Bjärnum

The Contreras's and I hopped on a regional bus just before noon and headed north to Bjärnum to meet with Frank Hilgers, who had invited us into his home for lunch and a trip to a local regional museum.

Of course I had met Frank earlier at practice, but this was the first time I had met his wife, Thérése, and his two daughters Sara and Anna.  Shortly after arriving we were greeted with a beautiful smörgåstårta (sandwich cake).  Smörgåstårta is a traditional Swedish meal, and this particular had tuna salad filling and was topped with shrimp, smoked salmon, cucumbers, tomatoes, and lemon.

Rich and filling.  After lunch, we headed out to the Bjärnum Museum of Regional History.  To get there, we took a shortcut through some very peaceful woods.

Suddenly, we stumbled upon a glorious sight...

Classic cars!  We lucked out and were visiting the museum while it was hosting a display of classic and antique cars, motorcycles, and even a few industrial machines.  The group toured an old schoolhouse first:

The schoolhouse also had the teacher's quarters, accessible in the back right of the above picture, that had artifacts that would be found there.  After the schoolhouse I couldn't stay with the group and had to look at the cars.

I took a lot of pictures of the cars.  There was certainly a European majority, but lots of makes were represented, including Volvo, Saab, Opel, Jaguar, Ford, Chevrolet, Fiat, and a few others.  After looking at the cars I rejoined the group to continue looking at the artifacts from the region.  The museum consisted of multiple buildings and had a surprisingly large and varied inventory.

After a few hours at the museum, we walked back to the Hilgers household for the promised fika.  It was a very pleasant and delicious afternoon in Bjärnum.