Bangor High School junior Justin Payson called it the “best experience of my life. It was hard getting on the plane to come home.”

Payson and John Bapst High School senior Jarrod Guimond of Orrington recently returned from a trip to Sweden and Finland with 21 other Maine high school hockey players.

Tryouts for the team were held on New Year’s Eve in Portland and Payson said approximately 50 tried out.

Their team compiled a 2-2-1 record in Sweden against teams comprised of players 15-18 years old. Then, they went to Finland where a pair of Finnish teams, with players 18-22 years old, walloped them twice.

“I had a great time playing over there,” said Guimond, who had two assists.

The players had to adjust to the Olympic-sized ice sheets (usually 200 feet by 100 feet) and different styles of play.

“The Swedes were really fast but they weren’t physical at all. In one game, the referee came over and made us stop hitting. They called so many penalties on us. Every time we hit somebody hard, even if it was a clean check, they called something,” said Payson, who had a goal in the seven games.

The Finns played the body more “and were much more talented” than the younger Swedish teams according to Payson.

Their team was involved in a post-game brawl with their last Swedish opponent because “one of their players ran one of ours five seconds after the game ended” according to Payson.

The coaches broke it up and Payson said there wasn’t any lingering animosity. In fact, he said, “All the Swedish kids had smiles on their faces because they had never been in a fight before.”

The players said Stockholm was a beautiful and vibrant city.

“People never sleep there. There’s always something to do,” said Guimond.

“And they all spoke English very well. They were much nicer than the people are over here,” said Payson. “They saw our team jackets and would come up to us on the street and talk to us.”

People were much more reserved in Finland, according to Guimond, and Helsinki didn’t have the charm or the activity of Stockholm.

The only negative thing was the food.

“I ate a lot of Swedish meatballs. In Finland, they had some kind of meat thing. It wasn’t very good. I was glad to get back home and eat real food,” said Guimond who, like Payson, had to raise $1,500 for the trip.

“We would go to the Pizza Hut in Stockholm,” said Payson. “Things were real expensive in both countries. You’d spend 15 dollars on a meal at McDonald’s.”

Their team will play the Czech national midget team on Friday at 7 p.m. at Portland’s Cumberland County Civic Center.