Today, we had a great day. But we ended up as criminals.
The day started well. In Middlefart. In Denmark. It had been very windy overnight and the van had been buffeted and rocked through the night. All very soothing for me, but MrsM was a little perplexed.
Anyway, when we woke up, it was a glorious day, flat calm, sunny.
We wandered over to a nearby supermarket (after we got dressed obviously) where we bought danish pastries for breakfast and coffee to go.
The pastries were fab-U-Luss. the coffee – meh.
Back to the van and we put stuff away and ate our danish pastries. Then we set off. Our first port of call was to try and find somewhere to exchange our propane bottles. We were getting a bit low on gas and with our journey northward becoming closer, we wanted to start the journey with full bottles. It’s the heating in the van, you see. It’s bloomin cold at night, and it’s a good idea to put the heating on in the morning to help defrost.
We got to a caravan place I had found and spoke to a really helpful chap, who told us that he couldn’t exchange our bottles – they’re the wrong valve type or something. Flippity flip!!! That’s going to be a problem.
We set off for our next stop, Copenhagen and decided that we would speak to the van company and see what they said. But we would do it when we got to our stop at Copenhagen.
It wasn’t a long drive today, only about 2 ½hours and we arrived at our stop at lunch time. Avrina made the sandwiches and I asked some questions about the gas.
There’s a depot of the van hire company in Malmo, so we have been directed there and they will sort us out tomorrow.
Our stop tonight is at a Marina near to the airport. We parked up, went over to the harbour-masters office, paid our money and got a wee credit card thing which gave us access to toilets, showers and washer drier. It also allowed us to hook up electicity, and we can fill fresh water and tomorrow (fanfare and rolling drums) we get to empty the toilet cassette. It’s going to be a smelly job and I have threatened Avrina that unless she is ‘good’ to me tonight she’ll be the one doing the emptying.
With lunch done and gas sorted, it was time for us to venture into Copenhagen to do a bit of sight-seeing.
We walked to the nearest Metro station and bought a ticket to the centre of the city. The Metro ticket, like most things in Denmark was more expensive than we are used to. But, the Metro stations, and the trains are free from rubbish, and just feel safe and clean.
We got off in the centre of Copenhagen and saw a hop-on hop-off bus. Perfect. We had a 1 ½hour tour of the city (photos to follow) and it was great.
Top tip – If you are ever in a new city, take one of these bus tours. they are good value and you get to see all the big ticket items in the city.
We even got to see the statue of the little mermaid, well, Avrina did. I saw her before and couldn’t be arsed getting off the bus for a photo of a mermaid statue. Spoiler alert – it’s really small.
After we finished the bus tour, we thought a drink was called for. It is St patricks day after all. We sat down at a bar on a strett full of multi-coloured buildings, running alongside a canal. If it sounds romantic and sweet, you’d be right. It was.
Avrina had a pint, I just had a half.
And we sat and watched the world go by. It was getting a bit chilly and Avrina noticed the bar had heated seats. Yes indeed! Heated seats. Little battery operated tcushions that you sat on and they burned your bum cheeks and let your back go cold. But there were also blankets.
We decided it would be a good place for dinner, so we ordered the Danish National Dish – Stegt flæsk
Go on. Look it up.
Doesn’t it look great?
Well, it tasted even better. The waiter told us it was ok to pick the meat up with our fingers and dip it in the sauce, which we promptly did.
Then, it was time for us to return to our little Fiat travelling machine, so we went for Chorros. haha. We saw them and just had to have some. Can you guess what flavours we had? Avrina? Chocolate. Of course.
Me? Cinnamon suger.
Then onto the Metro for a quick 7 stop blast back, a 10 minute walk and we could have a cuppa and do some planning for tomorrow.
We were just about to get off at out station when a wee ticket inspector asked to see our tickets. we proudly got them out of our pockets only to be told that these were single journey tickets and the time had expired on them. The shame!!!
He threw us off the train!
Well, not really. We were getting off anyway. We explained that we thought we had bought a day pass, like you would do in London or Paris. He was having none of it. He demanded ID from us, and wrote us up for a fine. 100Euro each!!! I wanted to fight him, in typical Essex fashion, but MrsM, ever the voice of reason, talked me out of it.
Tomorrow, the 2 criminals from the Charente are making our way to Malmo (over a bridge that turns into a tunnel and then a bridge again. I know, exciting) before turning North and heading up through Sweden toward Norway.
Do you think the ticket collecter/inspector was too harsh? Should we have run away? Had a fight with him?