Viking Runes

[curtiejoe]

While touring Sweden between Stockholm and Uppsala, we saw several 1000-year old rune stones set into the ground near the roadway or close to major waterways. All were carved with ancient Viking messages in their characteristic runic script. Luckily one of our party was Hans-Georg,a Swedish professor, able to decipher the strange-looking writings. Through him, a whole new world of excitement and adventure was revealed as we learned of long-ago and often far-away (e.g. England, France, Iceland, Russia and even exotic Miklagard/Constantinople) heroic deeds and happenings set in stone by the Vikings on their return to the Scandinavian homeland. These amazing and unique relics brought the intrepic explorer warriors' exploits to life again. The greatest concentration of these fabulous runes is in and around the town of Taby in the Community of Vallentuna, north-east of Stockholm. Here there are still hundreds of the relics scattered about the landscape. We ended our outing at the Viking Museum in Uppsala, where a more detailed and academic account of the intrepid Vikings and their runes is presented. Anyone with an interest in history and the Vikings would surely be enthralled by the experience.

[lhbrown]

Hi curtiejoe, Sounds like you had a great adventure on your Sweden trip. Was this an Elder Hostel trip?

[curtiejoe]

Hi L. Brown:

Not an Elder Hostel trip, just knocking around Northern Europe on my own thanx to the cheap connections by Ryan Air. Flew north on a whim from Paris and joined up with some swedish environmental studies colleagues I'd met a few years earlier at a convention held in Karlskrona in Southern Sweden. Encountering the runes by the roadside was a fantastic experience for me, as I've long been keenly interested in the Viking Age and their voyages of plunder, exploration, trade and colonization. Am longing to go back there, as well as to well-known Viking sites in Denmark, Norway, England, ireland,Iceland and Greenland.

curtiejoe

[lhbrown]

Hi curtiejoe,
Thanks for your reply. Sounds like you have quite an interest there. This is certainly not a run of the mill subject. Have fun exploring now that you are retired.

[daldoc]

Hi



Have you been taking trips with Elderhostel. we have gotten the brocheres or magazine and am thinking about doing a few when we retire in a couple of years. Just looking for some feedback on whether worthwhile.



Debbie

[lhbrown]

Hi Debbie,
Yes these trips a very worthwhile. They have biking trips in Tuscany, Britain, France, etc. if you like active trips. Also our friends took their grand children to Sweden to the Viking Museum there and they had a wonderful time. Elder Hostels really offer a great value and a variety of activities. And the participants usually are interested in the same subjects or activities.