Use train or car for 3-wk Scandinavia trip

I can't help you with the routes you mention but I can say that we've rented a car when we've been in Sweden. It's very easy to drive there - not much traffic at all and has allowed us to get places we would have been unable to see without a car. My cousin lives in Sweden and next week they will be taking a one day cruise to St. Petersburg, over and back.

You'll need a combination of car, train and ferry. Perhaps even plane. You certainly cannot do it all with just a car. Here are the quick rules of thumb: Use a car for scenic drives and seeing rural landscapes and getting to small towns. Use the train for getting to major cities or short daytrips when based in a city. Ferries are for getting across the Baltic and can be amazingly beautiful. Use a plane to go very long distances to save time and often money. If you have more specific questions based on your expected itinerary, let us know.

Actually, you can do it very easily by car. I've done it a couple of times, the route of one trip is pretty much forgotten, but the most recent one took four weeks, (but started and ended in Paris, included the Nutshell, a run to the Arctic Circle, and still had enough time left over to goof off in Alsace and Burgundy for a few days before it was time to catch the flight home). Neither trip included Finalnd or St Pete. The map projection makes it look hard, but it isn't that far. Try this idea (with a start and end in Copenhagen - - driving route only, Helsinki and St Pete would have to be ferries out of Stockholm, but they might be too hard for one trip - - figure four days, minimum for this tangent): Leave Copenhagen via either the Malmo bridge or the Helsingor ferry for Stockholm (six hours). Leave Stockholm for Oslo (six hours). Leave Oslo for Trondheim via Hamar (seven hours). Leave Trondheim for Bergen via the fiord heads (eleven hours, two days, easy). A couple of days in Bergen for the Nutshell, Greig's home, etc). Leave Bergen via Stavanger for Kristiansand (seven hours) and catch the late ferry to Hirtshals. Work your way down the Jutland and Arhus and Odense in a couple or three days back to Copenhagen. Include Ribe if time allows, don't miss Roskilde. Times are road times, so there's plenty left over for messing around each day. There are also plenty of days left over for prolonged stops - - I think there were only six or seven movement days, so in three weeks, there are ten left over (after including Finland and Russia) for staying in one place or shortening each day's drive. The total driving distance is only a couple of thousand miles.