Junibacken on Djurgarden (Stockholm area) Sweden

Stockholm, Sweden (Sverige) is a beautiful and amazing place.  And although we'd visited many other destinations, I'd never seen any place quite like it.  I loved the entire country (we drove it and experienced many beautiful and interesting things), and found it one of the most kid-friendly/family-friendly countries in all of Europe and Scandinavia.  The prices are more reasonable and kids are a welcome and expected addition.  That said, today I want to limit my comments to one of our favorite Stockholm activities:  Junibacken.

Junibacken is the Swedish name for the Pippi Longstocking and Astrid Lindgren Museum for children.  Because the city of Stockholm is actually a collection of lush islands (called an archipelago), everywhere you look you will see water.  Junibacken is located on the island called Djurgarden.  Getting here by car or boat is easy from the downtown area (the metro doesn't have a line here), but once on the island we found it a little hard to find Junibacken.  According to their directions (see http://www.junibacken.se/english ) it's next to the Vasa (or Wasa) Museum.  "Next door" actually means across a very big grassy area (muddy when we went) to the northwest of Vasa Museum on the northwestern corner of the island.  If in a car, take the Galarvarvsvagen street east off the main road (Djurgarden) and park in the car park at the end of the road.  Instead of following the crowd to the south or east, walk west following the trail and you'll see a smallish yellow building with a green roof set next to the water.  Inside is the separate little world of Junibacken.

 With many miniature buildings, a giant model horse and explorable Pippi house, art activities, exhibits and a little indoor train-ride depicting the many characters from Astrid Lingren's books, what we thought would take two hours lasted all day.  The kids cooked up some pretend dinners, visited each other at the different houses in the "town" and scurried over the woodland models with kid-sized hidy-holes and slides.  They loved running wild in Pippi's house and relaxed for a minute with coloring and blocks.  Pippi appeared and acted out a portion of her story and, although told entirely in Swedish, my kids enjoyed it immensely.  It helped that we'd been reading The Adventures of Pippi Longstocking and they were already familiar with the story.  A small area dedicated to Astrid gave me lots to read and the kids items to look at as we lined up for the train ride.  Having not read any of Lindgren's other works, I was surprised by the scariness of some of her stories.  My littler ones had to cover their eyes during parts of the train ride, but my oldest really enjoyed it and wanted to read all her books then.  Afterward they had more opportunity to do creative free play in life-sized sets and we spent way too much time and money in the gift shop.  A day well spent.


Notes:  There is a restaurant and bathrooms.  A coat check and lockers keep your things safe so you have hands to play.  There are at least two floors and I felt that strollers were an encumbrance here, especially on the train ride and stairs, but big wheeled-strollers would be helpful walking through the outdoor paths if your kids are very little.  Although there were teenagers here, this is mostly a place that kids ages 2-9 or 10 would enjoy.  The opportunities for imaginative play and exploration are a refreshing break for the weary traveler and I highly recommend it.