Bokenas, Sweden

Not a bad place for a web council meeting! It was sad saying goodbye to the council members - I've worked closely with them for close to three years and it's the last council meeting I will attend before we leave.

Trip to Gothenberg

Just got back from a two day planning session in Gothenberg. Weird planning for 2006 when I won't be here at Volvo. But it's good to have things all organised and in place for the guy who is taking over. Great seeing Caroline (as always!) and we had some good fun meals together as a group in the evenings. Here we are at Smaka which is one of my favourite restaurants in Sweden.



This is the lovely view from the office where we held our two day planning session. There was even a "pleasure room" next door with jacuzzi and all sorts of other delights - but no time to use it. Didn't get to enjoy the view the first day either - had a big storm move through and the window was belted with wind and rain.

Summer evening in Gothenberg

Spent a lovely evening in Gothenberg with some colleagues, including Caroline. Also Marriane, Eric and his lovely wife who I met for the first time. Dinner on a boat, enjoying the evening sun with lots of good laughs. Great company all round. It was great to see Caroline as always. I'm so, so going to miss her when we leave Europe.

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Where's my bag?

Gothenburg city airport is notorious for making you wait ages for your bag. And when you see their apparatus for transporting luggage from the plane to the airport, you're not suprised. No wonder too, that when it's snowing, your bags arrive sopping wet on the conveyer belt. I think they need to upgrade their technology! It might be quaint the first time, but not the 42nd.

Volvo Group Headquarters

Volvo Group is an enormous company that scans the globe so you might expect it's headquarters to be a towering skyscraper in a bustling city centre. Not so. It's an attractive rambling "mansion" on top of a hill in Gothenburg with courtyard garden in the middle (see photo above). Most of the offices look out onto gorgeous views. A nice environment to work in. Those concrete jungalists could learn a thing or two.

Volvo Headquarters - Gothenberg

Volvo flags against a sun rise - amazing cause it is was around 9 am!! I was in Gothenberg for a day. My last business trip of the year. I'm looking forward to a quiet Xmas, far away from airports and planes.

Stockholm

I spent a day and a night in Stockholm. I was there with Caroline to do a consulting workshop on a project I'm working on. A really nice city built on lakes with a hip, happening vibe. We had a Swedish Xmas lunch at a traditional restaurant in the old city. Like a huge buffet with everything from raw pickled herring (delicious actually) to cold meets and salads and hot dishes. You typically go up 5 or more times and totally stuff yourself. My kind of meal! My plane back to the UK was supposed to leave at 9 pm but was close to 3 hours delayed and we spent most of that time in the stuffy plane. Only got to bed at 2:30 am. Whoever said business travel is glamorous! The second photo shows one of Stockholm's most distinctive landmarks. I got a nice walk through the old city on the way to lunch.

Web Council meeting in Gothenberg

Went to a web council meeting in Gothenberg out in the country side and it was snowing. Really beautiful. That's Caroline you can see presenting. The venue was extremely posh and I got to enjoy one of the best meals of my life. It's a tough life here at Volvo!

Fun with Caroline in Gothenberg

Ally joined me later in the week so she could see Gothenberg. We then stayed the weekend with Caroline and Niklas which was lots of fun. One of our outings was Liseberg. Millions of Xmas lights in the trees makes Liseberg a very beautiful place. It also has an open air ice rink which is very romantic. I've wanted to bring Ally here for ages now, since I visted a year ago. Unfortunately it was pouring with rain so we didn't get to skate but it was beautiful nonetheless.

Pictutre of Ally and me in Gothenberg's botanical gardens

Went to visit some colleagues on Saturday night. It was Advent weekend which is a big event in Sweden so all very festive. Helen and Martin have a gorgeous little girl called Carla. You'll probably gather from these photos that she was the centre of attention!! The guy in photo with me is Carl, another friend from work, who is tremendous fun. He's also happens to be Carla's Godfather. It all made me miss Sammy very much.

On Sunday, we visited some local Islands via ferry. It was rainy but fun. Here is a nice pic of Ally in a fisherman's hat...

Gothenberg

Off to Gothenberg on Wednesay and Thursday. I was rather busy so no time for siteseeing, although I was here over 30 times last year so did't mind too much. I was upgraded in my hotel (they said it wsas beacause I am a preferred customer but I think they ran out of normal rooms...) to a palacial suite with three rooms and two TV's. Did't get too much time to enjoy it tho - just a place to crash.

I met up with some friends from work after a busy day in Gothenberg. THta's Caroline you can see in the doorway, looking smashing in the red coat against the blue door. Smaka is famous for it's Swedish meatballs and the food was great as always.

Trip to Gothenberg

The joys of Stansted

Stansted Airport at 5:15 pm on the way to Sweden… Whoever said business travel is glamorous!! The queues at airport security seem to take forever these days. I have a rigorous ritual of extracting from my pockets (item by item, before the amazed gaze of the security chap) my wallet, camera, PDA, mobile phone, iPod walkman, keys and coins. Anything to avoid being beeped and subjected to a thorough & intimate rub down by a burly guard. If only they'd hire pretty lady guards to do the patting down, I wouldn't mind so much.

Nice work if you can get it...

Our conference in Sweden was held at a stunning sea side resort. Here is the view from my room (full suite)- my job sure does have its perks!! I knew it would be nice just from looking at its web site before I went. It was a two day affair & we arrived early on Wednesday and left Thursday after lunch.

Cheating!
In the evenings, we did some fun events. Here we are on a Swedish invention called a "quiz hike" where you follow a map through the wilderness and have to answer fun trivia questions posted to trees. The team with the most correct answers won a prize. Not too difficult when you have a mobile phone and can call your other halves to look up the answers on the internet. We weren't the only team to do it!! It's amazing what Google can help with these days.

Sail away!
This is one of the photos I took on the "quiz hike" The sea was a beautiful colour and looked more like a lake, it was so calm. The Swedes love to sail and I'm not surprised with a beautiful and peaceful coastline like theirs to enjoy. I look forward to doing some ferry island hopping here in summer when I get some time at the tail end of a trip.

Meet Caroline!
Here's Caroline who organized the conference. We spent all of last year rolling out web sites across the world under immense pressures and became really good friends. She is from Sweden but spent last year in Cambridge on assignment. This year she has returned to Sweden so I don't get to see her much. She and her hubby are coming to stay with us in Cambridge for a long weekend in July so that should be fun.

The Lipstick Building
I returned to Gothenberg and spent the afternoon with our suppliers. They are situated in a rather extraordinary looking building which has been nicknamed "The Lipstick building" because that is what it looks like from a distance.

Lazing in the park

My plane back to UK only left at 9:30 pm so I went to relax in the park for a couple of hours after my meetings. I had a gigantic hamburger next to the lake then lazed on the grass. I'm starting to look forward to Prague. I've only got a half day tomorrow (although it's going to be frenetic) and then we're off for 4 days.

Zzzzz!

It's a tough life here in Gothenberg! I had to set my alarm to make sure I woke up and got the taxi to the airport on time.