Breakfast Club Sweden

US friends visiting Sweden 

April 2000

Bob Kjorli, Linda Worgess, Doug Witters and Michael Kjorli arrived at Stockholm Arlanda Airport Thursday, April 6, 2000 and were greeted by Hasse Arhagen, Anders Pihlgren, Lasse Sjöberg and Nalle Rönnlund
Anders along with Hasse and Lasse drove us to our hotel - the Täby Park Hotel-Best Western. We dropped our things and freshened up a little while our entourage awaited The Baltic Sea surrounds Stockholm and creates 24000 islands. We then drove to Lars´home

We checked out his garage/workshop and his two Harley Davidson motorcycles in Resarö, an island community..... We met his wife Anki and their daughter and dog and we were served refreshments. We toured the rest of the island and drove by the "Lewi Strauss House" wich is also located there.
From there we drove to Vaxholm, a summer resort area on the baltic sea.On a small island just across from the Vaxholm hotel a fortress was built as a part of the defense for Stockholm.IIIt´s now a museum, restaurant etc. 

We drove onto the ferry and, at no charge, were transported to Rindö. We drove across this island where we were catch another ferry from Oscar-fredriksborg to the next island, Värmdö. While vating for the ferry Anders drove us by his dredge boat that was anchored there.

The water that runs between Oscar-Fredriksborg and Värmdöis the main waterway for all boats coming to Stockholm. Perched on top of the land across the water was the "Butterbox"- a round building built as a fortress to secure the city from invaders.

While we were waiting in line to board the ferry...the three "Polis" (police) boats passed by ( the entire fleet)
After crossing, we drove to Saltsjö-Boo to visit Henrik and Maggie Asp. They have a ´47 Nash Henrik had done a lot of good bodywork on the Nash including the smoth-shaved hood
From Boo we drove to Nacka and visited "Ekens Gassers" garage were we met with Uffe Ringblom (Bellflower). Bellflowe was building a 32 Chassis.Bell
Lots of other nice cars and projects.
We drove back to Stockholm and had dinner at Mosebacke in a room overlooking the city. Linda had "Matusalem Rum" - delicious! 

After dinner we toured another garage and met with Pelle ("Snickers") The garage was in a basement (Kulturföreningen) and had lots of bikes, 
a 64 Galaxie
plus a nice blue ´49 Ford

We slept well that night
Friday 4/7/00 We had breakfast at our hotel and the guys (Anders, Hasse, Lars and Peter Andersson) picked us up. We found a Cambio and exchanged some money and drove to our next stop -  Had a drag bike, Cobras, frames for dragsters, Edsel...clean car, satellite Speed Harley.
Rod and Race, operated by Johan Hässler ( a friend of Lars) Had a drag bike, Cobras, frames for dragsters, Edsel...clean car, satellite Speed Harley.
SpeeNext we proceeded to Persåkers Speed Shop. They had a big inventory of parts. Lars swapped a couple of Street Rod decals for a kilo of theirs. In front of the shop runs the waterway that is  a lock between the Baltic Sea and the water around the Town or City Hall, building with three crowns on top, (which is a higher body of water). We saw a couple of Viking Boats on the water. Happened to meet Mats Frykstedt there, a Breakfast Clubber, but didn´t get to see his ´69 Camaro.
Visited Unique Custom Cycles and met owner Ronna (Ronny) and Benna (Benny) Norén. This shop, located in a basement of the Harley-davidson shop had from 100 to 150 custom bikes..... They are building the bikes from scratch using S&S engines and theire own desing for the rest, from frames to the gas tanks. Each complete bike sells around $50,000.. The bikes were awesome
Went to Hjalmaren, a small corner café where you ordered before you sat down, for a Swedish lunch
Attended the Swedish New Car Show in Stockholm before it officially opened with VIP passes. It was a huge show with all new model cars as well as old... arestored cars, makes we never seen, "semi" trucks with special paint jobs, a "semi# dragster, a jet airplane etc. they had it all
 allAfter the show we toured Stockholm with a drive along the river seeing a yacht (formery owned by Barbara Hutton) wich was anchored and turned into a restaurant and hotel
A Chineses Dragon ship wich was a restaurant.... and many other ships
We drove by the King´s Oalace and checked out the armed guards out front
We had dinner at the Hard Rock Café (the fourth ever opened). We were joined by Mats Frykstedt, Nalle Rönnlund and his daughter, Madeline. nalle, up until two years ago, had managed this restaurant- good service, good food, good beer...  

Most had a round of Acqua-Vit after dinner. We were dropped of at our hotel and had saome drinks before going to bed (at 3 am) in order to wind down from the day

Saturday 4/8/00
Hasse picked us up at the lobby at 7.30 am and drove us toAkersberga to meet with the Breakfast Club @ 8.00 am. On the way we drove by his office that was closed. (hasse is his own only employee). Lennart Rönn drove his 56 Ford Crown Victoria and Rolf Zander drove his 32 Ford 4-door to breakfast.... this We had food, drinks ,preseted each member of the club with a t-shirt and laughes a lot. We pitched quarters in the parking lot ( which Hasse won) and had some group photos taken
After breakfast "Norrtälje" Bosse arrived in his black 32 Roadster. Bob rode with him to the Breakfast Club´s garage There we saw.....
Hasse´s 32 Roadster.... Lasse´s 32 Roadster....
Claes´s 32 Ford Chassis.... and Rolf Zander´s 32 roadster with cowhide interiorn
plus one other
Work on the roadsters was great Rolf´s glass bodies are as good as we´ve ever seen
From there we drove to Claes Jungefelft´s home overlooking the Baltic Sea We saw his 32 Roadster body....
and his restored 65 Corvette Coupe... Claes is still on cruthes for a broken ankle but hopefully not for long
From there to Hasse Arhagen´s place to see..... his ´32 Ford 3-window.
and ´33 Chevy Pickup. After that we went to the house and met his wife, Anita. Hans graciously gave us a tour of his house We piled back into our cars and drove to Anders Pihlgren´s home to see his 57 Chevy Nomad. We met Ander´s wife kristina and his two children....
Kristina had prepared lunch for the whole group- potatoes, swedish meatballs, and all kinds of differently prepared herring...... and Absolut Vodka shots and beer. When we were finnished eating, a call was placed to the States from the Swedish Breakfast Club to the Michigan Breakfast Club
From there we walked up the road to Marko and Camilla ( hans´s daughter) new home. Then we all piled into the cars and met with Peter Andersson at the church outside of town to follow him to his place...
We drove, and drove, and drove and finally arrived at Peter´s shop-tools very organized
He´s working on a ´37 Ford Humpback but also built... a lot of homebuilt metalworking tools which he demonstrated
From Peter´s we drove to Lars Erik Lindberg´s- the Swedish Street Rod Association President in Upplands Väsby....... He was racing to complete a Ford Roadster for an upcoming car show
While there we also met his wife Rita, and was given... Swedish Street Rod Association pins and t-shirts
From there we drove to Lasse Bengtsson´s metalworking business which has been in the family for three generations. he has some pretty awesome metal working machines and lots of tubing, flat bar, angle and solid stock
We saw his ´35 Ford Pickup (company truck)... and his ´33 Chevy Cabriolet
Then it was back to our hotel to freshen up for dinner. We were given a ride to the Vaxholm Hotel and met everyone from the Breakfast Club and theire wifes- Marko and Camilla (and theire son, Douglas), Peter Andersson, Hans and Anita Arhagen, Lars Bengtsson and guest, Leif and Anne Bengzon, Claes and Margareta Jungefeldt, Anders and Kristina Pihlgren... Bosse Pettersson, Lennarts Rönn, Lars and Anki Sjöberg, Clay Sjöblom, and Rolf and Ann Christine Zander. We had a dlicious dinner and lots of neat conversation - nice restaurant, nice friends. American money wasn´t excepted for anything. The evening was very much appreciated.
Sunday 4/9/00: Hans, Lars, Claes, Anders, Peter, Lennart, Bob, Doug, Michael and Linda headed towards the Bålsta Car Club.. Enroute we rendezvoused with Leif Bengzon and Bosse Pettersson
We drove to Kristian Johansson Rod and Custom (Caprice Classic chop shop) Enroute we rendezvoused with Leif bengzon and Bosse Pettersson
We met Håkan Johansson in his 49 Gold Mercury.... lead sled there. We also met Stefan Rudberg
From there we followed Håkan and Stefan down the road to Stefan´s shop, a bonus garage
Stefan has a ´56 F-100 Ford with a "FORD ENGINE" in his shop as well as many other vehicles
a radical VW bug and.....
a Chrysler " Christine" custom in progress
Then we drove to the Bålsta Car Club-down a winding dirt road back trough a field making several turnes... The club occupies an old farm with many buildings. Both Håkan and Stefan are members
The first thing that stands out is the VW Red Baron Bi-Wing plane... that crashed on the side of a hill. Someone had quite the imagination for that one
The guy we talked with was Pecka who also did theire artwork for theire party/meeting flyers They had a pretty well-equipped machine shop as well as many cars, a dragster rail and several motorcycles.
One of the cycles was an old army bike equipped with outboard skis for wintertime control. Lookes like it could be a dangerous tree-wrapper to us They were getting ready for a club meeting that afternoon and a band was over at the house practicing for the festivities.

Leif Bengzon and Bosse Pettersson left us ar this point...
We drove to Bålsta ans stopped at Sibylla´s - Micke´s Grill for lunch From there we drove to Nalle Rönnlund´s place in Gottröra
Nalle showed us his shop Caltex Service Station museum Complete with gaspumps and three employees as well as a lots of memorabilia
He is also restoring a Caltex ´63 tanker truck ... as well as ´64 service car
His daughter, Madeleine was there and we also met with his friend Anette (a stewardess for SAS ) In a room of his house ha had several ´33 and´34 grille shells.
He then showed us his garage in the basement of his house, were we saw his ´34 Ford Chassis.....
More touring and we saw his Coca-Cola room and ski room His next project is an ESSO gas  station. After the tour of his basement, we all had rolls, te and coffee
We stopped for gas. The Americans bought and couldn´t beleive the prices. We shouldn´t complain about our gas prices as theire was 9.22 Swedish Krona per liter (quart) ( approximatley US$100 per tank). We still do feel bad for the last four days we had been touring at the expence of our hosts. At this point, Claes joined our group in the van as Lennart and Peter had to depart. We drove to Patrick´s Bar, downtown Stockholm, for some drinks and snacks. From there we drove around Djurgården, an island where there´s a museum, the Italian Embassy etc....
Our final stop of the day was at the shop of Leif Alderskans ("Batman"),. Leif sings rock and roll for a living but has amny talents other than his voice. He´s presently building a "Batmobile" and in just three short months has a full size replica mold sitting in his shop almost ready for fiberglass.  When he´s not working on the car, he not only restores masterpiesce paintings for the museums, but paints exact copies of famous paintings that have to be stamped as copies so they don´t get confused with the originals. There was full size busts of Batman and jack Nicholson as the Riddler and a famous painting in progress in another room of his shop. In yet another room, was a sectioned van that will become the sidekick to the Batmobile.
Hans, Lars and Claes dropped us off at our hotel, and over a few drinks had to say godbye to our friends....
Hans, however, graciously picked us up at 4.15 am on Monday morning to drive us to the airport The 
The only shopping that was to be done this trip was a sweater and cigars for Doug. There wasn´t time but Doug got his sweateranyway, at the airport on the way home. Words cannot express our appreciation for all the hospitality extended to us by all our wonderful friends during our visit to Sweden. it would be hard to have anybetter a time than we did....but we´ll certanly give it a shot on our next visit.

Looking forward to seeing some of our Swedish friends here in the Stated in September. Only wish all of them could come.

 

 

 

Foto and text by Linda Worgess

 

 

 

 

That´s all folk´sall folk´s