As I wrote last night, the worst part of staying in the hostel was the partying that occurred in the main kitchen area. Now granted my room was right next to the kitchen and I may not have been able to sleep due to jetlag (or worse I did not want to miss my 6:10 am train), but still the noise was insane. Plus, the hostel’s official policy is and I quote from their website:

Is it true that we can’t drink alcohol at City Backpackers?
“Well, we don’t want to be the big ol’ party poopers but our main trade is sleep after all! So the number one rule at City Backpackers is: Don’t spoil the stay of your fellow travellers. It is totally okay to have a glass of wine or a beer with your meal, but we can’t allow heavy drinking and loud partying at the hostel. In Stockholm you’ll find many bars and clubs that are much better suited for that.”

However, the entire night was full of people partying and staying up until I finally started to get ready at 5 am!!

I arrived at the train station at 5:40 am for my 6:10 am train. I bought myself a coffee and Danish and waited for my train. The best part about taking the train in Sweden is the snow that is on the ground for the entire ride. That’s an experience I have never had. The train stopped in Herrljunga at 8:35 am and I had a 40 minute wait before catching the 9:16 am train to Borås. The second train arrived in Boras at 9:54 am.

Since Borås did not have any hostels (that I knew of) I booked a room at the Best Western Hotell Borås for 595 Kronas. I was still debating whether to stay two nights in Borås or just one. But that decision depended on whether tickets were available at the box office. I tried to buy tickets from Ticnet.se but Friday’s matches were sold out.

Beg, Borrow and Deal
After checking into the hotel, I walked directly to Borås Hallen which only took about 15 minutes. When I arrived at the box office they told me tickets were available for Friday’s matches and that tickets would go on sale in 20 minutes. So, I waited and bought one ticket to both Friday’s and Saturday’s matches.

Train and Hotel Bookings
One of the big decisions I had to make was whether to leave for Copenhagen on Saturday night o Sunday morning. After walking around Borås on Friday and seeing my hotel, I decided to stay in Boras Saturday night and take the Sunday morning bus to Gothenburg, Sweden and transfer to the train to Copenhagen. Thus, I walked to the train station to change my train to Sunday morning which also saved me $30 (my fare dropped from 572 to 386 Kronas for the trip to Copenhagen).

Davis Cup: Sweden vs. Russia
One thing that is crazy about Friday matches at Davis Cup is that in theory you could be sitting there for a long time. Davis Cup plays best-of-5 matches which means that if both matches go the distance you could be there for 10 hours or more.

That did not happen Friday in Boras, Sweden as Robin Soderling and Joachim Johansson both won in straight sets.