Thursday: Our First Real Day on Gotland

On Thursday morning, I woke up pretty late. Well- actually I don't really have any idea what time it was. But I know I was completely knocked out until Mom called my room and told me to wake up and come to breakfast. So I got up and got dressed and went down and ate with everyone.
There were all these weird things at the breakfast buffet; pickled herring, these funny crackers and cheese and crunchy breadstick things; then there were all the normal things like oatmeal and corn flakes and fruit and toast. I got corn flakes and these orange slices and apple juice. It was pretty good. This guy saw Spencer's BYU shirt and he came up and said "Is that a BYU shirt I see?" and told us he and his wife were from Orem. It was pretty cool and kind of comforting to see an American; everyone is Swedish her and we all feel a little lost.
After breakfast I went back to my room and showered and got ready and then Melissa came and told me that Alec and his family were here and that they were talking in the lobby with Dad. So I went down after a little and blogged for a while. Alec decided to go get some breakfast (or brunch, since it was elevenish) at this little restaurant close by.
It was modern, but it also looked sort of quaint like everything else around. Everything was white, the chairs and all, but the gate was this old iron one and we ate outside, so we could see the roses and flowers growing all over everything. There was a pretty fountain with some kind of cherub in the middle; really pretty. Some of us ordered mango sorbet, mostly for something to do; that was delicious and had all this fruit on it, blueberries, strawberries, lingonberries(I think?), and this other berry that's orange and I don't know what it is.
Once we left the restaurant, Dad and Alec decided to go play tennis, so we thought we'd go GeoCaching while they were gone. Alec has this office literally right next to the hotel, so we stayed in there and looked up geocaches for a while. Then we walked to this part of the wall on the edge of the city (which is called Visby, by the way- it's the city on Gotland) It took us a while to find the cache, because there were so many deceiving cracks in the wall where it could have been hidden, but we finally found the right spot and logged in on the cache. Then we decided to search for another cache, even though we weren't sure if we would be back on time; then again, we figured Dad and Alec would be late back too). Ha ha.
We found the cache; it was at this mass grave where they buried a bunch of farmer soldiers after a battle a long time ago; very historic. It was pretty cool. After that, we walked back to the office, where I blogged for a while, and Mom and Melissa had to go back and get Melissa's backpack.
When Alec and Dad got back, we walked around for a while and looked at this bike rental place where we could rent for a week, but we decided to wait until later to rent. Then we walked up this hill and walked around by the city wall while Alec told us all this interesting stuff about Gotland. We visited Alec's friend, Mary, who was this old woman who lived in one of these cute dollhouses that everyone in Visby has. She was really nice. We sat in her garden and talked for a while.
After that we all piled into two cars with Alec (a five seater and a two seater) and went grocery shopping for dinner. We bought a bunch of food, and then Alec drove us to a cabin that he found for us with one of Mary's friends. It's about forty-five minutes away from Visby, in a part of Gotland that reminds us of Southern Utah. It's very pretty. One thing I have to tell you that is very important about Gotland is how amazingly gorgeous it is. Roses and poppies and these beautiful lavender blue colored flowers like lupines grow wild all over the place, in fields and forest. Almost everything is at least two hundred years old, so it all looks very historical and adorably picturesque.
Once we got to the cabin, we looked around and the family that is renting it to us helped us out and showed us around a little. We cooked dinner, which was spaghetti with pesto sauce and these long baguettes, with these little chocolate cookies for dessert. Later we went to sleep, and I read Jane Eyre for a while before I knocked out.