1. Hurl oneself out of a high-rise apartment

This being Sweden, suicide is always top of mind. Our Air bnb apartment was on the 14th floor of a Soviet style tower block that smelled of drains. Its main feature, apart from the dust and dead plant, was that it had large, fully-opening windows – without any security bars. This gave us wonderful views of the city but also the chance to kill ourselves if we leaned over a bit too far. Needless to say, when taking in the gorgeous sunsets, Rosie had to hold my ankles.
 

  1. Join the Temperance Society

In Stockholm, as a foreigner, getting even a bit tiddly is a game for fools. On the terrace of an anonymous looking bar, we scanned the menu for affordable alcohol and ended up ordering the house red for the gargantuan sum of £14.50. Never before have I made a drink last so long (approximately two hours). Rosie suggested we could stretch it out with a bag of crisps – but they were £5.50. Sweden is definitely the place to go for the Go Sober October brigade.
 

  1. Talk politics with your Air bnb host

I had a strange feeling about our Air bnb host from the start. His profile photo showed a man in a motorbike helmet and dark glasses. What was he hiding? A strawberry birth mark? An extra ear? In the flesh, Alex had a lip ring and a nasty leaning towards the right, the Far Right. On the day we were leaving, he came to take his keys and, while stripping the sofa bed, launched into a tirade against foreigners, no doubt emboldened by the Sweden Democrats’ success in the previous day’s elections. He was of the opinion that Serbian immigrants were solely responsible for all his country’s killings while Kosovans did all the ‘rapings’. Before we left, I’d originally planned on giving him visitor ‘feedback’ – like suggesting he buy a new plant and water it, as well as invest in a pair of ‘curtains’ that were wider than 6″ so they actually met in the middle – but thought my top tips, coming from a foreigner, might go bad and result in us both being hurled out of the health and safety less window.
 

  1. Reject the ABBA museum

Everyone we knew who’d previously visited Stockholm, recommended we take in the ABBA museum but when we arrived at Djurgarden and saw that it was no bigger than a garage yet cost £25 to enter, we changed our minds. Instead, we sat outside on a bench next to the ABBA photo wall and ate a £7 cheese and lettuce cob while I regaled Rosie with all the fascinating facts I knew about ABBA, like the circumference of Agnetha’s legendary bottom, and the fact that Anni-Frid is not even bloody Swedish. Then we sang Chiquittita and took photos of each other with our heads in the ABBA photo wall.
 

  1. Swim naked in a lake

In the Time Out guide to Stockholm it suggested a sauna in the Hellensgarten, a nature reserve close to the city centre. It said nudity was compulsory in the sauna and that to cool off it was the Swedish way to jump into the nearby lake, also naked. We duly took a bus to the nature reserve, went into the sauna, stripped off and sat on a flannel in a small wooden box. At the point when the heat was singeing my nostril hair (about 10 minutes in), we decided to take the plunge, in the lake that we’d assumed would be right outside the sauna. It wasn’t. Red faced with panda eyes, bare feet and nothing but a towel around our lady parts, we stepped out onto a terrace full of middle-aged, fully-clothed Swedish men having a jolly. We nervously scanned the scene; the lake and its jetty seemed to be way over yonder by way of a cinder cycle path, a grassy knoll where people were picnicking, and a pine needle-strewn copse. We scurried off, gingerly picking our way through all the obstacles to reach the jetty which annoyingly, seemed to be the finishing line of a triathalon so was heaving with swimmers and their fully-clothed supporters. We murmured a few ‘excuse me’s’, threw down our towels and jumped into the icy water, screaming, as you do. We swam around for a bit until Rosie said her ‘lips’ were tingling and that she wanted to get out. Therein lay the rub. The jetty was way too high for us to lever ourselves out and there was no ladder. So, I directed Rosie to swim towards the rocky shore where  a young couple were playing with their children.  She swam over and, stark naked, climbed out onto the rocks, slipping over twice in the process. Then, careful to avoid eye contact, she circled the family, got back onto the cinder path, bounded over the grassy knoll and skipped through the pine needle-strewn copse to the jetty. She ran very, very quickly in a sort of hunchback stylie. It was only later, when I too had scrambled my way out of the lake onto the rocks – where Rosie was waiting with my towel – that we noticed the jetty that we should have headed for, the one with steps, only a short walk from the sauna! With our prudish English sensibilities, we imagined every one of those Swedish nature lovers was aghast by the sight of our wobbly pink flesh, dwindling bushes and coat peg nipples. Of course, in reality, no-one batted an eyelid. The Swedes eh – so modern!