Denmark Tour Week 2

We continue to enjoy excellent bicycling trails and routes, rarely are we on busy roads. Motorists are very respectful and aware of bicycles and give us a good amount of space when they pass if needed, and always yield to us in the bicycle lanes. Several times we have gone through construction zones and surprisingly there has always been a bicycle lane detour to follow, something we have never experienced at home where the first thing to go is the pedestrian and bicycle paths.

From Ribe we rode to Esbjerg on the west coast of Denmark. Esbjerg is a lovely small city on the coast where we stopped just for one night as the distance to the next destination was too great for a day’s ride. The route was through low lying farmland, marshes and dikes, similar to the Netherlands perhaps. We found an interesting “Men by the Sea” sculpture in Esbjerg beside a beach where we enjoyed a bit of sunbathing.

George has been able to find many hot dog stands (rød pølse or red sausage) along the way. Apparently he is famous for his love of rød pølse amongst his Danish relatives as they are all offering them to him, in addition to the meal, when we visit.

Next stop was Tarm to visit cousin Aage, Gitte and their daughters Rikke (Lars), Julie and granddaughter Ines. Here we enjoyed another wonderful meal and gathering of the clan. We have been very spoiled on this trip with beds, showers, meals and laundry equipment, it seems too easy.

Aage and Gitte took us on a tour of Ringkobing Fjord which is a circular spit of land on the west coast where there is fishing, sailing, wind and kite surfing and a town called Hvide Sande (White Sands) that George was interested in seeing as he had watched the Danish crime TV series that was filmed there. We also toured a viking museum, visited a bird sanctuary, dipped our feet in the North Sea and had a delicious seafood lunch overlooking the sea.

Our next destination was Hammel to visit cousin Birgit, husband Niels and sons Andreas, Alexander and Jacob. For this trip we ended up not riding as we were invited, along with Birgit and Niels, to attend a celebratory graduation party that would have been too far to ride to. We were picked up by car and the bike was transported in their utility trailer. Unfortunately the party was cancelled due to a tragic drowning of one of the new graduates so instead we had a lovely lunch beside a lake and park near Silkeborg. The following day we enjoyed Aros (Aarhus Art Gallery) and Moesgaard Museum (Anthropological Museum) in Aarhus. During our stay in Hammel we were able to view the “SculpTuren”(sculpture tour), a series of chain saw sculptures done as a community pandemic activity and displayed on the road in front of Birgit and Niels’ home.

We rode to Aarhus the following day and enjoyed a tasty “smorrebrod” lunch with George’s 2nd cousin Ida and then rode to cousin Karin’s summer house just outside of Aarhus where we had a delightful stay with Karin and her good neighbor and partner Jacob.

The next day we rode back to Aarhus and caught the ferry east to Sjællands Odde across the Kattegat Straight and then cycled along the coast to Høvestrand where we were welcomed again by cousin Aksel and wife Birgit and stayed a couple nights in a summer house they had rented for a week. We had a relaxing stay there and enjoyed walks on the beach, good food, good company and playing a board game called Partners carefully translated from Danish by Birgit. I think they will have had enough of us by the end of the tour but we have thoroughly enjoyed spending time with them.

Our next destination was Jægerspris to visit friend Anker and his wife Anne. Anker was a good friend of George’s Uncle Niels and Per, and also a Canadian citizen who lived in Prince George for a number of years. Our trip to Jægerspris was supposed to include 2 ferry rides: one from Rørvig to Hundested and another small one from Sølager to Kulhuse. Unfortunately the second one was cancelled, we don’t know why, perhaps it was in disrepair, but it meant we had to ride around on land to the bridge down the coastline to reach Jaegerspris. It was an extra 20kms which didn’t seem too bad (70 rather than 50) but we didn’t know the best route and wound up on some forest gravel trails that slowed us down considerably. Then with only 9kms remaining we were pummeled by a thunder and hail storm and had to take cover under a big tree for about 15mins. We did eventually arrive at our destination wet and tired, but were treated to a lovely meal, shower, warm bed and good company.

The next morning looked better and we set off for our 50km ride into Copenhagen. Unfortunately after only about 3-4 kms it started to rain again and this lasted for a couple hours. It wasn’t very cold, just wet, so we kept pedaling. The new waterproof panniers we invested in are working well thankfully. Again on this ride we were following a route that took us into the forest, sometimes on gravel/dirt paths that were starting to get muddy with puddles, again slowing us down. We were starting to ask ourselves why we decided to ride north of the Loire valley (we have an unwritten rule to stay south of it) when we experienced our second flat back tire (always the back where it’s more complicated!). This was probably the worst time for a flat in the forest in the pouring rain with no good place to work. And to make it worse we realized we were surrounded by stinging nettle which had already attacked our legs. Sometimes you just have to swear a little, take a big breath and carry on, which we did. Once the tire was changed the weather did, miraculously, improve and the sun came out. We made it to Copenhagen and our hotel without any more adventures, wet and dirty, glad to be done cycling for the day.

Tags: Denmark