July 13, 2007 day 4 DENMARK and SWEDEN! en gang till!

What a surprise today brought! We went back to Sweden. We got up once again making it to breakfast just before it closed and came up to the room to plan our day when I finally got a hold of my good friend Gun Martensson who worked at Swedish camp for two summers in the mid 1980s. She had been callling my American cell phone leaving messages while I had been calling her broken cell phone and had stopped trying to reach her daughter Pernilla who had been modeling in Greece. Apparently , Pernilla had come home earlier than expected, so the kids were excited to see her especially. So, after checking train schedules, we figured that if we made the connections, we could be in Ystad, Sweden (on the southern coast of the Baltic Sea) within an hour and a half. We took off! We made the first train from Copenhagen to Malmo, Sweden just in time, but arrived two minutes later in Malmo than we needed to make a connecting train from Malmo to Ystad. We couldn't believe that it was actually sunny in Sweden--described as a typical Swedish summer day, unlike any we'd experienced yet in July! I have to say that it felt so good to be back in Sweden, if ony for a few hours, actually. I cannot believe the sense of calm and happiness I felt as we crossed the Oresund Bridge and arrived back in Sweden.


We had an hour to kill before the next train left for Ystad. Suddenly, we found the last of our Swedish money we hadn't changed yet in the bottom of my purse, so we set out for a walk to the square not to far from the train station. We didn't have to go too far before we found Carina's favorite, a Wayne's Coffee (like a Caribou minus all the extras such as my favorite Passion Green Tea Smoothie). She and I had coffee and got Robby his favorite Swedish ice cream--GB glass! We got back to the train station with time to spare and got to Ystad around 3:00. Gun was waiting all smiles!
I can't believe we pulled this off at the very last minute. Gun and her boyfriend Hakan had been out picking blueberries yesterday, and when Pernilla heard we were coming, she baked us a fresh blueberry pie.

We also met Hakan's son Karl and Perilla's boyfriend Eric and had a nice fika on their balcony.
The sun was gorgeous, and we could see fields of Skane wheat in the horizon. It was a short but very special visit.

When we got back to Copenhagen, we stopped at a favorite hot dog stand, and Robby enjoyed a rod polse med brod--senap och ketchup! He had been waiting for this very Danish treat.

Then, we decided to go to Tivoli after all.

It is one of the most beautiful amusement parks in the world with its color and themes throughout!

The night was perfect! There is a huge jazz festival going on in Copenhagen and an American band in concert. I don't know what band it was, but they were having great time with the crowd, and it made me miss our amazing American music. Aunt Teenie would have loved it. The kids got a "ride as much as you like" pass and did all the roller coasters like the Daemon several times over.

They loved the power tower and some other rides that they had first been on five years ago when Robby didn't make the height requirement to do all the big stuff.

I talked to my mom on the phone and thanked her for the tremendous efforts she and my dad had made when Chris, Scott, and I were young so that we could come to Europe and have our eyes opened to a wider view of the world than what we had experienced in Evanston and Chicago. I am so grateful for what they sacrificed to allow us those wonderful opportunities. I couldn't help but remember the times we had at Tivoli in 1967 and 1969! Some of the rides were the same, and all of a sudden, I had so many memories! We stayed until almost 12:30 a.ml when the park closed and were so glad we decided to end our trip at Tivoli. We walked back to the hotel, and here I sit finishing the blog while Carina just finished packing and Robby just made himself some hot cocoa. It is late, and we have to get up early to get breakfast, check out, and make the train to Kastrup airport to catch the flight to Amsterdam and then to Minneapolis. We arrive home at 5:30 p.m.

And so, I end this chapter with much gratitude and happiness that Carina, Robby, and I were able to have this amazing experience in Europe together. Who knows what the future will hold in terms of an opportunity like this again. I'm so glad we did enjoy the most we could each day. I think that all three of us have had new awakenings--many of which we may not fully understand until long after. For me, I believe that exploring new cultures gives us awakenings that can be transforming. Carina has already begun to talk about studying abroad, and Robby's new awareness every day about language amaze me. Not only does doing an experience like this help us begin to see the world as a smaller place because we find connection, but we can also learn more about who we are individually and what we may do to better ourselves and in some way the world we live in. I may not do much in my life that has a large impact on humanity, but I know that if I have helped Carina and Robby open their eyes a little bit wider to new possibilities, I have done something meaningful in my life.

July 12, 2007 day 4 DENMARK COPENHAGEN

As the old song goes, "Wonderful, wonderful Copenhagen!" We had a great night's sleep and made it down to breakfast 10 minutes before it closed! And what a breakfast it was--make your own waffles, eggs, bacon, as well as the usual fare of yogurt, musli, cheeses, all types of breads, and awesome coffee. We had so many ideas in terms of how to spend our two full days in Copenhagen and decided on a suggestion from Rose-Marie's family--the Experimentarium. We went online and checked out the location--too far to walk and then figured the advantages and disavantages of bus vs. train or a combo and opted for a longer bus ride so we could see the city as we rode to the "museum." It was a great choice for us. The Experimentarium was just that!


It was a hands-on museum with all different options.


There was a dinosaur room,

a room of circus types of experiments,

things to learn about the body and personality types,
science types of things,
on and on.

We were there until we closed--probably the last ones to leave actually, and we could have stayed longer. It reminded us of a combination of each of these: Cosmonova in Stockholm plus parts of the Science Museum, the Minnesota Zoo, and the St. Paul Children's Museum as well as Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry.

When we arrived back in the center of Copenhagen, we thought about going to Tivoli, Copenhagen's 100 year old beautiful gardens and amusement park, but we decided on going to dinner at Hard Rock Cafe

next to Tivoli instead and going back to the hotel early to hang out. Unfortunately, we had to wait an hour for a table, but we had soft drinks and coffee while we waited and wrote up a list of our favorite and least favorite events, activities, and places to visit on the trip. We didn't look at each other's lists until we were through, and it was fun to compare what each of us thought were the highs and lows. Highest on the list were visiting the dear friends and family we stayed with, good food, and being with Katie. The most common low was rain, rain, and more rain! The Hard Rock was fun despite the wait and the awful high prices. Robby got his usual HRC hamburger ($17.00), and Carina and I split a large plate of macaroni and cheese ($25.00). Two cokes and a coffee cost $20! Plus there is the additional 25% moms tax! We did enjoy hitting 4 Hard Rock Cafes, however, in four countries (London, Paris, Sweden, and Denmark)!


Back at the hotel, we played cards, then Robby played some video games while Carina and I watched a movie in Swedish on Danish TV and then the musical Chicago in English with Danish subtitles. Wild!

July 11, 2007 day 3 DENMARK AARHUS

The sunshine yesterday was too good to be true. We awoke to major traffic noises, voices at breakfast at resaurants along the canal right outside of our window, and a steady downpour of rain, rain, rain! Apparently, Sweden and Denmark have had 10 times as much rain this month as is normal.

So, after breakfast and stowing our baggage in the the luggage room at the Cab Inn, we set off with raingear to find the bus to take us 25 minutes outside of town to the amazing Moesgard Museum. Once we got off the bus, we had a hike through a wooded area.
Not only are there two huge buildings which house the exhibitions, but the grounds are equally impressive with Viking houses reconstructed as well as a Stave Church. Here is a link to paste into your browser if you want to find out more about the museum itself: http://moesgaard.hum.au.dk/my.php?top=2&language=1 Moesgard Museum is a museum I had wanted to see ever since our first trip to Europe together in 2002. I have studied and read a book and watched a movie about the Mosefolk or Bog People as they are known. The kids were equally fascinated and read just about everything in English on display.

This is a museum of ethnographical artifacts, the most amazing being the Grauballe Man, a body discovered in the peat bogs of Denmark in 1952 and which is dated as the oldest body found ever. Research has placed his death at around 270 B.C.--from the Iron Age. The body is incredibly preserved due to the properties of the bog, which have also darkened his skin and turned his original hair color to red. Here are some links with more information on this incredible body if you would like to read more. My pictures didn't turn out so well since he is covered in a glass case with very low lighting. Check these out: http://nematode.unl.edu/fensgrauballe.htm AND another (also about some other findings of these bodies, called "The Bog People" first made known to the wide-spread public in P.V. Glob's book THE BOG PEOPLE: http://www.tollundman.dk/grauballemanden.asp And here is a LINK to read/hear Seamus Heaney's poem called "The Grauballe Man" http://www.bbc.co.uk/northernireland/schools/11_16/poetry/war2.shtml




The undigested food was still in the Grauballe Man (called so because he was found in a peat moss in the village of Grauballe, just outisde of the town of Silkeborg, on Jutland, not far from Aarhus), who they believed was 34 years old, somewhat well-off, and who could just about be finger-printed today with the likelihood that his fingerprints would come out about as well as a living person! We were so fascinated and stayed at the museum for several hours.


Another room that really intrigued us was the one dedicated to rune stones. Several rune stones in the exhibit had been found surrounding Aarhus. There was a lot of information on the letters themselves as well as on the rare stones--about 200 found in Scandinavia but only about 20 as old as some of these!

The kids liked hiding behind them and exchanging echoes, too.















We finally hopped on the bus back to the charming city of Aarhus and set out exploring after another delicious meal at Mackie's.





































We sought out Mollestein, a tiny street beside the well-known Cathedral of Our Lady,



said to be the oldest church in Denmark.
Mollestein was a place I had read about because of its charming houses, hollyhocks and roses, and "back to the past" feeling. We were not disappointed!




Here's Carina by the first few houses on Mollestein:




On the way to Mollestein, Inoticed quite a resemblance to old English houses here, too.




We left Aarhus, again feeling that another day would be nice. Because of the incessant rain, we decided not to brave Den Gamle By--an open air, back to the sights, sounds, and smells of the past, museum, but I'd like to return some day to see it. Our 3 1/2 hour train ride back to Copenhagen began at 5:30. We were pretty weary when we finally got to our hotel, Best Western Hotel Hebron, where we stayed last year for a couple of days. We got so comfortable in our room that we decided not to go out to eat but instead to snack on leftovers from breakfast this morning, play cards, read, and just hang out.

July 10, 2007 day 2 DENMARK Billund LEGOLAND!

Yeah! Sunshine all day!!!
The Legoland Village provided a terrific breakfast to start our day. We checked out and were able to leave our baggage at the hostel for the day. Already at 10:00 a.m. when we got there were the cars lined up. It was very, very crowded, so we were glad we got an early start. The festive atmosphere struck me first, and unlike Valley Fair or Six Flags or even Liseberg, this was an amusement park dedicated to simple play. Even the lines to get on the rides had a little section with a large container of Legos and an area for building surrounding it where kids could play and create while the adults with them moved along the waiting lines inching toward the rides. Their kids were always in full view, and once they arrived at the front of the line, they could easily (well, not always, because some of the kids didn't want to be torn away from their intense Lego building once they were into it) call them back into the line again to get on the ride. It was so fun watching the kids' intensity and pride as they built their little 10-20 minute creations, and truthfully, when I watched Carina and Robby make their own little creations in the comfort of our hostel room, I could see those same emotions surface!

The park was made up, like Disneyland, into adventure "lands" like the Wild, Wild West, the Jungle,


Duplo-Land (devoted to the toddlers and 3-4 year olds who have not fully graduated to the miniature size of Legos for fear of swallowing.


There was even an opportunity for kids to take a driving safety course while driving little Lego cars. The instructor taught them rules of the road, the European signage, and how to signal right and left. Upon completion of the "course," they were given a Legoland Driver's License. This was for ages 7-13, and Robby almost convinced Carina to duck down in line and try it with him.


We also visited (twice!) the 4-D movies (done with no specific language and filled with fun special effects the special glasses enabled us to see. Once in the theatre, I was reminded of Carina's fear seeing "Honey, I Shrunk the Kids" done the same way at Disneyworld when she was 4. She was so frightened! She weathered this one beautifully, however, and we came back later to see the Racer Movie.

The rides were fun but nothing like we're used to in the States, but the Legos were more than interesting. There were little villages (made to look like Sweden,
San franciso, Hamlet's Castle Kronborg, the Statue of Liberty,














Mount Rushmore, etc.) everywhere, and lots of things moved and whistled and looked so real and quaint at the same time.

We enjoyed the whole thing and, as usual, finished the visit off with ice cream! Note the Romeo and Juliet allusion!











We opted to go back to the hostel about 4:00 not not only to kill some time, but it enabled Carina and Robby to play with more Legos in the lobby before we took off for the bus to Vejle and the train up on the northeast coast up to Aarhus where we we to spend the night.

We arrived about 7:30, found the Cab Inn, dropped off our luggage and went exploring for a place to eat. We found Mackie's, a great little pizza and burger place just down from our hotel, which had a river flowing alongside it. Mackie's was just what we needed. Robby had a huge mushroom cheese burger, and Carina and I split a huge Veggie pizza. Yum!