Aros to Aarhus

Aarhus, the city with everything you could dream of. There's an energetic beat of the pulse in the vibrant city of Aarhus, Denmark. It's Denmark's youngest city, but the old past is kept very much alive. I STILL haven't gotten over to see the oldest quarter, De Gamle By or the genius of Aros (the modern art museum), but I do plan on it in the next few port days. There's just so much to see and do here and the vibe is so fantastic. You walk right into town from the ship and right away you get a mixture of old and new with all the Danish architecture. You can stroll down Aboulevarden right alongside a waterway where there all kinds of hip restaurants. The shopping is a little pricey, but very trendy. You can find an H&M store here just the same as you can find a Starbucks in New York City. There's a huge student population here so there are plenty of sidewalk cafes and pubs as well. You can take in a good lunch in the outdoor seating and have an eyeful of people watching. As with all of Scandinavia, Aarhus is bike friendly with special pathways and rules just for bikers. It's so easy to get a bike as well. You just take a 20 kroner coin, pop it into the slot on a city bike rack, unlock the lock, and you're good to go for the day. When you return the bike you pop the lock back in and your 20 kroner piece falls right out of the lock on your handlebars. The people are so trustworthy here it seems I saw several city bikes just parked with the others and not locked up. Anyone could take advantage of the situation and take the bike, return it to the lock stations, and get your 20 kroner piece, but no one does. Isn't it amazing? In America that would be unheard of. You can't even leave your wallet in the front seat of a beat up car that's locked WITH a steering lock on it. It's just an open invitation for someone to break in let alone leave a bike out. Anyway that was a tangent. Back to lovely Aarhus. I ventured off with my city bike and drove by the old town (Gamle By) to take a few snapshots. I knew I'd be visiting there next time, so I didn't want to go in this time especially with 2 ships in port. Then my curiosity struck. I have a vehicle that moves faster than my legs. I could go ANYWHERE. So I did. I rode down out of the main city and into the countryside. It was so peaceful and serene. Riding through the entire city and traveling along the beach was so fulfilling AND I was getting exercise, which meant I didn't have to work so hard in the gym today. YAY! My curiosity took me to Tivoli Gardens, which is the Scandinavian equivalent to Six Flags in the US. I didn't go in because here in Aarhus it was just meant for kiddies. There were maybe 2 roller coasters and the rest was just a regular little theme park. I drove past and went over to Frederiksbjerg. It was a quaint little town that just seemed peaceful enough to ride through. The houses were all gorgeous. It must be amazing to live here. I rode back towards the water and found a bike trail by a hotel. Lo and behold another city bike rack. These things are everywhere in the city. You just have to find them. I drove on the bike trail and had an immediate sense of home. The tree lined trail and park I was riding through was strangely similar to the Metropark system in the Cleveland suburbs. Well except for the Danish signs that would pop up now and then and the Danish ramblings among the locals. It was so relieving to be riding through the park over hills, wooden bridges, and through tunnels. I even rode past an old Viking home with the thatched roof and all. My curiosity kept taking me further and further as I reminisced in my head about my younger days when the family would take the bikes out and spend the day on the trails sometimes biking for 20 miles. It was great!! I ended up back in the city refreshed and experiencing something new in Denmark. The atmosphere just seems so positive up here. I can't explain. Whoever thought I'd be riding a bike along the countryside of Denmark?

A little bit about Aarhus I found was that it was that the Vikings landed here with a vision for anticipating the future and truly knowing how to live life. It seems no one ever works here whenever I visit and it always seems like a weekend. It's probably due to the large student population, but the city and shopping areas are always bustling with people. Danish people. Back to the Vikings. They founded the town of Aros (an old Danish word for "river mouth"), which formed into Aarhus. The Vikings traveled by water and berthed their ships by the Valdestedt, which is where you'll find the cafes and department stores today. It's a vibrant area that continues to be a place to make bargains, meet, and have a good time.

There's so much culture here right down to the churches and cobblestone streets. You have your huge shops like the Salling department store (the Danish Target), Bik Bok, H&M, and Mango. There are also little bakeries, old general stores, bookstores, and so many other little shops with character in them. On one visit I even had the delight of visiting the Aarhus Art Building. It was a small display of 6 pieces. Each piece had a theme and was several works of art to make one collective piece. Some pieces had one artist and others were a collaborative effort of many. It was an eye opening experience and I was told that Aros Art Museum is even better. We don't get to experience the nightlife, but there are several theatres and opera houses strewn throughout the city. The city is so beautiful I'd definitely recommend it as a summer vacation spot. It's also just a hop, skip, and jump away from Copenhagen as well.

Medieval Times...

Lovely Tallinn, Estonia. It's a place I never imagined I'd see or even thought about seeing. I've been here 3 times already and each time was just as good as the first and I'm STILL discovering. Yes, we are now in regular cruises and only a few ports come up now and then that are new or rare. Otherwise, we're in repeat mode until returning to the Mediterranean in September. Estonia sits just on the brim of Russia. It actually gained its independence from Russia in 1918 only it was overtaken by Russia in the war again in 1944. It became part of the collective U.S.S.R. until fully gaining its independence again in 1991. Russians, Ukrainians, Byelorussians, and Estonians make up the diversity of the country. The old city is the best-preserved in Northern Europe. All the streets are lined with cobblestone and the buildings are much in the style of the medieval era. There's a gothic town hall at the epicenter of this old city and then the towering spire of St. Olaf's Church (which I learned was once the tallest building on earth). The day started off quite lovely and HOT! Whoa. For being so close to Russia and the north, it was pretty damn hot out there. We wound through the city to what the crew has remarked as one of THE best places to eat, the Kompressor. It definitely lived up to its reputation. We pretty much served ourselves by placing an order at the bar. We ordered 4 types of pancakes. One filled with bacon and smoked cheese, a garlic and cream, raspberries and sweet cream, and finally banana and honey. These were no ordinary pancakes and not crepes either. These had the size and feel of a crepe, but the thickness of a breakfast pancake. There was a slight saltiness to them as well as a sweetness. Yum!! We chowed down on those and washed it down with a lovely glass of pear cider. I tell ya, I have 5 rum and cokes in our bar and it doesn't go to my head like the pear cider out here. Whew! Last Tallinn we also went to a good medieval place to dine on some fabulous mushroom soup. The mushrooms were HUGE. It was called Olde Hansa. It was a great place if you like to eat meats like bear, rabbit, duck, deer, and other such odds and ends. We weren't very fond of the gamey nature of the menu, but the mushroom soup accompanied by the ale was lovely. I also had this pudding dessert with a saffron cream on top. It was soooo good. Anyway, back to today. I strolled around and found a good place to get free Internet and caught up some on my picture uploading. SO, look back on previous posts. I did what I could in the time I had. The shopping here is the cheapest of all the ports. Just strolling around town is wonderful. Right outside of Olde Hansa you can get a whiff of the brown sugar and butter roasted almonds. It glides through the air and right up into your nostrils and in a funny way reminds me of Christmas. They taste wonderful. Something to think about for the holidays. Incidentally, you CAN take a trip here to SEE good ole St. Nick in the North Pole. St. Nick's own church resides here in Tallinn. I keep forgetting that the idea of Santa Claus came from Europe. Who knew I was so close to him? Along the perimeter of the entrance to old town is a place called the "wall of wool." So named for the wares being sold. TONS of wool sweaters, scarves, hats, gloves, mittens, jackets, and all other sorts. These are crafty people. You can get a whole bunch of wood carvings, glass blown items, linens, and all sorts of other trinkets. Tallinn just takes you right back to those medieval times with every square inch in old town right down to the locals dressed up in the garb of the time. I guess it kind of compares to the recreations in the U.S. in places like Philadelphia or Williamsburg. I'm liking the ports up north so far. I just wish they were a little more inexpensive.

Wernemunde to Berlin..

Guten Tag. Yesterday started off a bright and early 6am as I traveled via train for 3 hours to Berlin, Germany. We boarded the train in the port city of Wernemunde and left the train in Lichtenburg in Berlin. Our first stop was the Brandenburg Gate. It was the largest of the customs gates built during the Soviet reign to regulate the comings and goings from East Berlin. The square has been built up tremendously over the past 6 or so years and we saw the pictures to prove it. Much of the city was still being renovated from the damage caused by World War II. The World Cup Soccer games are also happening here in Germany and Germany is doing well. As we were walking around the square everyone was getting ready for the game that was going to be shown on a big screen in the park on the other side of the gate. They all donned their face paint in the German colors, the colored hair, jerseys, or the many splotches of the German flag in various forms. They were blowing these little horns that blared in our ears and they called to each other with them as if it were a ritual. It was crazy, and as the day approached 5pm (World Cup time) it'd only get crazier. We had our history lesson on the Reichstag although we never went into it. That must be a different tour. At the time of the Berlin wall the Soviet Flag was flown on this building high above the city. We drove around town and saw the infamous (or according to our tour guide "well known" since he was trying to stay away from the word famous) TV tower that stood over the city with a huge globe at the top. Evidently this was to show West Berliners that the East Berliners were up to date on the latest communications during that time frame. It was decorated today as a soccer ball. We drove past a piece of the wall that still stood. The wall came down in 1989 just 2 years after Reagan spoke at the Brandenburg Gate saying it should come down. While the wall was being constructed, it was built as a double construction. There are the inner and outer walls. The place in between the 2 walls was known as the death strip. This was because over 80,000 guards patrolled this patch between the walls to prevent any escapes from East Berlin. Any attempts would be shot down by automatic fire. The same thing happened at the Iron Curtain separating east and West Germany only the wall there wasn't a double construction. Because of the reign of the Soviet Union inside the wall, the architecture reflects the horrible designs of the GDR (or German Democratic Republic). Although our guide says it was anything but a DEMOCRATIC republic. The wall was an interesting drive by and I do wish I got to stop there and actually look at both sides of the wall. Our guide was telling us that the West Berliners used the wall as a canvas for their graffiti. However on the east side it was kept clean because of the strict enforcement. When the wall came down, graffiti artists (the younger generations) had no canvas so they started using private property. Because of this there's graffiti all over the city and Germany is still coming up with ways to deal with it. After our drive by of the wall we had a stop at Checkpoint Charlie. This well known spot is where U.S. and Russian tanks had a stand off while the wall was being built. It was uncertain what would happen while these tanks stood face to face and caused great tension at that locale. Evidently when passing the wall at this point there were 3 checkpoints (Alpha, Bravo, and Charlie). This was probably due to the fact that leaving East Berlin at this point went into West Berlin, which was a part of the union of the French, British, and American allies. A sign was erected saying that as you approached East Berlin you where leaving United States territory. All the remains of the customs gates and the wall have been removed. The only thing that still remains is the American guardhouse that stands in the middle of the street. It was lunchtime and we enjoyed an exquisite German buffet meal at Maximilian's. I had potato soup, sauerkraut, pork loin, spaetzel, crepes, and some other delicacies. After leaving this place we drove by the holocaust war memorial. It was a huge space of land dedicated to the many people who lost their lives during this terrible time. No names were on the stones, just various stones arranged in a strange fashion with many levels all over the land. It's hard to describe and it gave me an eerie feeling as we passed. We were on our way to a riverboat that would take us into Potsdam where we'd see the sights of the Potsdam conference between the big 3 (Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin). We passed through Potsdam square which is entirely commercial and built up since the wall came down. We drove through parts of West Berlin in which the main boulevards were lines with the many famous chic stores that you'd find in London, Paris, Italy, or NYC. Once again World Cup fever was in the décor lining the center strip of the main boulevard as bushes were carved into orbs decorated like soccer balls. We arrived at our relaxing riverboat and cruised for a good hour down the Wannsee Lake. This lake is actually a river that was expanded. We saw the many homes lining this lake and as we drove to the riverboat we drove through some residential areas around this lake. I can say that these homes are GORGEOUS!! Also comes with the beauty factor is the price tag. I didn't get a quote, but judging from the reaction of the guides, they're only meant for the elite. We ended our riverboat cruise at the Meierei Brauhaus. It was a festive little Biergarten on the water and I could smell the familiar scent of hops being cooked in the air. I lived with that smell for 2 years while working in Virginia near the Anheiser Busch brewery. Ahh the memories. We walked down a shady path and beautiful gardens to the site of the Potsdam conference, Cecilienhof Palace. A gorgeous palace in the German style of architecture. All we needed was polka music. It's now a hotel on the lake and would make a lovely stay. We hiked over to the next palace, which was the home of Frederick, the Great (or in some circles Frederick II) known as the Sanssouci Palace or from its French translation "without worry" (Sans Souci). This palace had huge grounds and was ornately decorated. I also learned that the great Frederick was a little spoiled and flamboyantly gay. Evidently he wanted the entire palace to himself, so he constructed the main palace with a small guest room that he knew his guests would complain would be too small for their comfort. He did this on purpose so he could have the main palace to himself knowing the guests would stay elsewhere. Also his architect friend suggested that since the palace was on a hillside that he should have it raised to be seen from the beautiful gardens below as guests arrived. Instead he ordered construction to hide the palace so that as you approached it from the lake, the palace would appear hidden until you started climbing the stairs. It would appear that there was no palace to anyone just entering the grounds. The unfortunate part was that he had the illusion constructed to his short height of 4 foot and some inches. I also learned that he had a lover. A boyfriend that he paraded around Germany for several years before his father beheaded his lover and forced him to marry. Of course no children came from this marriage, so his nephew ended up taking reign upon his death. His nephew didn't even follow his wishes to be buried beside the palace with his 11 dogs (yes he was a dog lover). His nephew buried him next to his father in Berlin (how ironic) and 200 years later the family excavated his grave and carried out his wishes. We had little time to visit the vast grounds and beautiful gardens. There was even an old fashioned windmill right next to this palace. It was definitely a sight to see and the guide said you could easily spend a day here. Next vacation then I propose to stay at the Cecilienhof Palace and stroll around the grounds of the Sans Souci Palace. We traveled through Potsdam, which had been mostly restored after the war since it was much smaller than the huge city of east Berlin. Now it was time to board the train and leave Berlin, which was a good thing because just driving through Potsdam the crowds were getting large due to the approaching kick off time. In the 3-hour span it took to train home we found that Germany won their game today as the guides were all screaming and cheering in the rail cars. It was a long day (13 hours), but a very informative, enriching, and entertaining one.