Tag 19*24.07.2023

I woke up.... It was raining... It was 6 o'clock... Okay, if it's raining, I can turn around again... Everyone else was still asleep... Woke up again at 7 o'clock, it was raining... Thoughts started to spin... How do we pack the stuff? Looked at my phone, weather app... Oh no, rain until 11 o'clock... And quite a lot... Then I took a look out of the tent... Water... Water all around the car... Swampy, a huge puddle... Other campers walked past our tent with soaking wet mattresses and sleeping bags... Well, what to do now... Another look at my phone... Oh, a gap in the rain... From 9 to 9:45 o'clock... Everyone was motivated to pack everything during that time and then have breakfast elsewhere (maybe McDonald's 😉)... We packed barefoot... there was only water all around anyway and no shoe would have stayed dry... The trunk was packed... We left the tents out to dry a little longer, there was a breeze that could help... But then... Without warning, it started to rain heavily again at 9:20 o'clock... and quite a lot... Steve crawled into the tent, we girls hopped into the car... checked my phone again... Rain, heavy rain until 10:30 o'clock... Okay, let's wait... Read, crochet, doze off... Look at my phone, rain until 11 o'clock...

But then it got less, it just drizzled, turned into drizzle... Everyone got out, packed up and then we could leave our spot and the campsite at 11:40 o'clock... We hadn't even driven 500m when it started raining again...

The destination was the hypermarket Gekas in Ullared... Seen it on Galileo and read about it online... Apparently you have to see it if you've been to Sweden... Well, I've read a lot, big, crowded, huge parking lot, etc. But what awaited us exceeded my imagination by far 🙈 We were completely overwhelmed at first, and Steve was just hungry, there wasn't even a coffee yet and it was already 13:45 o'clock... Finding a parking space was already difficult...

Gekås Ullared AB is a department store in Ullared, Sweden, and the largest supermarket in the world. The company was founded in 1963 by Göran Karlsson as "Ge-Kås Manufaktur". The department store had a total of 4.6 million customers in 2011 (2016, 4.8 million), who bought goods for 4.2 billion SEK. It has an area of 35,000 m², ⁷ 6,700 shopping carts, and 82 cash registers. The department store can be visited by 5,500 customers at the same time. On July 30, 2013, a record number of visitors was reached with 27,500 customers. On November 9, 2019, a turnover record of 41.7 million kronor was achieved.

The hypermarket is complemented by a holiday village, a campsite, and a hotel (115 rooms).

We dived into the hustle and bustle, Steve wanted to stay outside and look for something to eat and look after Ella... And we, yes we entered the store and just stood still and stared... Madness 🥴🥺🧐 so many people, so many items in partially huge packagings... After an hour of marveling, searching, walking around, etc. we were exhausted... Haven't even seen half yet... Just wanted to get out 🙈 We did have a few items in our basket, because some things were at good prices... so we queued up at one of the 82 cash registers 🙈 and it took 17 minutes until it was our turn... Conclusion: You have to see it once, but I wouldn't do it again 🙈

Then we continued to our last stop of our trip before slipping into our beds at home... The place I chose was near Ljungby and is located on Lake Bolmen, the 10th largest lake in Sweden... Bolmens Camping... And it's a place we'll definitely remember if we ever find ourselves in Scandinavia again... The sanitary facilities are a bit old-fashioned, but everything else around it is just great... 👍 A great ending 😌

https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gek%C3%A5s

https://www.gekas.se/

 https://youtu.be/H71f-YcdToE