Copenhagen

Friday 18th August, and we were off to Copenhagen, finally. Karen & Mike have lived there for the past 18 months or so, and we still hadn't visited them, despite it being high on our list of things to do. So, when Karen & Mike visited us in June, we booked flights to see them during this weekend. The only weekend they were free, and we were at a loose end.

Soon after they left us in June, they announced their engagement, so we also had to congratulate them, and find out how long Mike knew he was going to pop the question and other details.

Our flight was with SAS (Scandinavian Airline) and we thought it was very good. We arrived in Copenhagen after just over an hour and, being early, we sat and waited for Mike & Karen. After a short while, Mike arrived, minus Karen, who was stranded in the US on a business trip. So, Mike played the perfect host, and guided us back to their apartment on the excellent train service.

Karen & Mike's apartment was great. So spacious compared to our flat. They have a cool Ikea pull-out sofa in the lounge, so we were very comfortable. After chatting for a while, and having a nice cup of tea, we slept around 1am.

Next morning, I ventured into the bathroom for a shower. Little was I to know, that I would have been better off staying dirty for the weekend. I turned the shower on, and noticed the stream of water hitting the end wall where it threatened to trickle down to the floor, so I redirected the nozzle to go straight down. I put my clean clothes down on the ground, and my towel on a shelf, and gaily threw my PJs onto the floor as I got into the shower.

After a very nice shower, where I vaguely noticed a bit of water backing up in the bottom of the bath, I drew back the shower curtain and started to step out. I stopped, as I thought I had water in my eyes because I couldn't believe what I was seeing. I was sure my pyjamas were moving! Rubbed my eyes. Yep - they were floating over a considerably amount of water. My clothes for the day had sunk already. Panic! We were on the 5th floor after all!

I yelled for Mike, and grabbed my towel. He opened the door (the right Mike fortunately) to see what the problem was (he was thinking I had left an item of apparel behind). It didn't take him long to assess the situation. He grabbed a pile of towels from the washing basket and flung them in the water. They were absorbed without a trace. About this time he called for Mike, shouting that there had been a flood.

Mike thought that it was the trickle sometimes caused by the shower hitting the back wall, but was he in for a shock when he stepped in! Out came the cleaning products, out went the carpet. Out I went! The two Mikes mopped and I dried off my underwear and got dressed. A bit sheepish!

Fortunately it wasn't my fault. Mike pulled back the drain grating in the bathroom floor, and stuck a wire clothes hangar down there. Out came a big wad of hair and gunge. Certainly not all from my head, else I'd be bald! I just happened to be in the shower when it blocked. Obviously the bathroom was designed for this time of emergency, as it was a sealed floor, and no complaints were had from the neighbours below. However, the neighbour 2 floors down rang to complain, but it turns out she was complaining about the carpet dripping from the balcony onto her pot plants. Mike assured her it was clean water (!!) but moved the carpet anyway. Everything was hung out to dry on the clothes rack.

Breakfast went a long way to comforting me. Mike had got Danish pastries (real ones!) and a walnut bread loaf from the local bakery and introduced me to the delights of chocolate slices on bread. A delicacy from Denmark. We even bought some from the supermarket to take back to London. Wafer thin chocolate slices plonked on bread. Although Mike did spoil it with putting jam on his piece too. I went for the pure unadulterated chocolate option. Not even butter! Yummo!

Soon after this, Karen arrived. So, we chatted some more, and eventually agreed on meeting for lunch after Karen had showered. So, Mike took us on tour through a castle just opposite their flat, and on to see the Little Mermaid.  It is about ten minutes from their house. Little is very apt. But I was pleased to see it, as I identify it with Copenhagen. I felt I could go home from that point having seen all that I know of Copenhagen (not expecting to go to the Bohr Institute at all on this trip).

Rubber Chicken meets Little Mermaid

We wandered along the harbour and eventually got to Nyhavn where many a cafe and restaurant can be found. No. 17 seemed to be the consensus, and Karen got there soon after us. We ordered, and I ate traditional pickled herring, liver paste and some potato concoction. It was perfectly edible, but I didn't get the recipe. I'm not planning on preparing any Danish evenings for Mike back in London. I'm going to stick to the chocolate slice on bread for breakfast.

The other thing on my list of things to do was to buy another pepper mill. Karen & Mike had given us one as an engagement present back in London last year, but it was one of the things stolen from der Bus in Luton. So I wanted to replace it. We scoured stores to no avail ( I have since got one the same from a shop in Santa Cruz, California - Peugeot mechanism and all) but had fun looking.

An important thing to get done today was to watch the All Blacks play South Africa in the Tri Nations. So we found a pub that had too many South Africans for my liking. It was a very exciting game - one of the best. But, New Zealand lost in the dying seconds and put us in the unusual position of wanting South Africa to beat Australia in the last game. This would give the Tri Nations to the most deserving team - New Zealand. Where all rugby trophies belong. We met some rugby mad Danes (didn't know they existed!), and some pleasant South Africans amid the rabble.

To forget our sorrows we went to Tivoli - an old-fashioned amusement park in the middle of Copenhagen. I thoroughly recommend this as a highlight. Mike and Mike decided they would ride the Big Drop (I don't know what its real name was - you get raised up 50 m or so, and then dropped suddenly. Looked awful!). Karen & I positioned ourselves for a good view of their faces on the way down. It was quite amusing. Their faces screwed up a bit, but the really funny thing was both their legs went straight out from their seats. So, although they both said it was a cruise, Karen & I had seen their bodies belie their bravado. That's our version of events, and we're sticking to it.

There are some nice restaurants at Tivoli, so we picked an average priced one, and queued for a bit to get in. Mike & I had venison and loved it. Dessert was pretty good too.

Just before midnight on Saturday night, there are fireworks at Tivoli. So, we found a good spot and watched them. The wind was blowing the wrong way, and we all got showered with soot particles and exploded fireworks. Not to mention obscured by the smoke. A few smuts in the eye later, it was all over. We rounded off the evening with a few arcade games of the best sort. A game where you put rubber frogs onto a plate, and whack the end with a huge mallet, sending the frog through the air hopefully to land on a lily pad. Another where a water pistol is used to hit targets which gradually inflate a ballooon - winner is the one that pops it first. Very enjoyable evening.

We got home late, and crashed pretty soon. Although I picked up a book of Karen's to read which was to be our undoing later.

Sunday was relaxing. We toured a bit more of the city, seeing the palace and the marble church. We spent a few hours in the Nation Museum, checking out the Danish section with great interest. There were runes, coffins, skulls with holes drilled in for surgical procedures (and evidence they lived to tell about it too), viking ships, weapons and all sorts of clothes. There were plenty of artefacts from medieval Denmark too, and a good Greenlandic section. A very good museum. I gauge all museums from Dunedin's fantastic museum, and this one rated pretty high. After this, we visited the Round Tower, which was an observatory built for a king.
He was so lazy, the tower had access for a horse and carriage almost to the top. Now there is an art exhibit at the top. Very odd too, it was. Paper shapes at around 20,000 dollars each (some as cheap as 1000, others 100k). Not quite my cup of tea. Kinda hard to imagine it as anyone's cup of tea, really. Imagine it as the kind of thing where if you bought a new house, and this paper contraption was in a room, you'd pull it down thinking the previous owners had some bored kids. That, or an origami master run amok.

Mike and Mike at Round Tower

Back to Karen & Mike's flat for dinner. Mike cooked an awesome salmon and potato dinner and it was fantastic. Mike & I decided to see the Viking boat museum at RossKilde (oops, I can't spell it, and my attempt doesn't look Nordic enough) on Monday. We whiled away the hours chatting some more, before reading the book till the wee hours.

Woke up after Mike & Karen had left for work. Started reading the book. Kept reading the book. Told Mike to have the first shower, but kept reading the book. RossKilde plans vanished as the morning passed - and Mike still hadn't showered! With the book finished, I showered and we reassessed our options for the day. Some shopping was decided upon, along with a photo shoot of the rubber chicken with the Little Mermaid.

We met an old Danish lady in Mike & Karen's lobby, and she muttered some Danish at us and gestured wildly at a dwindling pile of Ikea catalogues. As we crept up quietly to her I'm pleased I did not utter my single word of Danish in greeting ('Hey' was what I thought was Danish for 'Hello', but turns out that was Swedish. Apparently hello in Danish is 'Hi'.). We smiled, and let her ruffle the pile a bit. Maybe she was saying how the Swedes are taking over Denmark and no good will come of it. The Danes being a bit anti-Swedish by all accounts. Lucky I didn't greet her in my flawless Swedish then!

Next stop - dodging the tourists at the Little Mermaid for that rubber chicken photo. I waited for a pause in the frantic posing, and grabbed my chance. I held the rubber chicken aloft in front of the Little Mermaid, and Mike took video footage and photos. Then, a woman started waffling away to me in a Nordic language of some description. It did sound awfully like the Swedish Chef from the Muppets. I wondered if I was offending Danish sensibilities holding a rubber chicken in front of the number one icon of the country. I did not need to worry. She merely wanted to poke the chicken - I think she wondered if it was real. Maybe petrified chicken - a long lost Danish viking recipe. Her friend behind mimicked biting the chickens head off. The Scandinavians have strange eating habits (remember Mike's huge slab of rams testicles in Iceland, and the whiff of petrified shark we got - not for us though - reserved for special festivities. Thank goodness!).

We bought a present for Karen & Mike to celebrate their engagement, and wandered back aimlessly (although Mike swears he knew exactly where he was going) through parks. Mike & Karen arrived to see us off at around 5pm. We promised to see RossKilde next time.

We had nice weather, and we enjoyed seeing how Karen & Mike live in Denmark. We've still got a few Scandinavian countries to explore (with Norway, Sweden and Finland being high on the list), and will no doubt tackle them soon. Denmark was surprisingly un-foreign, with the two old ladies on our last day being the only ones with no English that we encountered (although our stunned mullet expressions might have indicated to them that we only spoke Swahili, and they were fluent in English). If it weren't for pickled herring, we could have been in England. I'm sure living there presents its own unique problems that we were unaware of (Mike touched briefly on a strange tax system), but for English-speaking tourists it is very easy to get around.

Normandy Beaches

This weekend was a trip to Normandy (in French - Normandie). Grant and Greg came along, and we planned to storm the WWII beaches in a frenzy of tourist activity. It did not start well, with a departure from Honda at 4:30pm (Junction 5 of the M4 motorway) on Friday afternoon, planning on arrival at the HoverSpeed terminal in Dover at 6:30pm. Unfortunately, the M25 was bumper to bumper, and we arrived at the terminal around 7:30pm, after touring Folkestone looking for petrol. Turns out we just missed the sailing by ten minutes as it had been delayed. So, we sat in the StandBy queue, chatting to two Germans desperate to get home after a sunless summer holiday in Scotland. We finally got on the final sailing of the evening at 10pm (it was a SeaCat instead of the HoverCraft) and found ourselves in Calais, all ready for a three hour drive to the F1 in Rouen. Yep, we got into Rouen at 3am, found the F1 and crashed.

Next morning we drove to the beaches starting at Sword Beach. Unfortunately we were in a French traffic jam for a good portion of the morning. The weekend continuing as it began. But, the museums kept us entertained and informed when we got there. Hordes of tourists (esp. Americans) were doing the same thing. Sword Beach was packed with lcoals and tourists sunning themselves and swimming. Grant did not get a true feel for the war effort from this pleasant beach. Too hot and too crowded. We tasted icecreams (this was before Grant had become a McFlurry addict) and ate ham and cheese baguettes. Mike drummed up a room for us in Cherbourg (at the tip of the peninsula) after going through most of the accommodation in the town. Lucky last. We drove past several other beaches in the direction of Cherbourg and dinner.

One of the most important sites was at Arromanches. Here we could see the surviving concrete caissons from the hilltop overlooking the area. The Allies had towed huge concrete blocks here from England and set up a temporary harbour to unload soldiers, machines and supplies. This was one of two sites this was tried, but one was destroyed soon afterwards by a big storm in the Channel. Here at Arromanches you can still see the one that survived for a few months. One concrete caisson is washed up on the beach at Arromanches and you can walk to it at low tide. So we did. And it was huge. It still had bollards on the top side for tying ships up alongside, even though they were rusted and seaweed encrusted.

The museum here is one of the best and we spent about an hour looking at many relics from the war. We may have spent more time, but there was a bagpiper playing inside and it was a bit deafening. I love the pipes, but they are best outside (or at least in a huge hall - not a small museum where you can't escape).

The hotel in Cherbourg was one room with a double bed and two single beds. We made a pact not to use the toilet as there was only a shower curtain separating it from the main room. We waited for Grant to shower and get ready, then we went out to find dinner. We found a quiet restaurant just off the main streets, and I had a nice confit of duck (same as Mike). Very yum! The conversation at dinner was deep, and Grant & I wandered back to the room afterwards and left Mike & Greg to continue their discussion over some beers.

Mike & Greg ventured home around 3am after a few drinks. Greg leapt onto Grant's bed to close the curtains, but apart from that everyone was sleeping like babes in a few minutes. Waking was a bit more difficult. We had McDonalds for breakfast, just to check that Cherbourg Maccas was the same standard as other places. Then it was back to attack the beaches from the opposite end. First up - Juno. They had an excellent museum there, and we went down to the beach which was a bit more deserted than Sword Beach.

Next, Point De Hoc where the rangers had to scale the cliffs to get at German gun emplacements. They lost a lot of men in the battle, but won in the end. Only to discover that the Germans had moved the guns already. I appreciated this site, as the holes made by bombardment were still visible and it meant the visual impact of the craters left more of an impression in your mind of the senselessness of war. Perhaps even more so than rows of crisp, clean, white marble crosses at the American cemetery we were about to visit. The reminder of how much damage can be done with a bomb is a necessary part of a war memorial. I'm not sure though, how much of a deterrent it is to those in power, as wars seem to go on regardless. Still, seeing these sorts of places makes me remember my country's sacrifice of its young men.

On to Omaha beach, shown in graphic detail at the start of Saving Private Ryan (although that was filmed on a beach in Ireland). This is where the American cemetery is also located, with the 9000-odd crosses I mentioned above. It is a lovely memorial site, with peaceful gardens and a lookout over the beach. There were many Americans here, no doubt here due to the exposure of an Oscar winning film. However, anything that gets this sort of place in the public mind is worth it. This beach unfortunately cost a lot of lives, as it was not as gently sloping as other beaches, and I believe the general in charge made some miscalculations which lead to a loss of backup tanks.

We decided to stay in Amiens this night, which we thought would be 1.5 hours drive away. This would leave us close to the Somme and the site of the WWI trenches. As New Zealand had been involved in this battle, we hoped to find memorials that would bring all the fighting closer to home, and more personal. We booked into another F1 (the worst one we have stayed at yet), but unfortunately it took us closer to 4 hours to drive there. I was hindered somewhat by not knowing the scale of the map I was using to navigate. It meant we got to the F1 at 1am, and we were all a bit worse for the wear (how we had found it was another surprise). I was surprised to see sheets piled up in the hallways when we trucked our pack up to our floor. It was an omen of poor management.

Next morning, I couldn't get a shower as several were broken on our floor. And then when we went down for our pre-paid breakfast, there was no bread and no jam. So, after complaining bitterly (well, I couldn't in French, but Mike did well, especially with the help of another slightly disgruntled Frenchman) we got our money back and we piled our luggage in der Bus and left. After Mike accosted an innocent Frenchman walking home with his armful of baguettes and got details of where he had bought his bread (Mike had shouted out of der Bus in his best French - "What shop did you get your bread from?" to which the Frenchman replied in perfectly passable English, directions leading back past the village town hall, turn left, turn right...."), we found a supermarket (although I suspect it was not where our innocent Frenchman had come from - but it served us OK). In fact, better than OK, as it cost us 20 F less than a breakfast at the F1, and we had juice, grapes, brie, baguette. Very nice.

Now we were off to look at the Somme. This was the Western Front, and nearly 1 million people died here. We had the New Zealand memorial on our list, but there were a few other points of interest to see along the way. First stop was the 'le Grand Mine' - a huge crater left by tunnelling Allies as they burrowed under German trenches and laid explosives to blow them up. Mike had to ask directions from an old local, who was pleased to have someone to chat to. He asked Mike if he was English, and said Mike spoke very good French when Mike told him we were from New Zealand. Mike had got into the French swing of things by this stage and was able to waffle away quite well to him. With our updated directions, we found the crater. The explosion was heard in London, and the resulting crater is huge. There were less crowds here, and we had the place to ourselves for the first few minutes.

Next stop was the memorial to Newfoundland soldiers. The reason we wanted to see this site was that it remained as it was when fighting finished (apart from grass now growing where I suspect only mud could be found during the crucial years). Trenches wound their way all over the place, and I was surprised to see that they zigzagged when I had visions of straight rows. But it makes sense to zigzag them, because you can defend corners, and shrapnel won't go around them.

Next, we found the British memorial. It was a very impressive monument, with 70,000 names of missing Brits written on the walls. 70,000 they couldn't find. Grant found a couple of Holdoms there in the register. I found a S Emmerson on the wall. Quite sobering to see so many names, and know that they had just disappeared in fighting, buried under mud or blown away without a trace.

After that, the plain, simple New Zealand memorial was touching. And we found the name of the cemetery where New Zealanders were buried here in France on the other side of the world, on an information board outlining the New Zealand campaign in the region. So, we went to Caterpillar Valley cemetery, where caterpillars fall out of the trees (and they were huge things, not to be messed with, as evidenced by Grant's yell of surprise when a big juicy one fell on his arm and then twitched violently (the caterpillar not Grant, although perhaps it is an accurate description of them both)). There were names from the Otago and Canterbury regiments on the walls, and headstones to many New Zealand soldiers only identified by their uniform ('Known only to God').

I think we all came away with a certain amount of pride in the way young New Zealanders had fought so far from home. To think that we (the equivalent of great grandchildren in the generations between us and them) could visit beautiful France, talk to locals, eat, drink and stay in the hotels, only because of their sacrifice. Such a notion must have been so far from their minds when they were fighting on the Somme. And so many of them never left. It was so sad standing there, reading their names. Wondering if anyone was left alive that thought about them, or if anyone had visited the place where a loved one was buried. Back then, it wasn't an easy matter to come to France from New Zealand to visit a grave.

Time to get back on the road and head for an hour up to Calais. We made the ferry crossing with only 4 hours to spare (we had learnt our lesson). Enough time to explore Cite Europe (a big shopping mall) and get as much cheap French petrol into der Bus as we could (yes, Mike got ten pounds in at a squash, even though it took us 30 minutes in the petrol station queue).

On home soil by 8:30pm English time (we managed to get a hour earlier ferry crossing), and in bed by midnight (after dropping Greg and Grant off we ran into multiple roadworks in west London!!). A very good weekend indeed.

Brands Hatch SBK 2000

This weekend was a Superbike round at Brands Hatch. This is an awesome track just south of London - by the M25 motorway. The only problem is access, and you can read about fun and games exiting the circuit later. Richard and Theresa arrived on Friday night as their flat had been cleaned out by the movers ready for the shift back to NZ. One-Ear was a bit suss of this new flat. She slinked out of her cage with the lowest belly I have ever seen. I'm surprised she could walk with her legs that bent. She hid behind the table well out of sight. This was her haunt for about a week whenever Theresa and Richard weren't around. But, she came out Friday night when we were all asleep, as I woke up and heard her breathing in my ear. Theresa and Richard returned to their flat Saturday to clean it from top to toe. Sunday, we left quite early, but it was still a long queue to get into the Brands Hatch ground. We stocked up on McDonald's breakfast before joining the car queue, so we had enough sustenance to make it through the crowds.

As it was a gorgeous day, there was a huge crowd, and rumours Fogarty might not race again, but would have a few laps here, meant people were here just in case it was the last time to see him on a Superbike. We found a patch of ground on the opposite side of the track, and settled down to watch a good days racing and munch our way through food (we had a disposable BBQ which was very nice). Aaron Slight didn't have his best day out, and came off in the second race. Bit of a disappointment.

Leaving the circuit afterwards became a bit of a mission. It took us nearly two hours to get out of the paddock and onto local roads. Richard went and got us all an icecream from a Mr. Whippy truck. Needless to say, he didn't have a problem finding us when he returned (we'd moved a car length in that time). A funny thing though. A girl pushed her way through the bushes between us on the road and the campsite she'd just left. She was so occupied with getting out of view of the campsite to go to the toilet that she had neglected to see the hoards of cars idling their way down the road behind her. She found a bush, hidden from the campsite, in plain view of us, and crouched down. Mike wanted to hoot the horn, but I thought that would be cruel. So we all averted our eyes and continued creeping down the road at a snail's pace. In all, when I checked the mileage when we got home, it had taken us 3.5 hours to go just over 50 kms. Brands Hatch just cannot move cars out fast enough.