FREEDOM Community Event 2026 - travel inspiration and mingle photos!

Writer: Helena Bergström

Last Thursday, we organised the ”FREEDOM Community Event 2026”! The aim was to provide travel inspiration while bringing together travel journalists, bloggers, content creators and others in our travel network. Here are some photos from the evening!

FREEDOM Community Event 2026 - with mingle photos from Cawa Media

The event was organised at A House at Slussen and we had seven partners: Uzbekistan, Frankfurt am Main, Tunisia, Austria and Slovakia and Solid Wine and Xbrandify.

It was incredibly fun and incredibly intense. We hardly had time to take any photos ourselves, so we're glad we brought in Cawa Media for event photography. Here you will find Cawa Media photos from the event! Almost all the photos in this post (with a few exceptions - as they are our own photos) are photos from Cawa Media.

Exhibitors - five destinations

Our five collaborating destinations were each given the opportunity to create an ”exhibition corner” on the premises. Here they could have roll-ups, brochures, goodies, competitions or whatever they wanted. Uzbekistan created an incredible space, with lovely fabrics and beautiful artefacts.

It wasn't just Uzbekistan that offered travel inspiration. Tunisia had a lovely corner, Slovakia offered inspiration on everything from mountains to wines and you could also meet both Frankfurt am Main and Austria.

Bubbles and snacks

When the guests arrived, we started by offering snacks (in the form of a ”boat” of cheese and charcuterie) and bubbly. Peter's son Billie and his friend Stefan were at the bar, and they were helped by Jonathan Gharbi de Maré - an experienced travel writer who writes for FREEDOMtravel quite often.

”The ”boats" contained charcuterie, cheese, tomatoes, olives and biscuits ...

The bubbly - Contarni Prosecco, from Veneto in Italy - was delivered via Solid Wine, which offers a wide and careful selection of wines for restaurants. What a lovely bubbly, we couldn't be more pleased!

The guys at the bar did a great job - and when the dishes piled up a little later due to a problem with the dishwasher, Marlene, from Jikitas on Adventure, also came to the rescue.

Mingle

Visitors started to trickle in around 4pm, and suddenly there were more and more...! To be honest, it's a bit hard to understand how many ”100 people” really are. And also: Yes, some people who signed up didn't come ... and some people who not signed up ... come on! That's probably how it is. Here are some photos from the mingle - from Cawa Media.

Welcome presentation

On stage, we started with a welcome presentation - to tell you about the evening and our partners.

Besides briefly introducing ourselves, we presented our five partner destinations: Uzbekistan, Frankfurt am Main, Tunisia, Austria and Slovakia.

Then, we wanted to introduce the participants... How would we do that? We chose to highlight four ”personalities” who could all be on the journey, and then the participants in the locomotive could vote via a QR code. A lot of recognition we think! This is how the result came out!

• YELLOW: The Story Collector - ”We'll see what happens”
• BLUE: The Master Planner - ”I have already checked it out”
• GREEN: The Peacekeeper - ”As long as everyone is happy!”
• RED: The Mission Leader - ”Let's go!”

Food and wine

Now it was time for food and wine! The Embassy of Uzbekistan offered Uzbek food - and then, of course, there was the national dish plov! This is a beloved rice dish with meat and vegetables. In addition, there was salad and ”samsa” - small priogs with meat or vegetable filling. It was delicious!

More presentations

After dinner, our ”gold partners” had the opportunity to tell us more about their destinations: Uzbekistan, Frankfurt am Main and Tunisia.

Coffee and chocolate balls

”We should have something sweet for the coffee”, I thought, when we were planning the event. ”Ok, I'll make chocolate balls!”, Peter replied. He made about 300 of them. We had to clear out coolers we got a while ago and turn it into a freezer - it turned into many boxes of chocolate balls! We served them with coffee and they were very well received!

Song and dance

Uzbekistan offered a singing performance, and it was fantastic! The music and singing are not only beautiful, but also captivating.

First up to dance with the singer was Peter.

Very quickly he was joined. How marvellous! Swedish participants as well as Swedish-Uzbeks and Uzbeks took the dance floor. Wonderful atmosphere!

More mingling

After the coffee, singing and dancing, the mingling continued! Here you can see some more mingle pictures from the evening! You can also read posts at, among others 4000 mil, Lena in Wales, Former Single Mum and Spa Guide Sweden!

Lucky draw, goodie bags and Good bye

As the evening drew to a close, it was time for the lucky draw! We had a really nice prize from Frankfurt am Main, but also nice prizes from Croatia, Uzbekistan and Revolution Race (and from us).

Thanks to all!

A big thank you to everyone who contributed to the event and the evening! The atmosphere was absolutely fantastic, and it was really thanks to all the nice and lovely people who contributed with joy and great humour! Many, many thanks!

We end with a film from us at FREEDOMtravel - not from the event but from the years gone by!