At the big town square in the Swedish town Västerås, right in front of the City Hotel “Stadshotellet”, there is a sculpture of workers on bicycles on their way to work. It’s also a great hint of how this town should be explored best by the tourists.

The sculpture was created by the artist B G Broström and called ASEA-strömmen, symbolizing workers on their way to work in the 30-50’s at the big Swedish Electricity company ASEA (later ABB), which was founded in Västerås as early as 1883.

I loved to take a closer look at two of the sculptured workers, they looked so authentic, especially with the snow.

This sculpture is a reminder of a time when many Swedes did go to work by bicycle instead of buses or cars, but it also reminds us of all kind of travel by bicycle.

Västerås - as many other Swedish cities - has excellent bicycle roads, so next time you’re in town - or another town: why not take a bicycle sightseeing tour? More and more cities starting to offer rental or even free bicycles everywhere.

We’ll definitely keep this in mind - unless it’s raining… then we’ll rent a boat! *giggles*

Lifecruiser ♥ Bicycles
 

Earlier post about this town:

Swedish Roadtrip: Vasteras Gherkin Town
 

Lifecruisers reasons for doing a roadtrip sometimes are a bit unsual, this time to the Swedish Gherkin town about 100 kilometer from the capital Stockholm - to buy a vacuum cleaner - not gherkins…

It simply were the only nearby place that had the special supermodel we wanted, so off we went to the Swedish town of Västerås.

It was a bit late on the day so we had some kind of race against the time, since we wanted to take some photos in Västerås before the sun went down, which it does very early in the afternoon at that time of the year.

Västerås Old Town

Västerås is one of Sweden’s oldest towns, which tracks back to the end of 13th century, but even the vikings were there before that. There are still some old buildings left in the town, even though many of them are gone.

Known for gherkins

For us Swedes nowadays though, Västerås is mostly known because a special kind of midget gherkin (Cucumis sativus) or cucumber, were grown here from the 18th century and forward. It was a German gardener, Bernhard Johan Bohnsack that started it. The gherkin was sold all over Sweden and even to parts of Europe and is mostly used to be pickled.

That’s also how the town got it’s Swedish nickname Gurksta’n (The Gherkin town).

Västerås Castle

Västerås Castle is where the famous Swedish King Gustav Vasa held the reformation parliament in the year of 1527, that made Sweden switch from Catholicism to Protestant.

The Starred Cathedral

Västerås has a beautiful old Cathedral dated back to the 13th century that is worth a visit, you can see it in the end of the street picture below.

It’s very beautifully situated with the creek floating by below. The Cathedral has got 3 stars in Guide Michelin.

Inside there is another Swedish King buried: Erik XIV (dead by arsenic poisoning!). It’s said that because the sarchophagus were too short they had to chop off his feet & put them aside his body…!!!

His current sarchophagus is made of black Carrera marble from Italy.

The Black Creek recreation area

It might be hard to believe when seeing these winter scenes, but it’s very popular during the summer, when the area around the creek, Svartån, is filled with strolling people, choosing between different cafés and restaurants.

Boat life around lake Mälaren

Right outside the town is the lake Mälaren with hundreds of islands in the archipelago and there is a very active boat life in the summertime - as everywhere around Mälaren or the Baltic Sea.

Shopping: H&M’s hometown

There are some shopping that can be done here, the Swedish company H&M was even founded in Västerås. Some specialist boutiques & large shopping arcades, even though we did not have time for it.

Photo slideshow of Västerås

It were getting darker, we had to rush our photo session there, but still, it will give you a pretty good picture of how this Swedish town looks like.

Slideshow with all the photos from Västerås town:

Unusual treehouse hotel

Thinking of going there? Where to stay? Our tip is: the unusual Hotel Woodpecker in the old oak tree!

Roadtrip mission completed

Did we get our wanted vacuum cleaner? Yes! And we’re very happy with it, because it’s quite the opposite from our old one that just did blow around the dust: it’s actually working!

Very efficiently, we have to watch out or we’ll be sucked up too! *giggles*

Lifecruiser ♥ Swedish Roadtrips
 

There is some very creative hotels even in Sweden and we did a roadtrip to one of them a couple of weeks ago: Hotell Hackspett or in English Hotel Woodpecker, about 40 feet up in an old oak tree in one of the parks in Västerås.

This is a very traditional Swedish red cottage, just placed a bit unusual. It was built in 1998 and renovated in 2006. No damage to the tree was done when they built this cottage, no nails - it’s carried up by very powerful steel wires.

CHEAP HOTELS IN VASTERAS AND SWEDEN

Mikael Genberg is the Swedish artist that came up with this unusual and fun project and this is not the only place he want to place a red cottage - he also want to place one at the moon before 2011, thus creating quite an interesting challenge for the Swedish Space Corporation!

I’m not so sure that I could manage to book the Woodpecker treehouse hotel suite for the night, not that I wouldn’t dare to sleep there, but because how on earth would I get up there in the first place? I’m afraid of heights and it’s only accessible by a (wobbly?) rope ladder!

No, but I like the use of the rope ladder for something else though: to get up the yummy meals!!!

In this photo you can see how the ropes goes up in a hole at the floor at the treehouse, but I saw no harness - which I think they use to get you up there, you don’t have to climb thankfully.

… and yes, it does has both a kitchen and a toilet up there too, so you don’t have to worry about getting down the rope ladder in a hurry! *giggles*

Personally, I think they have a rather expensive room rate: 1100 SEK (146 Dollar / 108 Euro) per person and night without any meals, 1250 SEK with breakfast, 1500 SEK per person and night with breakfast and dinner.

One could think that you really could get some peace and quiet alone up there, but I wonder how it is with all the people passing by in the park? Would it be like to be on stage?!

Tempted to give it a try? The treehouse can be booked by Västerås Tourist office (+46 21 39 01 00).

It can only be booked between 1 April - 31 October since it got no electricity or heat (other from yourself!), but I recommend June-August since nights can be very chilly!

…and sometimes very windy too, but that might just do the trick to get you to sleep…

Lifecruiser ♥ Unusual Hotels