Copenhagen

I leave Ribe on a regional commuter train and switch trains at Bramming and somehow get a direct train to Copenhagen even though it seems like most have switches in Odense. I purchase an assigned seat but the train I am on does not have the car I am assigned to so I just grab a seat anywhere (we are on a two car train for some reason). Fortunately no one makes me get up for my entire journey. I have no train snacks because none of the stores are open before I leave in the morning.

My original plans had an overnight stop in Odense, the home of Hans Christian Andersen. Because I really dislike rushing through cities I cut out this stop and added time to Copenhagen instead. This gives me an excuse to return to Denmark.

I didn’t sleep well last night because of the party outside until late. Luckily I nap on the train ride.

It’s a 20 minute walk to my hotel so I grab a croissant sandwich and coffee for the journey. My room isn’t ready yet upon arrival which is probably good because I can see myself lazily lounging in my room until it is time to meet a friend later. I had originally planned to do laundry during this time as well but the weather is too beautiful to be inside. Hopefully I can make my clothes last a couple more days (sorry Copenhagen about my smell).

From my hotel walk towards what looks like the center of town. I end up on a busy shopping street. I notice truckloads of high school graduates in mobile parties like the ones I’ve seen in other towns. These are loud and more high tech though. One truck backs up into the square I am in and loads of kids come swarming, stripping off their clothes and bathing in a fountain. What fun! I will continue to see truck after truck of party goers the next few days (you can always hear them coming with the music and whistles).

There is a mermen statue underwater that I try to get a look at but the water is cloudy.

My friend reaches out. She is biking down and will meet me at a beer bar around the corner. We grab some beers and sit outside in the nice cool air and chat. It is very warm in the sun but in the shade the temperatures are perfect.

She takes me around town and shows me landmarks and gives me advice. We stop for a cider across the street from a Scientology building where there is a desk for L Ron Hubbard, if he ever comes back.

From there we share a BBQ plate at WarPigs, a Mikeller location that has American style BBQ. The BBQ pork rivals what I can get in the USA. The location is in the Meat Packing District which is basically an old meat packing district home now to many hangouts in its unassuming blue and white color buildings.

We go down by the water and enjoy the nice early evening. Danes are all about soaking up the sun. I am very lucky to be here this time of year with the sun constantly shining despite’s my annoyance that I will sometimes sweat here.

I finally check into my hotel and there is no AC as usual but I have a fan so I feel lucky. There is noise outside but I am so tired that I sleep well.

In the morning I head out early to get coffee. I am meeting my friend for brunch but not for a couple hours.

She suggests this very funky cafe Bankeråt around the corner from my hotel. There are lots of animal heads and other things…very strange. Brunch is the Danish style where you can choose a number of items from a list and they all come out in little containers (similar to what I did the other day in AArhus). It is like tapas for brunch.

She has errands to run so I wander around town by myself, first stopping to check out the food hall TorvehallerneKBH near my hotel. I am full now so I make a note to return.

This is a bike centric town so one has to make sure you are not actually walking in a bike lane. Bikers are pretty good at avoiding tourists but its always good to watch out for them.

I rent a bike and ride out to Superkillen park, a funky park in the Norroborro district that was designed to incorporate themes related to nearby immigrant groups.

I get on a bike again but this time starting my search for the popular little mermaid statue. I make a pit stop in a park and the happen upon some historic housing.

I find the genetically modified version of the little mermaid first, a modern art take on the historic character. There is also other weird sculptures in this area that looks like it is also a cruise port.

I eventually make it to the actual little mermaid and it is crowded with tour groups lining up to take pictures with the mermaid. I sit aside for a while thinking if I wait in out the crowds will die but they never do. I eventually get up and go snap some pictures myself, doing my best to avoid the crowds in my photos.

I continue on along the water to a waterside seafood restaurant where I get some fish and chips and a drink and watch the boats pass by. It is a beautiful day which I guess are rare here. I am very lucky because most of my days are beautiful.

I walk to Nyhavn district, the distinct beautiful view of the city with the colored buildings. I watch the drawbridge as the boats pass underneath.

I’ve been warned about the pricing of the area so I stop in a cute bar that is on the way back to my hotel to get a carrot cake themed whisky cocktail that is quite good.

Tomorrow I plan to check out the historic theme park Tivoli and try to beat the upcoming rain.

Aurlandsfjord and Nærøyfjord

Fjord Cruise

Our fjord cruise doesn’t start too early so we have time to have a relaxing breakfast at our hotel. It is always nice to not have to rush in the morning.

We board the cruise from Flam to Gudvangen and find comfortable seats as our base downstairs where we have a panoramic view. There are a few floors of decks outside that are standing room only so we alternate going inside and out to admire different things during our cruise. Some of us already saw some of this journey the evening before during our RIB boat tour but it is nice to have more of a panoramic view from the large ferry – which is electrical thus reducing the emissions.

We arrive at the even smaller town of Gudvangen. I cannot believe it is even smaller than the town Flam but it is. The major attraction here besides boating is the working Viking village you can visit. We drop off our bags at the Viking village to go get lunch at one of maybe two restaurants in the town. I end up ordering a very large dish of meatballs.

We walk back to the Viking village and wait for the 2:00 PM tour. My friend tries ax throwing as we wait.

The tour guide takes us around the village which acts as a living village. People come from all the world to live and work here, in fact the girl from the entrance is from Minnesota. We learn about metal working, textiles, weapons, and boat making among other things. It is a very educational day in a charming Viking town. I even try archery. I am not great at it but perhaps in time I could be better.

We try one of the local beers and go to catch the bus that is the next leg of our journey. The bus will take us to the train that will take us to Bergen. We have one stop along the way to admire the views.

Finally we are on our train to Bergen. We are getting in later than I’d like. We find a restaurant still serving meals later. It is our splurge meal. I decide to take a chance and order the reindeer steak. I am pleased with my choice. It is similar to beef and not gamey at all. I also order a rhubarb trifle for desert. This is probably one of the best meals I’ve had in Norway so far, and I am paying a good amount for it.

My friend talks me into staying out for one drink even though it is close to midnight (way past my bedtime). It is difficult here because even at midnight, the darkest it will be, it isn’t even fully dark. I would be tricked into thinking it was earlier than it is if my body wasn’t so tired.

Tomorrow we explore Bergen a bit.

Guinness Storehouse visit

Sad that we missed out on our previous Guinness appointment due to Delta and JFK airport but we are glad we get a make up session on St Patricks Day. After a bizarre morning we can use some beers in our life.

We decide to head down to the Guinness Storehouse early to eat a late lunch since all the restaurants will be either packed or not serving food near where we watched the parade.

We eat at one of the on-site restaurants. The food is nothing to rave about but at least we are no longer hungry.

The can’t reschedule us for the same experience we had booked because it is totally sold out until my friend leaves and only offered once a day. But they do offer us tickets to pretty much every other experience that they have. We have a scheduled time but they don’t seem to be strict on that as long as you have a ticket for the experience you are in line for.
We soon learn we will be drinking lots of Guinness today. We have three tickets for events that will give us full pints of beer and on top of that we get to have a sample of Guinness.

We start with the learning how to pour a Guinness at GUINNESS ACADEMY. Guinness is not always my beer of choice but I have had enough of them to know there is a special way to pour them. Our beer instructor takes us through a very fast instruction. It is obvious there is something we are missing. We discover that most people arrive here after visiting the complete museum before hand whereas the people at the entrance erroneously told us to come directly to the 4th floor to start our special experiences. We get through our own pours, gain our certificate and decide to take our recently poured beers downstairs to start our way through the museum. This is where we have our first full pint given to us.

Guinness is no longer brewed here but we learn about the history, chemistry, etc.

After the tour we do part 2 of our experience, we have a beer sampling. A guide takes us throw the flavors we experience in the beer.

Part 3 is the STOUTIE experience where we have our faces printed on a pint we then drink. This is pint number 2.

We stop into a bar to watch an Irish band play for a little while. We haven’t heard much Irish music since we’ve been in town. The bars we have visited thus far play mostly covers. We stay awhile to enjoy.

Finally we visit the Gravity bar up top for an additional free pint. The bar has beautiful views of the city. We chat with some former locals who are back in town to watch the upcoming Rugby match. They tell us only tourists watch the St Patricks Parade because it is crap.

We make one more stop and then call it a day. Tomorrow we plan to wander around Dublin and sightsee locally.

Arrived in Dublin

I check out of my hotel in Belfast and head to Dublin today but first I head out to see the peace wall that I missed earlier. Thank goodness I still wake up very early so I can go out and sightsee before I need to leave. My sleep schedule is not so great for pub visits but opportune to seeing sights during the day.

The peace wall is the barricade that separated the two fighting groups of Ireland in the middle of Belfast to help foster “peace”. Before the mid-90’s this country was torn in pieces by constant violence. I am going to try to simplify it and I’ll probably get it a little wrong but basically it is between the British loyalists or Protestants (Ireland used to be ruled completely by Britain) and the Irish Separatists or Catholics. Ireland was technically declared independent in 1922 but I guess Britain wasn’t totally out of the picture and it caused factions to form. Northern Ireland remained loyal to the crown for the most part while Southern Ireland wanted to remain independent. This morning I walked down to the peace wall, which still exists, to see the art and written messages promoting peace and unity. There is talk of bringing the wall down but this particular wall is still up for now; perhaps so they never forget the past and they don’t repeat it. I learn later that I should have booked a black taxi tour to get a real feel for the history. I have another reason to return.

I had planned to take the 20 something minute walk to the train station to catch my train to Dublin but then it starts raining, then it develops into sleet and snow. I take an Uber instead. The train is on time and even the basic car seat I purchased is pretty comfortable, although it was never quite clear if I am in the right class. I have flash backs of getting kicked out of first class in Spain. I don’t get comfortable until we move and I see train staff walking by not caring about which ticket I have.

My hotel is a little distance from the train station in Dublin so I Uber again (Ubers are taxis by the way). It starts pouring, sleeting, and snowing just like Belfast. The weather has seemed to follow me here.

After hotel check in I decide to waste no time and sneak off to an last minute tasting at the distillery around the corner. The triangle shaped area I am staying is called “The Liberties”. It used to have the highest concentration of Dublin whisky distilleries. Irish whiskeys where thriving in the 19th century, people couldn’t get enough of them. Three things happened in the early 1900’s to change that: Irish independence, prohibition in the USA, and the Irish ignoring new technologies in the industry. All the existing distilleries closed in Dublin by the 1970’s (some moved operations elsewhere and stayed alive). In 2015, Teeling Whisky Distillery became the first new distillery to open in Dublin in 125 years. A distant relative once had a distillery not far from where the current location is so basically whisky is in their blood. I purchased the tasting where I try 3 different whiskies. Each had their own merits. My favorite being Single Grain Irish Whisky. The other tasting included a special cocktail that I also want to try so I purchase one at the bar after our official tasting. Now that I am all liquored up I decide I need dinner.

I wander around town in the evening. I go by all the temple bars. I notice teenagers lining up for blocks for some concert of a band I have never hear of. They seem to be wildly popular though.

I make reservations to try boxty – a local dish.

I get to the area early so pop into a pub where a person is performing Irish tunes and contemporary covers. I remember to order half a pint this time. Seems to be perfect for me lately for a quick drink.

Boxty is ok. I was expecting a life changing experience but it was just good. The meat was more tender than I expected so I liked that.

No late night drinks for me so I head back to the hotel for the night. I am meeting my friend tomorrow.

Te Papa Museum

I am still in Wellington New Zealand for one more day. I have heard good things about the Te Papa Museum so that is today’s destination.

First I stop for a fancy breakfast and coffee.

The museum is in walking distance from my hotel so I stroll around town on the way there.

I am obsessed with these crossing lights. The stop is a man and the go is a lady. I am the weirdo taking pictures of the walk signal.

Te Papa museum is by the water.

The first section I visit is the Nature section, or the section dedicated to things natural to New Zealand such as volcanos, earthquakes and birds and other wildlife.

I am obsessed with this slimy sucker, something out of a science fiction movie.

And of course I have to check out the kiwis, birds I still have not seen alive.

And some bigger dumb birds with little or no arms.

The star of this exhibit is the humongous squid. It is what nightmares are made of.

It’s the biggest colossal squid ever caught!

There is a very impressive Maori exhibit. (For the most part photos are not allowed inside). I learned many things about the Pacific peoples who came to inhabit New Zealand. I even tried to learn some new words

Rongomaraeroa Te Marae (communal meeting place)

I loved the section that contained portraits of Maori tattoos. The exhibit explained the meaning behind the tattoos. They were beautiful to see.

Kaleidoscope: Abstract Aotearoa

The modern art exhibit bursts with color.

While at the Weta Workshop yesterday I heard our guide mention the Gallipoli exhibit at the Te Papa. The workshop is responsible for designing the characters from this exhibit that shows the struggle troops from New Zealand dealt with during World War I.

It is also at this museum that I learn that I can probably never immigrate to New Zealand due to my “advanced age”. Maybe I’ll end up in a highly desired employment someday or some cute kiwi wants to help give me citizenship 😉

After the museum I stop at Mr Go’s restaurant for some Asian dishes.