Karl New York City, United States of America.

Well, what a week. My first week back since Australia and I feel like it’s a whole new city. The weather has been hovering around 17ºc – 20ºc during the days and just below 10ºc at night, perfect.

I sit here in my kitchen, with a bottle of French riesling to help me reflect on the week and weekend just gone, and I must say that Stockholm is a place to visit when the sun is out. The trees have leafs, the rivers are flowing with boats & kiyaks, the parks are full of people and and the city is alive! The long dark winter is finally paying off, and everybody is making the most of it, including me.

Saturday I woke up early and took a walk through Östermalm in an attempt to get into some spring gear. I spent a fair amount of my time though taking photos of the beautiful cherry blossoms that line Kungsträgåden (King’s Garden). I will be uploading the rest of the blossom shots this week. It was really nice to be out taking photos again, headphones on (DJ Krush only with spiritual enlightenment thanks to DJ Krush – Zen). I sat and watched the people for a good while and realised that Spring has definitely landed.

Last night I caught up with NYC legend and fellow Fi employee Priscilla (Lil’ Pri, Ludapris, The Mexican) at Mosebacke, which lead us on to pizza and then a crazy apartment party, which while didn’t go late into the night (we packed it in at 1am), still managed to attract the attention of the Stockholm Polis who claimed they could hear us from 5 floors down on the street. We weren’t playing music loud, but because it’s spring, we have our windows open, and the sound echos across the area like nothing else. Oh well… they were cool with it.

As in my previous post, I woke up with an itch to get on the bike. After making a cracking breakfast with Canadian housemate Liam and Italian housemate Matteo, I jumped on the saddle and belted out 45kms. I decided to head south as far as I could go. I am so happy that Stockholm has such awesome bike paths. They’re wide, well directed and so smooth. It was like riding on a skating rink for 4 hours. I rode hard and fast for what felt like forever, there were a few moments when I realised I had been day dreaming and had to snap back to reality. It was that good.

I got as far as Skogår, which is about 20 km’s south of Stockholm. I know this because I managed to jack some unsecured wifi connection and Twittered about it. It was amazing. A rich area I would suspect, with houses raised high on cliffs overlooking peaceful lakes and amazing forests. It doesn’t take long out of Stockholm before you’re immersed in nature. The best way to see it is obviously on a fixed gear bike.

I arrived home exhausted and made up a nice plate of cheese and meat and am currently finishing off that bottle of riesling, almost topping off the perfect weekend, apart from the obvious.

I’m back to no drinking this week, and also running hopefully 4 of the 5 nights. I bought a great running jacket, and now that it’s warming up, the sun is out longer so I can run longer and avoid getting the flu.

Until next time… hej dåg!

Today was another beautiful day in Stockholm, so having an empty diary I decided it was time me and the bike got reaquainted. I smashed 45kms by simply following a bike path to who knows where. I ended up in Skogås, which is on the water, simply beautiful. It was like a little paradise away from Stockholm. Lots-a money out there, me thinks!

Knackered!

こんにちは!

Hello! I’ve made it safe and sound to Tokyo. A long flight, however the free sake put me right to sleep. I flew JAL which now comes highly recommended. Such a great airline, lovely staff, good entertainment, comfy seats, etc. It was a fairly empty flight so I had a whole row to myself. Ace. I highly recommend the bird view camera. Top and front view from the plane of the outside world. Awesome.

I met a nice couple, attempted to brush off my Japanese to complete failure, but they were nice enough to try with me.

I’ve spent the day riding around Tokyo, and I have to say this is an awesome place to ride. Flat, fast, the traffic and pedestrians gives way to you, and the temperature is cool and calm. We took a spin around Yoyogi Park (pictured above), to Harajuku (via Supreme), then to Daikanyama, to Shibuya (via Ganso Sushi) then back to Hatagaya. Probably around 30kms all up. Looking forward to riding again tomorrow.

Tonight I’m going to the launch of Sonpub’s new album where my friend and host Shannon is VJ’ing. I’ve been told to dig in for a late one.

The dollar is pretty shit. It was 57 yen to the dollar today, which means my money is halved when I withdraw, but I’m doing fine on cheap booze and 95yen sushi.

More updates to come, I’m going back to my beer.

Missing you all.
xo

Yes, the No Comply Festival is about to unleash it’s fury across Melbourne & Sydney, and to celebrate, NiceProduce.com has worked with some of the biggest influences in street wear to produce a limited edition range of T’s.

NiceProduce got in touch with legendary skateboard influence and photographer Steve “Stevie G” Gourlay to develop this classic box look.

Definitely something I’m proud of. Nice work, Alex.

The new Visvim Fall/Winter line is slowly dropping in Japan.

I’m a big fan of the E-Cat Messenger series. I currently use a Spring/Summer 08 30L bag to help me get from A to B and it’s perfect. Has been known to carry 6 packs, bottles of wine, a Nintendo Wii + extra controllers, loads of NiceProduce and more. The 18L will be better for my daily commute, but the 30 seems to do fine for those unexpected days of carrying booze.

I just wish the dollar was still strong against the yen seeing as I’ll be at FIL / Visvim in about 4 weeks from now.

I wonder what else I can sell.