptures along the way - see the Bingo post for the photos (I'll just include a few ones in this post.)

This one was called "Uppnått Mål" (Achieved Target).  Tomas asked why he looked scared and Alana said it was because he had a pole up his bum

This one was in the  next row of houses called Kota (Vertebra).  So you have the choice to have a piece of spine sculpture or a guy with a pole up his bum outside your house.

After chasing around finding the sculptures around the edge of the park, we headed into Pildammsparken.

Looking into Pildammsparken from the East

The first area we found looked like a play area - there was a wooden cabin and some wooden play areas:

The play area

The idea that it was a play area was proven by the fact that Kris and the kids found a stack of frozen lego, gloves and socks.  While Kris peeled up the frozen clothes (they were frozen stiff) to place them outside the cabin in case their owners returned, Cam, Tom and Alana gathered up as much of the lego as they could.

And another glove..

Cam found the wooden play area

Welcome to Kristine's frozen clothing emporium

While Kris was chiseling socks out of the leaves and Cam was crawling through the wood, Alana and Tom found a frozen puddle in a tree stump.  They started dancing on it and then decided to try to break it with a stick. Only when you have kids do you get to hear someone say "Guys, stop trying to break the puddle."

The puddle

Close up of the puddle

We then found Jimmis, a play sculpture that lights up at night.  The kids had fun climbing on them and more so when they realised that someone had drawn faces and mustaches on them.

Jimmis

Next sculpture we found was Ekotemplet, which the kids said looked like the Chamber of Secrets inside - but then again the kids say that anything that has a round well in it looks like the Chamber of Secrets:

Ekotemplet with the Chamber of Secrets well inside

Unfortunately when they looked inside, the well didn't contain a path to Hogwarts, instead it contained a Chamber of Gross Secrets:

Frozen Chamber of Gross Secrets (this is all frozen in ice)

Then they found a second Chamber of Secrets:

Another Chamber of Secrets - this was just filled with frozen leaves.

I then led us into the next area to find more sculptures but ended up heading in the wrong direction.  We were never 'lost', we just needed to use Google Maps to get back on the right path.  However we did stumble across Swedebank Stadion (stadium)

Swedebank Stadion

Swedebank Stadion

After Kris managed to get us back on the right track we found the Pildammsparken amphitheater.  The kids had great fun rolling down the hill, but Tomas wasn't happy when he found that we were walking around the top - "Well me rolling down was a waste of time!"

Pildammsparken Amphitheater

The first part of Pildammsparken was a big oval  surrounded by trees, but this was the more formal part of the garden, containing Crown Princess Margareta and Queen Silvia's gardens.

Looking down from the edge of the Amphitheater into the gardens

Kris at the top of the gardens

Kronprincessan Margaretas Blomstergara (Crown Princess Margareta's Flower Garden) was a little bare in the winter

But this sign shows how it should look - it's colour banded like a rainbow, the coloured strips represent the colours of the plants planted in the two sides of the garden.

Drottning Silvias Rosenträdgård (Queen Silvia's Rose Garden) was also a little bare, but Kris liked the way they place conifers around the base of the roses to protect them from the cold

Drottning Silvias Rosenträdgård

Walking into Drottning Silvias Rosenträdgård

The fountain at the center of the garden

The next garden was the Barnens Trädgård (Children's Garden).  The concept appeared to be that an adult could sit in the middle and the kids in the areas around.  It looks like they could garden or read stories etc.  Again the play areas will filled with conifers to protect them.

Barnens Trädgård

Barnens Trädgård

Next we came across another of Pildammsparken's lakes.  This was filled with seagulls, petrels and other birds that were being fed as we came past.

Angry birds?

We also found a tree that something had hollowed out:

The hollowed tree

The lake was starting to ice up nicely:

Icing on the lake

The next sculpture was a play fountain.  the water starts at the top of the concrete part and flows down the two sides.  There are gates that kids can open to allow the water down.  Once it gets to the bottom it flows through the back, down the stones and is pumped back to the top

The play fountain

Next we came across Galtheas Hage:

This translates to "Galtheas Hage is a beautiful place for quiet rest and reflection.  We therefore ask that you not to play sports, party, BBQ or otherwise interfere with the serenity.  Enjoy the tranquility and thank you for respecting this."  The sign was correct, the Hage was a nice place, but the number of firework casings littered around under the sign, showed that not everyone respected it.

Galthea -  There was a strange looking young man taking shy photos of this one. Then I realised that I may have looked the same..

The lake by Galthea Hage was started to ice fairly impressively.  The kids didn't believe Kris that it was ice until they saw seagulls walking across the surface:

Frozen lake at Galthea's Hage

Our final stop in the park was a play area.  Sweden definitely goes out of its way to make the play areas impressive:

The play area

Can you spot Cameron?

King and Queen of the castle

Alana winning the mouse vs rabbit race

There was a play sculpture I wanted to get a photo of, but there was always another family playing on it, and I didn't want to be the creepy guy that hung around at the playground taking pictures of other peoples kids.  Instead I became the creepy guy that hung around uncomfortably waiting for them to move on.

The play sculpture (finally empty) - Le Fruit Rouge (the red fruit).  The left side is a set of steps where the child can climb to the top and then side back down under the top of it.

While we waited, I silently pointed out a gong and set of musical pipes to Kristine.  "Good thing our kids haven't found those yet..."

They found it... and most of the neighbouring towns would have known that too

Hat shaped cubby houses

Cam in a drum set

The kids theater - each set piece slides on a rail so the kids can move the train etc.  There's also seats for the audience.

After finishing at the park we ducked to the shops to have lunch and buy a few things.  On the way back, we got evidence of how cold it was:

Another frozen fountain

Really frozen

The rest of the evening was spent getting warm and getting blood flow back into the ears and fingers.

Map of our walk - it ended up being about 7km not including walking around the shops or back to the bus (it starts when we got off the bus (green spot) and ends when we got to the shops (red spot)).  The loop at the bottom was me getting us lost - we has intended to walk from the 'Pildammsparken' text to the east, but instead did a big loop before we got back where we wanted to be.  The little zig-zags are us searching for sculptures or chasing a run away child:

Our walk