Being Tourists in Denmark 2006

Decisions, Decisions

I’d booked a weeks holiday from work during the school summer holidays, and decided that we should have a short budget break somewhere. Maybe drive to Scotland? Or visit friends & family back down South? This year we had a heatwave in July, and the thought of a holiday in England is great when the weather is good, but we couldn’t rely on that by mid-August when my time off was booked. I think travelling abroad usually feels more like a ‘proper holiday’, so started researching on the internet for a budget holiday.

My sister, Mia had taken a trip to Denmark in June, to visit our cousin Camilla and her family. She had got a really cheap flight with Ryanair travelling from Stansted, so I took a look at what they were offering. Humberside is our closest airport, but a bit limited in flights and destinations offered. Even though Stansted is quite a distance from us (about 3 ½ hours drive), I thought it might be worth it if the flights are cheap enough? I discussed it with Liddi as I was tempted with Prague, or Dublin perhaps? Liddi was less impressed with those destinations, and asked if we could go to Denmark too? We could probably stay with Camilla, although she has a very small house and 2 young children, and was now living out in the country. We would be without a car, so possibly be a little cramped and stranded? I know Camilla would be very hospitable…but…not quite the holiday I was planning. Maybe another time? Liddi had only been to Denmark once, 7 years ago, when we went with my mother and we stayed with her 80 year old aunt Sylle in Fjerritslev, the village where my mum grew up. It’s where I had been on holiday many times during our childhood (staying with grandparents then), and much as it was lovely, and familiar, and reminiscent of childhood holidays, I always wished that if I went back to Denmark I would like to see another side to it, places we hadn’t visited before, and not be beholden to relatives. Be a real tourist!

Flights to Denmark were cheap. We could fly to Aarhus on the East coast of Jutland for just £13 each….hang on, did I read that correctly?? Yes, £13!! If I could find some cheap accommodation also, then that sounded like a perfect idea! Aarhus is the 2nd largest city in Denmark after Copenhagen. That may make it sound like a sprawling metropolis, but you must remember that in Denmark nothing is too big. With a population of just over 5million people, nicely spread out, it is not like visiting London or a big English city. I spoke with Mia, and she said that if I contact the Aarhus Tourist Board, they have a list of people who have rooms available in their houses which can be rented much more cheaply than a hotel. Not exactly bed and breakfast, firstly because there is no breakfast offered, but mostly because it’s usually a more casual arrangement where they may just have one spare room for occasional visitors, rather than run a B&B business. Sounded perfect – I sent an email, got a list of people offering rooms, and sent messages to several asking for prices and availability. I was thinking that mid-August could be peak tourist season and I might have problems with availability, but as it turns out of the 10 messages I sent, about 6 had availability, so I had lots to choose from! I had a very prompt message from one lady, Mette, who said it was just her and her 14-year old daughter, and they were only a walk or bus ride from the city centre. The bathroom and kitchen was shared with them. The room cost 325 DKR per night (about £32 for us both). It all sounded perfect! I went ahead and made a reservation.

Pre-Holiday Preparation

Now I had booked our holiday, and had something to look forward to, I dug out the ‘Learning Danish’ book and CDs that mum had given me. I had planned to give it a try, but now I had a real incentive! Although not able to hold a full conversation in Danish, I have been brought up listening to Danish spoken whether it was on our holidays visiting relatives, or mum’s weekly telephone conversations with Sylle or other Danish people she’d rather not speak too, but would manage to anyway for an hour or more! I love hearing the Danish language spoken, and get excited even to hear English spoken with a Danish accent. I do understand quite a bit of the language, but unfortunately for me, all Danes speak such good English that I never get much of a chance to practice a conversation with the little Danish I can muster, before we revert to speaking in English. Maybe this time would be different?

20 minutes practice a day… play the CD in the car on the way to work…I’ll be fluent by the time we head off for Aarhus! Easy!!

Head off for work, CD in my hand, slip it into the CD player, wait a while, CD spat out. My CD player is a little temperamental, but I’m sure I can get it to work eventually? Forget for a few days…try again. No luck. My journey from work is 20 minutes to home. Eventually, I get it working when I’m about 3 minutes from home. I daren’t stop it playing now! Sit in the car outside my house for 15 minutes listening to the CD. I should have brought the book too, as much of it is referring to stuff in the book! Listen to the section on pronunciation and running through the alphabet.

Try as I might, there are some letters where I just CAN’T hear the difference – mum has tried to teach us this “surely you can hear the difference between æ, ø, and other vowels as they all sound completely different?” well, actually, no, I can’t hear the difference, but I’ll keep trying!.


I liked the conversation bits best on the CD and was pleased to find that I understood virtually every word! – all about Hans picking up his friend George from the railway station in Copenhagen after he had traveled by boat from Harwich to Esbjerg (aah, sweet memories!), and then taking a train to Copenhagen. English George spoke perfect Danish – lucky him! They made plans for eating, drinking (favourite Danish pastimes) and some sightseeing and visiting friends and neighbours. They comment several times about how ‘hyggeligt’ everything is.

‘Hyggeligt’ is an mportant word in the Danish vocabulary, translated as ‘cosy’, but describing more of the atmosphere created rather than simply being ‘cosy’.

In July, England was hit by a heatwave, perhaps I can borrow Liddi’s CD walkman and learn on the beach at Skipsea? I am informed that the CD walkman hasn’t been working for some while, so not possible.

Oh well…plenty of time…where’s my bikini?

August arrives, the heatwave has disappeared and seems to have been replaced suddenly by Autumn, and I admit I have not progressed very far with my language skills, but let’s face it, they all speak such good English anyway! Anyway, it’s always easier to pick up a language when you are in the country….

Saturday 19th Aug – DAY 1
Left home at 1.30am (not a time to get up by choice, but one of the odd things you do only when going on holiday!). Drove 3 ½ hours to Stansted. Watched the sunrise over Essex. Lovely. No traffic problems (obviously – it was the middle of the night!). We headed for the well sign-posted Long Term Car Park.

Pink Elephant – who thought of that name for a chain of Long Term airport car parks?? Was it after a heavy night at the cocktail bar?

The previous week there was a major security scare at UK airports. Extra restrictions in hand luggage have been imposed, and everyone was being checked rigorously. We arrived in plenty of time for our 2 hour check-in, but Stansted was in chaos! It took nearly 2 hours just to check-in. I don’t think this was all to do with the extra security checks, but was partly because they seemed hopelessly disorganized with queues of people snaking all through chairs and around desks and corners, no-one knowing where they were supposed to be, with people to ask being surprisingly scarce. I spoke with a man who took a regular weekly Ryanair flight to Spain, and he said it was like that every week, irrespective of the extra security arrangements! Going through to the departure lounge we had to take off our shoes and Liddi was very, very thoroughly frisked all over, much to her horror and embarrassment, by a uniformed, middle-aged woman. However, being rubbed vigorously up and down her trousers did promote a giggly, ticklish response! I’m sure the security staff were used to that?

We managed to rush to the correct gate, just in time, without any time to look at the duty free or tax free shops or whatever they are now (not actually free at all!), but did grab a smoked salmon sandwich (well, I was on holiday!). The plane left at 7.30am. We had our smoked salmon breakfast.

Was it too early for a gin & tonic? (I had been up for about 7 hours now, so did that constitute a kind of late lunch??), ok, I’ll stick to a tomato juice for now. Plenty of time to catch up later!

We arrived in Denmark at 10:10am (allowing for one hour difference). Everything smart, neat, organized, punctual and friendly. This sums up Denmark! Bags ready within 10 minutes. Took the bus to City centre. Clean and comfortable.

Liddi was amused to see signs on the bus showing images of things forbidden – drinks, cigarettes, ice-cream .… and pølser (Danish hotdog).


I remember when we were children and just arrived in Denmark for our holiday, driving through the countryside always looked so…..Danish! Well, it didn’t look like Surrey where we’d come from anyway, so the difference must be because we were in Denmark, right? Now, looking at the countryside of wide open spaces, neat fields ready for harvesting, a few houses dotted about on the landscape and few cars, it reminded me of …..Yorkshire!

Toni and I would always look out for ‘dragons’, which was something else we didn’t see in Weybridge. A ‘dragon’ was an agricultural machine with a slim neck and funnel shaped top that rode along behind a tractor and spat out fire. Well, actually it was probably dried grass or some other crops, but we thought it looked like fire coming from the dragon’s mouth.

I saw one just outside Aarhus and pointed to it, saying to Liddi “ooh, look, a dragon!”. She looked at me strangely and was unimpressed., saying it was only farm machinery! I started to explain, but she didn’t really seem very interested…anyway, we have them in Yorkshire!

We got to Aarhus station and stepped off the bus. Mette had emailed me instructions of how to get to her house :

How to get to Præstehaven 39 from the Train Station:
There are a lot of busses to our place (3, 14, 15 are my favorites) and in 10 minutes you'll be there. Place yourself with your back against the façade of the train station and just opposite you'll find a lot of different bus-number - go for 3 or 14 (no 15 is just around the corner to the left still with your back to the station).

So, we placed ourselves squarely with our back against the façade of the station, and looked across at all the lovely buses. I don’t understand how she could possibly say which ones were her favourites, as they all looked fairly similar to us, whatever the number! However, each to their own opinion! We saw several bus shelters next to each other and headed over to look for the correct number bus. But, hey, what’s this? A small snack hut next to the bus stops selling pølser. Well, we simply couldn’t resist, could we? We had a lovely ‘proper’ Danish rød pølser, with all the trimmings – crispy onions, raw onions, ketchup, mustard and remoulade. Delicious! Liddi and I promised ourselves that we’d have a pølser every day we were in Denmark. We knew we couldn’t take our pølser on the bus (after seeing the signs on the previous bus), so we sat in the sunshine, enjoying our snack, not in any rush, pleased to be in Denmark on the first day of our holiday.

I was listening to a conversation in Danish between a dad and his 2 daughters who were sat near us, and I was smiling at some of the replies the little girls were giving their dad to his questions. Liddi looked at me – “what are you smiling at?” I whispered (in case he could understand me) “I’m listening to their conversation and it’s funny – I’ll tell you what they are saying later”.

I was pleased to find that I did understand a lot of what was being said around me, and during the course of the next few days, I would often listen into a conversation and then report to Lydia what was being said. Being a super-cool teenager, she didn’t want to admit that she was impressed with her mum’s language skills, although she did say she hadn’t realized I knew so much Danish. I know she was impressed really! She even wanted me to teach her some words, not that she would be speaking them to any Danes. Obviously!

We finished our pølser and got on a Number 3 bus. Mette said it would only take 10 minutes. After about 15 minutes, we didn’t seem to have passed any of the landmarks that she said we would, so I was getting a little worried. After 20 minutes, I gave in and went to speak to the driver when we next stopped. He didn’t seem to speak any English, so I showed him the name of the stop we were looking for, and he shook his head. That was a worrying sign! He pointed to a bus stop across the road, and said we should get off his bus and wait at that other bus stop (he said it in Danish but I understood!). He said to take bus No. 3. (wasn’t that the number of the bus we were on??). Anyway, we did as we were told, and I realized that we were waiting for a bus to go in the opposite direction to the way we’d just been. We were just outside the town now, by a large road junction with nothing except road, cars and a bus stop. Several buses stopped, but no number 3. About 15 minutes later, much to our relief, we saw a No. 3 bus. We got ready to get on the bus, only to find the driver smiling at us. He was the same bus driver that had dropped us off on the other side of the road. He’d obviously been wherever he was going, and was now on his way back. Couldn’t we just have stayed on the bus?? Anyway, we went back into town, did a complete tour, then drove back passed the train station, feeling a sense of deja vu, and stopped at a bus stop on the other side of the road from the one we had initially taken, and then headed off in the opposite direction. So much for Mette’s clear instructions. After about 10 minutes (she was right about that!), we got to the bus stop on Viborvej and got off. By now it was about 12 noon.

We found Mette’s house, and were welcomed in. She was a fairly short woman with a mass of curly, ginger hair. Not very typically Danish at all! We met their dog, Lucky, who was a cute Westie and very friendly. Mette gave us a quick tour of the house and we put our cases in our bedroom. Liddi and I had a double bed, but Mette said that it had 2 separate mattresses and quilts, so we could separate it to put one mattress on the floor if we wanted to make two beds, much to Lydia’s relief!

As I said, the weather was warm and sunny. The air was really very warm and pleasant. Great for being on holiday! Last week at home it had been cold and gloomy. Jumpers and socks weather! Hardly seemed like mid-August, especially after July’s heatwave. Yet here in Denmark the air was warm and it was very bright and sunny. We got our sandals out and put on our strappy t-shirts (bringing along a cardigan just in case!).

When you consider that Denmark is as far North as Scotland, we must be lucky that it always seems to be warm and sunny when we visit.

We came back down and had a chat with Mette. She described herself as a ‘human anthropologist’ and explained what that meant. (Ok, I didn’t really understand, but did lots of nodding and smiling). She preferred to do research at Universities, but there wasn’t much work about so she was currently working as a care worker in the community for elderly people, which meant she was working 3pm 'till midnight for each of the days during our stay in Denmark. That sounded great to me, as we got the house to ourselves in the evenings!

She explained that her 14 year old daughter, Meja, was away for the weekend in Germany with some friends as they had gone to see the band “Tokyo Hotel” – had we heard of them? No. She showed us around the house, and opened the door into Meja’s room. It was covered with posters of “Tokyo Hotel”, who were a boy band from Germany. When I say ‘boy’ band, that’s exactly what I mean. Boys. They looked to be about 14 or 15 years old! Liddi looked unimpressed, despite Mette’s enthusiasm! Somehow I doubt that we’re going to hear of them in England.

The house was all very smart and stylish, neat and tidy, and looked very Danish. It always makes me wish we lived like the Danes, and I vowed to try to smarten my house up a bit more when I got home, make it a bit more ‘Danish’ and take away some of the ideas from Mette’s house!

When I went into the bathroom, I smiled to see that the stone floor was exactly the same as the floor that my grandparents had in their house, where we used to stay as kids. It was a ‘wet room’ which was pretty standard in Denmark at that time, and was very practical. The house was built around 1940 and I’ll bet it was the original floor. Mette’s house would have originally been a ‘wet room’ too as the open drainage was still there, but now with a pipe running into it. It’s amazing how small details like looking at the floor can evoke such fond memories!

Home magazines these days in the UK are full of this new idea of ‘wet rooms’ like it’s only just been invented and is a new and expensive luxury for English bathroom lovers. As with most stylish, practical things, it’s been around in Denmark for years!

We headed back outside and over the road to the large supermarket opposite called ‘Kvickly’ for some essential provisions: tea, milk, juice, butter, etc. We bought some proper Danish breakfast rolls for the morning (they should be bought fresh but the shop would be shut tomorrow). Now was there anything else essential?? Oh, yes, wine! We took it all back to the house to put in the fridge, and found that Mette had already left for work.

There is something really fun about pottering around supermarkets on holiday, and finding all sorts of new and interesting things as well as lots of tempting, gorgeous food that we don’t usually find at home, and some things that you don’t even know what they are. But why is it they all have such daft sounding names? Fancy calling a supermarket ‘Kvickly’ – as if you should be rushing around shopping in a hurry!


We left the house again in the warm sunshine, in no particular hurry, and decided to walk into town rather than take the bus (especially after this mornings bus fiasco!). Mette did say it should only take 15 minutes or so. We knew we had to head downhill to start with. We did have some maps in the bedroom which we hadn’t taken, but it would be fun to explore! The 15 minutes turned into 30, then 45 before we hit anything that resembled a town centre. Wait a minute, this is looking familiar…we’re back at the railway station! We looked at a few shops, but quite a few were closed. In Denmark many shops close at midday on Saturday, so only the bigger shops were still open. We were happy to just walk around, window shopping, and familiarizing ourselves with Aarhus where we would spend the next 4 days.

The short walk into town, which took much longer than expected, reminded us of a walk we did while on holiday in Zakynthos with mother. We had decided to follow a sign to a museum and monestry which claimed to be outside the town, only 3 km away, but after several hours, and after passing further signs along the way for the museum which still claimed to be 3km away, we decided this measurement was a kind of poetic license allowed to the Greeks, possibly to distract the tourists. After several hours in blistering hot sun we did eventually reach a small shack and café where they were obviously surprised to see us, or anyone for that matter! However the day proved to be a real adventure and well worth the journey.

It started raining a bit, but it was still warm. By 5.30 it started raining some more. Being the eternal optimist, and obviously completely un-British, I had not brought an umbrella, so we decided to find somewhere to shelter and treat ourselves to an early dinner. After all, it had been an early start and a long day.

We found a good, ‘hyggeligt’, restaurant and Lydia ordered steak with béarnaise sauce (her favourite dish), and I had a great Danish dish, Bixemad, which is bits of left over meat, ham, potato and onion, all fried together and served with a fried egg and ryebread. It was delicious, and the portion was enormous. So much so, that I only managed half and asked to take the remainder home in a doggy bag! Food in Denmark is not cheap, but it’s very good and it was the start of our holiday, and it was lovely to be out enjoying Denmark, so I was happy to add the £30 meal to my Visa.

By the time we left around 7pm, it was still raining a little, but also warm, so we decided to walk back to the house. The journey took only about 30 mins this time. We were familiarizing ourselves a bit with our new surroundings.

When we got back, I broke open my new carton(!) of wine that had been nicely chilling in the fridge, and poured myself a glass of holiday wine. I raised my glass and said ‘skål’, and sat down in the lounge to enjoy our first evening on holiday. Mette had said that we could make ourselves at home and that there was lots of English-speaking programmes on the TV. I thought it would be fun to find some Danish TV, but I was wrong! I only found a couple of channels to flick through, and one was just starting the British film, Clockwise, starring John Cleese. We sat down to watch.

We heard a key in the door and then I remembered that Mette had said her friend would be walking the dog and letting himself and the dog in later. The friend, Derek, came in and introduced himself. He was a Scouser who had lived in Denmark for some 30 years, and consequently spoke English with a strange accent. He said he had a type of allotment nearby with a small wooden house on it. I was thinking of my dad’s allotment and his small 7 x 5 shed. Similar I expect?

Turns out the ‘small wooden house’ was more of a Danish summerhouse, which means it probably wasn’t all that small, and was probably very cosy and smart. The area of allotment was also fairly large. He lived there all summer and then had another house for the winter. I want to live like that!!

After Derek left, Liddi went to bed, and I must admit I ended up dozing a bit on the sofa, so missed large gaps of the film, which was probably a good thing. It had been a long day!


Sunday 20th Aug – DAY 2

After a good nights sleep we awoke, all excited to be on holiday and in a strange place. We got up and had our rolls and pastry bought the day before. Lydia and I vowed to have pastries every day, as well as pølser. Mmm very healthy!!

In Denmark, they don’t call their pastries ‘Danish pastries’, they call them ‘wienerbrød’ which means Vienna bread and they are so much tastier than the Danish pastries we buy in England!

The shops are shut in Denmark on Sundays, so we thought it was a good excuse to try something else. We set off down the hill towards the town, and passed a very large graveyard, next to a really smart modern building, which turned out to be the crematorium (obviously!). Graveyards in Denmark are not like in England. They are really neat and well tended, and without any sign of garish coloured flowers or ornaments. They tend to blend in more with the surroundings, with small shrubs and heathers being preferred to vases of cut flowers. They don’t have gravestones like in England, but tend to have large bolders or rocks, simply carved and blending into the surroundings. It makes for a very beautiful and interesting walk. There was a section of ‘English-style’ gravestones, and these turned out to be for English soldiers killed in Denmark in the 2nd world war. I wonder if their families have visited? I’m sure they would be impressed if they had.

Everyone in my family has always been fairly keen on taking a walk around a graveyard. Not in a morbid way, but because each gravestone tells a story or holds a secret, and the peace and tranquility make for a relaxing and pleasant walk. Danish graveyards are neat and simple, yet smart and stylish, and a pleasure to be a part of…like everything else in Denmark really!

After a very pleasant walk, we headed back out towards the road, and came across a pølser hut (they are in abundance in Danish towns!), and of course had to stop for some lunch. Delicious!

Next we made a visit to Den Gamle By (the old town), which was a type of living museum. A small old town, many original buildings, some had been carefully dismantled from other areas of Aarhus and re-mantled in Den Gamle By, and new ones built to look old, all full of original features, artifacts and memorabilia. The streets were all cobbled, and a small river ran through the town. It was beautiful and was really like stepping back in time.


All the staff were dressed in old costumes, and some were in the shops and houses acting 'in character' and chatting with the 'tourists' about what they were up to. Some of the shops were really selling things - ie., the baker, the sweet shop and the general store. There was, of course, a gift shop which was tasteful, smart and neat. The cafe was smart and clean with very tempting food and drink, and naturally there was a 'kro' (pub) all lit by candles and selling Danish beers.

In between the warm sunshine, we would get a sudden downpour of rain. Luckily, I had borrowed an umbrella from Mette, although it was better to dash inside a building. I found the tailor's shop particularly interesting as my great-grandfather had been a tailor and from some of the tales my mother had told, he had probably worked with similar products to those shown.



It was really interesting to see how the guttering and drains coped well with the sudden, yet large amounts of rain. It was all such a simple and effective system, and all ran down into the streams. Is it a sign of getting older (or more boring) that I was impressed by the drainage system??

We spent several hours at Den Gamle By, and really we could have happily spent all day there. It was a great value day out, and one I would definitely recommend to anyone visiting Aarhus!

We got back to the house tired and slightly damp. Dinner consisted of the left-over Bixemad from the night before, lightly re-fried with some delicious home-made liverpate and Danish rye bread.

One of the first Danish phrases I was taught by my grandfather (morfar) when I was very little was “Det va dejlig” which means “that was lovely”. The Danes love good food, and like to praise the food and the host(ess) whenever possible.

The house was empty (or was it?). We had spotted a pack of playing cards on the bookshelf and decided to play some ‘Gin Rummy’. My morfar had been very keen on playing Gin Rummy and had taught us his version of the game when we were kids, so playing it always made me think fondly of him (aah, I can almost smell the Tuborg and roll-up cigarettes that went with it!). I knew that as I’d been playing for many years, inevitably I’d beat Liddi easily, but I wanted also to teach her to play better so that it would be more challenging for us both. We put up a stake for the winner. “How much can you afford to lose?” I said to Liddi. She laughed and asked me the same question! We decided on 20 Danish Krone.

Turns out she was a fast learner, and I lost 20 DKR!! After that we decided not to bet with money!

Liddi went upstairs to visit the toilet, and decided to talk another quick peek into Meja’s room (a teenager’s room is always fascinating, especially to another teenager!). She opened the door to discover Meja sitting in her room, quietly tapping away on her computer, on MSN messenger to her friends. Liddi was very surprised to see her, as we thought we had the house to ourselves. Meja was obviously also surprised to see Liddi opening her door and looking into her bedroom! They smiled briefly, said hello, and closed the door. We heard nothing more from Meja that evening (nor indeed for the next few days we were staying in the house).

We studied the tourist brochures for plans for tomorrow. We wanted to see the art museums but they were closed on Mondays, so shopping?

Monday 21st Aug – DAY 3

Whilst Lydia was having her morning shower, I went out to buy fresh rolls from Kvickly, together with a couple of lovely fresh pastries, ready for our breakfast, a perfect start to the day!

When back in the kitchen and making tea, Mette breezed in, smiling broadly and asking how our day was yesterday, and what our plans were for the day ahead. After a brief chat she went on to announce, “well, it seems we have a menstruation house today”. I saw the look of shock on Lydia’s face, and wondered a) did she really mean to say that or was there a translation error; and b) what was she going to follow that comment with? It appears she was well aware of the meaning of the word, when she went on to state, “I have my menstruation, and so does my daughter Meja, and I think one of you do also?”. The shock on Lydia’s face turned to disbelief, so I quickly said (to save Lydia’s obvious embarrassment), “oh yes, it’s me – I am a bit early this month. I think that often happens in a house full of women, doesn’t it?”. It was a strange start to the day, and Lydia and I laughed about it when we were out of the house, commenting on how bizarre of Mette to mention it. It turns out things were going to get more bizarre…..

We’d planned to find the ‘Latin Quarter’ which was good for shopping and cafes and the Cathedral where there were some interesting buildings and museums. We could take the bus, but we decided once again to walk. You see so much more on foot. With the help of our trusty map, we found the pedestrian only shopping area fairly easily. One street they had 3 Hennes & Mauritz shops (that’s a good thing!). Cheap and cheerful or bargain souvenirs are not words you are likely to hear in Denmark. As always, everything was smart, tasteful and tempting (apart from the price). There is a river running through the centre of the city, which makes for a good navigation point. We did go into H&M (OK, we did go into all 3, and then back to the first one!).

Shopping is very tiring and makes you feel quite exhausted. It’s very important to have several stops for drinks and snacks!


I must admit that we didn’t come away laden with shopping bags and bargains. In fact we bought just one school jumper for Lydia (saves a bit of laborious shopping time when returning home), and also a pack of playing cards in the sale (both from H&M obviously!). Hardly last of the big spenders (ooh, I feel a song coming on!).

On the way back home, we decided to walk through a park which bordered the main road. It looked at first like a small park, but the pathway through it twisted and turned, and led away to other grass and wooded areas and we soon lost sight of the road, or had any idea of where we were, and discovered that the park was a bit like a tardis. So, what was to be a slight detour for a scenic route, ended up as a pleasant and relaxing (or at least it would have been if we weren’t thinking about how to find a toilet!) adventure that added over an hour to our return journey.

We eventually got back to the house weary from all our walking, looking forward to a house to ourselves and a relaxing dinner with a chilled glass of wine or fruit juice (guess which is my choice and which is Lydia’s?).

Glass of wine in hand, I noticed a note from Mette!

“Dear Jenny & Lydia. Hope your day turned out nice! ♥ As I informed you, you are free to use the kitchen for making breakfast & tea/coffee, and use the dining room for eating breakfast. However, I would like you to respect the privacy of this house and not use the living area of my family (living room, etc), also the kitchen is only for use for coffee/tea making outside breakfast times. All the best, Mette”

The door to the lounge had been shut and locked. Now, this made us laugh because the layout of the downstairs was mostly open-plan. As you came through the front door to the hallway, there was a door to the right to the dining area, which had a dining table (and a very noisy budgie – what is the point of those??). This area was open straight through to the lounge. From the hallway to the left was a door way into a galley style kitchen, with an open end wall/breakfast bar accessible from both the kitchen and lounge. From the hallway straight ahead is a door into the lounge. It was this door that was locked, although by walking through the dining area, you came through to the lounge anyway. So, it’s not that we couldn’t get into the lounge as the area was open plan. The locked door was simply a demonstration! Bizarre!!

I must admit that I couldn’t help standing at the end of the dining area and putting my toe over the invisible line that would be the threshold into the lounge in a rebellious, childish, demonstrative way.

Unfortunately by then we had just cooked some lovely ‘rød pølser’ bought from Kvickly with crispy onions and we were sat in the dining area eating it, while reading her note telling us that we were not allowed to do this!! After we had got over the shock and stopped laughing, we decided that Mette was out at work, so she wouldn’t know, and so long as we washed up and cleared away, no harm would be done? We hadn’t heard anything from Meja so we didn’t know whether she was tucked into her bedroom with the door locked, or out?

It was a bit strange though! She had not told us of these rules before we arrived or during our first day discussion. I thought we were able to share the house with them, especially as Mette would not be there in the evenings as she was out working. On the Saturday night, she had said “make yourself at home” and you’ll find lots of English programmes on the TV if you want to watch. So what changed her mind??

After that episode, she became known as ‘Mad Mette’.

We finished our dinner and washed up, rather than putting things in the dishwasher, to remove evidence of our activities. We were discussing the weirdness of the arrangement, and still laughing. Lydia was putting away the plates, and I said quite flippantly “we’ll be alright, so long as we don’t break anything!”….well, need I really say what happened next? I’m sure you’re ahead of me on this one! I’m still cringing at the thought! In front of the plates in the kitchen cupboard was a couple of small, pretty coffee cups that looked like Royal Copenhagen Porcelain or similar. In complete slow motion, one of the cups toppled forward….oops, still a chance to catch it….fumbled and dropped….Liddi was also trying to save it….but all to no avail. The cup fell on the hard mahogany kitchen work surface and smashed. We both looked at it open mouthed and then looked at each other. Oh My God! That’s done it now, we’re in real trouble! I scooped up the pieces and put it into a little plastic bag. We’ll have to tell her, and apologise, and offer to pay. How shall we do that? What should we offer?

Despite the fact that no-one else was in the lounge, we decided to do as we were told and shut ourselves quietly into our bedroom and play cards.

We did later hear Meja emerge from her room and shuffle downstairs to get a drink and food, then disappear back into her room and shut the door. So, she was in! I hope she didn’t hear the breaking cup? At least she would be able to tell her mum that we had obeyed instructions and were not spending the evening downstairs in the lounge.

Was this ‘hyggeligt’ ? Well, not in a typically Danish way, but it was good for Liddi and I to spend time together with no music, phones, TV, etc. Liddi was getting very keen on playing cards, and unfortunately getting quite good at it too, beating me on several occasions!


Tuesday 22nd Aug – DAY 4

We snuck down for breakfast, hoping not to bump into Mette. We were feeling guilty about the broken cup. Obviously! We’d written a note, sincerely apologising, and leaving a 50 DKR note (approx £5). There was no sign of anyone else in the house, so we decided to get ourselves out and about as quickly as possible.

Outside the house, we felt relieved to have escaped without facing Mad Mette. We started to run down the road, laughing, like naughty children escaping a telling off from mum!

We had decided that today was our cultural day. We headed to the Aros Art museum. Aros was the original Viking name given to the town of Aarhus. Lydia and I love art. That doesn’t mean we love all art, just that we love to see in case it’s lovely or inspirational or clever or all of that. The museum had only been opened a couple of years, and was large, spacious and modern with an eclectic mix of old and modern art.

There was an amateur black and white film showing on one of the stairwell walls of a naked man, lying down on a field of grass, with a small toy airplane circling above his head, tied to a piece of string which was attached to the man’s…er…manhood! Is it art or simply madness?

Some of the modern art was very odd indeed! Just inside the entrance was a huge “new and unique” sculpture of a crouching boy. I knew I’d seen it before and yet I’d never been to the museum. Then I remembered it was an exhibit in the Millennium Dome at Greenwich which we visited in 2000.

Despite being slated by the critics and most people with an opinion (most of who hadn’t been), I loved the Dome and it thought it was a wonderful treat containing artistic, creative, education and fantasy elements all under one beautifully structured roof.

At the Aros museum, there were stairs leading to the roof where you could take a look at the panoramic views (once you peeped around the very large air conditioning units), and you could see the sea and views all across Aarhus.
I love a good view, so we took a couple of photos, but I also have a fear of heights so we decided it may be better to explore a bit more on ground level. After leaving the Aros museum, we headed back towards the centre of Aarhus to take a look at the port area to see if there were any cosy cafes overlooking the sea. There was a main road, noisy working port with large ships and a railway line. So, we decided to head back towards the Cathedral.

I was hoping for a café serving good value, Danish cold table. After much searching we ended up at an American-style pizza restaurant. Not exactly what I had in mind, but loads of good, tasty food nevertheless.

After lunch, time for more museums! I had read about a ‘Viking Museum’ which seemed to be at the same address as a Danish bank. We entered the bank, and I headed towards one of the cashiers to ask if they knew where the museum was. Just inside the bank doors, there were stairs heading down, and a small sign saying “Viking Museum”. It seems that when they excavated the bank, they found it was part of an old Viking settlement, so parts of it were displayed with the artefacts found there and at other places around the city, which were all put in the museum. It wasn’t very big, but it was free. They still went ahead and built a modern bank above it! In the bank we even got free coffee and tea. Great bank!

Last museum of the day was the nearby “Women’s museum”. It was a history of women’s things. There was a whole section of antique menstruation products – must be a popular subject in Denmark! Lots of things to do with children also. There was a ‘chill out room’. A totally white room with a couple of huge white bean bags, with some gentle music and some changing coloured lights to relax to. Lydia and I gladly took off our shoes as requested and stretched out fully on a bean bag each. Just us in the room. Chilling.

Aaah, we could have spent hours in there, until a group of Japanese tourists decided to come in and take a look and spoil our tranquillity.

We then found a room, a mini library, with books that could be used for research or just reading. Most were in Danish, but some in English. I headed for the map section. I love maps! There were some computers in the room with a step by step guide to the museum. Lydia asked me if I thought they were connected to the internet? I said I didn’t think so. I was wrong. It must be one of those ‘generational’ things in that I would just go through the programme that was showing on the computer, do as I was told, and Lydia wanted to fiddle about and try something different. She worked out how to close their programme and get on the internet. In no time I noticed she was communicating with a couple of friends on MSN Messenger! I gave in and got on another computer to send a quick email, despite the difficulty we had with finding a few characters on the Danish keyboard. We had to be quick as the museum was closing and we didn’t want to be told off.

Was this holiday to consist of us behaving like naughty children trying to avoid being told off (and not always managing) ?

We knew we couldn’t go back to the house and cook any dinner, but we did have a huge, filling lunch. So, we decided to splash out on something easy and delicious for an early dinner. Guess what? Yes, you’re getting the hang of this - pølser!

Wed 23rd Aug – DAY 5

Last day today. We were feeling quite relieved to be leaving Mette’s house, and ready to go home, but also feeling that we hadn’t spent enough time in Aarhus. After packing my case, I left Liddi to finish her packing and took my last trip to Kvickly. Whizzed around the shop…you guessed it…quickly! Picked up several packets of a popular Danish fruity, gummy, sweets called ‘Spunk’ which always goes down very well as a souvenir gifts back home, especially with Lydia’s friends. Can’t think why! They’re just like mini wine gums.

Got back to enjoy our last breakfast of rolls and pastries. I was so disappointed to find that my milk decided to fall out of the carton in lumps and was clearly undrinkable. No tea. Oh no!!

We said our goodbyes to Mette, in a polite way, and left with our wheely suitcases. She told us we could store our suitcases at the railway station.

We could take the bus, but then why change the precedent we had set now? We’d managed to walk everywhere so far. What’s the problem with dragging a couple of suitcases behind us as we walked. They had wheels afterall.. All that walking was the perfect antidote to our pølser and wienerbrød.

We got to the station and found the lockers. They looked small and we had 2 fairly large suitcases. I opened one of the lockers to find it was enormous inside! We could put both suitcases in one locker and could have probably both slept there for the week as well. All for approx £2!

We spent one more day looking at the shops. Mostly window shopping again for us, but lots of lovely things to look at. I managed to find a shop which sold traditional Danish open sandwiches. Finally – on our last day! I had a delicious and beautiful roast beef open sandwich, but I couldn’t get a cup of tea which I was now craving.

The search for tea now became a quest.


Of course I could find tea that cost about £3 per cup, and was heavily perfumed, but that was not what I fancied. In the end, I gave in and I have to admit that I went to McDonalds. It cost about 80p, and the extremely polite man opened a lovely wooden box, where I could choose from a selection of about 10 different varieties of tea. I chose ‘traditional English breakfast tea’. Had to go back to get milk, as it doesn’t come as standard, and then took a seat outside to watch the world go by and drink tea. Bliss!

Recent surveys have shown that the Danish people are the most content nation with their lifestyle and happy to live in Denmark. It's easy to see why, and the people are indeed happy and content. It appears even the graffiti artist are content with their lot!

After a full and exhausting day, we caught the bus from outside the train station at 5.30pm to arrive at the airport at 6.30. It was the only bus we could get to be sure of our check-in at 8pm. We got to the airport. We were the only people there! The flight to Stansted was the only flight leaving that evening.

It was a bit like the BA advert – “Where has everybody gone?”

We went to the café. We had tried to make this a ‘budget’ holiday and were down to our final 60 DKR (about £6). That was what it cost us for chips and 2 drinks. Aren’t airport’s expensive? We had a couple of hours to spare, with no shops to look at, so…..time for a quick game of Gin Rummy, or two, or three!

Eventually people started to trickle in to the airport.

It’s always easy to tell who is English and who is Danish. Or, so I thought. This was the first time I’d seen quite so many Asian passengers who’s children all spoke perfect Danish, despite the adults mostly speaking their native tongue!

We sat aboad the Ryanair flight on our journey back to England. Being a budget airline, you have to pay for drinks and can also buy sandwiches and snacks. Everyone who bought anything, got given a raffle ticket. We were told to hold on to our tickets as someone on the flight would definitely win a free flight with Ryanair. Whoop-de-doo! Marketing hype was what I thought! Anyway, as we were nearing Stansted, the flight attendants excitedly said they were going to announce the winning ticket. Our initial air tickets were very cheap, but then add on all the extras, and the holiday had not been quite so cheap afterall*. For that reason, I was hoping I was not going to win – but then, if you think that it’s probably inevitable, isn’t it? So, my number was called out, and the winner was encouraged to wave their ticket in the air. I did as I was told. Dam! I meant to keep it quiet!! The attendant came over, congratulated me enthusiastically, asked my name and then told me I would get details of how to claim my free flight before we disembarked. Then – can you believe it – they announced my name and seat number over the tannoy!

Now, there are some people (some of whom I now quite well!) who like to be the centre of attention, or to be noticed in a crowd, but I am not one of those people, so I did find this public display most embarrassing!

We arrived back in damp, dreary Stansted at 11:45pm, tired and ready to go home. We had to wait until 1pm to get our cases. Welcome back in England! I was not looking forward to the long drive back to Driffield. We arrived home at 5am and fell straight into bed, to sleep through until 10am. I had visitors due to arrive later that day. By the time we awoke, memories of our holiday in Denmark already seemed an age away!

Farvel Danmark. Vi ses i igen!



*Flights only £13 each…..how cheap is that? Seems cheap enough, but was this really the ‘Nail Soup’ of travel plans?? -

So now for the figures:
Flights (x 2 = £26 + £60 taxes & fees + £10 baggage + £7 cc charge = £103)
Accommodation. Room cost 1300 KR (4 nights – approx £32 per night).
Airport parking - £36
Travel insurance - £11
Petrol to/from Stansted £40
£318 & spending approx £200 = Total cost for 5 days holiday £518

- so you see why I did not take up Ryanairs offer of ‘free’ flight!!

2 people/ 5 days – over £500 – is that good or bad?!
Maybe Denmark is not the best place for cost cutting holiday?? – how about Prague next year??

Suggestions on a postcard please (preferably from a tried and tested budget destination!).