This is not a normal thing for those that are out serving all over the world but here in the ME/AN Area (Middle East/Africa North Area) everyone gets to take a 10 day leave from our volunteer service in the summer. This stems from the fact that it is scalding hot in these areas and most of the church leaders, US govt workers and many ward/branch members take off in the summer. It is just wonderful that we are included in these plans. We wanted to go somewhere we hadn't been and had always thought about! We chose Denmark/Norway; and we were not disappointed! Oh. My. Goodness. ~ it was spectacular and truly a trip of a lifetime!We arrived in Copenhagen, Denmark, checked into our hotel, rested for a minute and off we went for some fun adventures. In the top pic of me you can see a little arrow pointing to a blue thing; this is my blanket and eye mask from W&G last Christmas and I take it everywhere I go ~ the best ever since I tend to be cold even when living in the desert. Anyhooo, it came in extra handy since this trip the weather was a bit nippy, chilly but soooo refreshing which was such a relief after instant sweating, when walking out the door in Al Ain.
Billy figured out where the subway was and off we went to go for a glorious boat ride!The boat ride was amazing. Ours was a smaller, shorter boat so we could see everything from both sides. There were all these little tunnels we would go through and our guide would remind us to make sure and sit down, keep our arms/hands inside the boat and not to touch the walls (as they were within inches of us). The boat drivers are very skilled and had to go through these tunnels with exact precision. You can see in the lower right corner the very crowded 'long' boat (I'm afraid that might have been a bit claustrophobic for me 😉).
We were on one of Copenhagen's harbor/canal sightseeing loops, traveling out through the Inner Harbor (Inderhavnen) toward Holmen/Nyholm, then up toward Langelinie, where the Little Mermaid sits. Holmen was Copenhagen's historic naval base and Nyholm still has naval facilities, which explains all the warships.
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The Little Mermaid was written by Hans Christian Andersen, a Danish author. He published the original fairy tale in 1837. I personally don't like the Disney version as there are no consequences for Arials choices, but that topic is for another time. We came back through the harbor and canals around Christianshavn before returning to the starting point. The classic tours specifically advertise the Opera House, Amalienborg, Christianshavn and Little Mermaid as part of the loop. And here's the cool geographical bit: when we were out by the Little Mermaid we were getting very close to the open harbor entrance. If our boat had continued north/east instead of turning around, we would eventually leave Copenhagen Harbor and enter the Øresund, the strait between Denmark and Sweden. We were essentially cruising on saltwater connected directly to the Baltic Sea, not a freshwater river. |
It opened in 1843, making it the third-oldest amusement park in the world. Hans Christian Andersen visited Tivoli and was reportedly inspired by it while creating The Nightingale. The little bear in the bottom left corner is Rasmus Klump, a beloved Danish children’s character and Tivoli has created an entire themed area around him (like, Mickey Mouse ~ someone said Walt Disney visited here and got his idea for Disneyland from Tivoli 🤗). The Pancake House sits next to the Rasmus Klump playground, in the heart of Tivoli by the lake. The restaurant itself is designed like a whale’s belly, which fits the playful nautical theme.
The top middle pic are of houses with grass roofs; they are traditionally called Torvtak and they are surprisingly practical. Traditionally, the roof was built with wooden boards, covered with birch bark for waterproofing and then layers of turf/soil were placed on top. Eventually the grass and plants grew into what looks like a little meadow sitting on the house. The thick turf provided excellent insulation against Norway's cold climate. It also used materials that were readily available locally. The roof eventually becomes part of the landscape. From a distance, an old farm with a turf roof can almost disappear into the hillside. That's especially useful when you're looking at those old farms scattered impossibly high above the fjord.We took a Fjord Guiding tour which took us out on the Norwegian sea! When you're cruising the fjord there are tiny green terraces way, way up high. You'll sometimes see what looks like one or two little houses surrounded by an impossibly small patch of grass. Those are often former farmsteads. Some of these farms were not connected by a road at all. The fjord was their highway. People would take boats along the water, then climb hundreds of meters up the mountainside to get home. And the reason you still see the buildings today is that many of these farms were occupied until surprisingly recently; some remained in use into the 20th century. The middle top picture by my head: Knivsflå, an historic mountain farm, located beneath the famous Seven Sisters waterfalls. Skageflå is probably the most famous farm. It's perched dramatically about 820–980 ft above Geirangerfjord. It was a working farm with several buildings and grazing land. Our guide pointed out all the, surprisingly, many farms built way up on these mountains. Insane!So as we were cruising through Geirangerfjord, and looking at pretty scenery, we were looking at a landscape where: ⛰️ mountains + 👹 folklore + 🌱 turf roofs + 🐄 farming + 🛥fjord transportation all developed together.
Next day we got on a bus that took us all over the beautiful city of Alesund, Norway and I'm so glad we did. It was stunning.
This is the open-air museum, Sunnmøre Museum, in Ålesund, where historic buildings from the Sunnmøre region were moved and reconstructed on one site, creating a little historical village. It’s on the island of Nørvøya, just outside central Ålesund, and has old farmhouses, boathouses, barns, and other traditional buildings. It was so fascinating and if I would have figured out how to set up my Fitbit from K&L I would have at least recorded 1 mile of walking here!
They advertise the "Best Fish & Chips in the World" and although I have had Fish & Chips in many places these were very delicious to what I can compare with my limited expertise.
The city was truly beautiful and with the luxury of more Trolls ~ "The Trolls come from very old Scandinavian Norse folklore. Some of the earliest written references appear in medieval literature, including the Edda from around the 1220s. Think of a troll as a way people long ago explained a landscape that was huge, dangerous and mysterious. Imagine living here hundreds of years ago: You're in a tiny wooden farm surrounded by enormous mountains. It's dark for much of the winter. Avalanches can come down the mountains. Rocks fall. Fog rolls into the fjord. You hear strange noises in the forest. You don't have modern geology or meteorology. So perhaps the mountain isn't just a mountain. Perhaps there's a giant sleeping inside it. That is essentially the world of Norwegian folklore. Trolls were generally imagined as powerful, primitive creatures living in mountains, caves and forests. And there's a particularly famous rule: Sunlight turns trolls to stone. That's why Norwegian folklore explains so many strangely shaped rocks and mountains as trolls who were caught outside when the sun came up."
Last stop: In Keil, Germany we noticed the “roundabout art” (Kreiselkunst) everywhere. Germany commonly puts sculptures or themed objects in the centers of roundabouts, partly to make otherwise ordinary traffic intersections more distinctive and attractive. This became especially common from the 1990s onward. In Kiel, the particular animals can also have local meaning; for example, the stork is associated with the region and even appears as a symbol/mascot connected with local culture and sports.
We took a taxi to Laboe where the U-995 sits. It is a real German World War II submarine that you can walk through. It’s a Type VII U-boat, built in 1943, and now preserved as a museum ship on the beach at Laboe.
This WWII submarine was very cramped and much smaller than any of the other submarines we have been in. The ONLY good thing for me would be that in the downtime we could play a lot of cards 😜.
Norway captured U-995 at the end of WWII and used it in the Norwegian Navy. After a while Norway had no further military use for it and since Germany requested it back in the 1960s, Norway agreed to return it as a museum ship as a gesture of goodwill to Germany in 1965.
ALL DONE. A very incredible, much needed getaway from our worries and cares. I was probably better at closing my mind off to the problems back in Al Ain and it helped that I sent this message out to anyone that happened to text me (I had first put it in our Branch WhatsApp feed so they knew we were going to be gone):Auto Reply:
Hey Everybody, President and
I will be gone until the middle
of August ~ so:
1. If you need a ride contact
Louie +971 55 289 8162
2. If you need food contact
Sunshine +971 56 854 3851
3. If you need advice contact
Carla +971 56 135 5896
Anything else?
Wait 10 days or contact
James +971 56 483 3985
or
Brian +971 50 207 5228
😇💙😇💙😇💙😇💙😇
I only got a few texts while in Denmark and after receiving my reply text once, twice, even 3 times, all correspondence ended until I got back. I tried to tell Billy to just let everyone believe we were still gone for a few more days, but with so many little problems awaiting him, we were back in full work mode the next day 😢.
When can we go back . . . 😉?
Sources: CHATgpt, Wikipedia, V Visit Norway, R riksantikvaren.no, W Wikipedia, M Mynewsdesk, Lille norske leksikon, en.wikipedia.org, B Bobilavisen
