Survivor Ellesmere

Thursday morning I left my sweet paid-for-by-the-EU hotel and got my train to Copenhagen. I had the best seat mate - he was a 60+ man from Northern Norway (just south of the Arctic Circle) who works as a tour guide on a Berlin-Prague tour for a Norwegian company. He takes that train a lot, and could tell me about all the towns we went through. He also guided me through the unexpected (though not if I had actually looked at my map) ferry portion of the trip. There's no bridge between Germany and Denmark, so the train gets on a ferry. Then everyone gets off the train and heads up to the ferry decks, and heads back down 45 minutes later once you're in Denmark. Anyways, bonus ferry trip. My first outside the Maritimes! The ship was also not unlike those ships, except for the duty free. I spent most of the time up on the top deck, enjoying the sea air. Then I got cold. But luckily only a few minutes before it was time to head back to the train. My first task upon arriving was to find my hostel. It's a bit more out of the centre than I thought, and their directions suck, but luckily the woman at the information desk seemed to have fielded the question before. Twenty minutes later I was in my empty five person dorm. Which in the end had one other person in it last night. Benefits of the off season.

I've quickly learned a few things about the Danes. One: all of them speak English. To the point where my pathetic attempts to speak Danish are probably more insulting than just speaking English. (Which I've started to do. Taler de engelsk was getting me odd looks.) Two: most of them are blonde and beautiful. I do not think it's fair that this city should be so good looking while Toronto is so not good looking. (Those of you reading in Toronto excluded, of course.) Even the ones who aren't blonde are still good looking. Sigh. I need to find and date the Danish community at home. Well, maybe not date them all, just a few. Three: EVERYONE has a bike. I finally understand those displaced Europeans who wax poetic about bike riding in Europe. This is their dream city. Super-wide bike lanes everywhere, bike-specific traffic lights, bike racks all over the place. I've seen bike traffic jams there are so many cyclists. Madness. Also, they just leave their bikes anywhere, rack or not. I thought they were leaving them unlocked everywhere, until this afternoon when I saw someone unlock his. They rarely lock them to things, so if you were a very determined bike thief you'd be in good business here. There's this little device that's basically a circle through the back wheel. So that the back wheel won't turn. It's neat.

I've had such a productive day and a half of sightseeing. Copenhagen is very compact, so I've had no troubles walking basically everywhere. And now I almost know where I'm going. I won't bore you with lists, but I made it to the Little Mermaid statue. It's closer to the shore than I thought - which explains why people can keep stealing her head. Tivoli Gardens is closed this time of year, so I won't make it to the other most-famous-attraction in Copenhagen. But I did walk by it. Okay, one last highlight of the day was the super awesome astronomical clock at city hall. It tracks the actual time, the "true" time (ie. noon is when the Sun is directly overhead, so varies significantly over a time zone), SIDEREAL time (relative to the stars, not the Sun), sunrises, sunsets, eclipses, phases of the Moon, Christian holidays that are related to phases of the Moon, the Zodiac, positions of the planets, Julian Day, the precession of the Earth, and more. That thing is awesome. I will enthrall you with pictures when I get home. I can tell you're as excited as me.

I've also started to notice some very definite pros and cons to traveling in the off season. Places are less busy. When Melissa and I toured Europe after graduation, I felt like I was always surrounded by American tourists. This time I feel like I'm surrounded by Danes. Maybe they're tourists too. Despite the fact that I'm still doing touristy things, it feels more authentic than the last time around because of this. It's nice to not hear English except for when you're talking to someone. At the same time, because it's not prime tourist season, places have shorter hours, and my guide book is wrong. I think they did their best to give off-season opening hours and what not, but their descriptions of places are biased to the summer months. And it's colder. It's not super cold, probably about zero, but after a few hours wandering looking at pretty things I start to notice it.

I have one more day here and then I'm off to Bergen on a super-cheap, 8 am flight. Which seemed like a good idea when I booked it, but Daylight Savings time starts Sunday, so it's really a 7 am flight, and I need to be there super-early. Luckily, my slightly out of the way hostel is slightly out of the way towards the airport.