Svere's Small Hotel Rønne

... to make it light up! Of course I tried it out and powered a little section of lights on the tree. Then we walked down the shopping street that is closed to cars. According to Christel it is the largest shopping street in Europe. I didn't have a chance to change my money to Kroners so I did it on the street and 80 Euros was 550 Kroners or something, but It is so hard to wrap my head around how much everything is because its like 65 kroner and obviously I am used to the dollar so I just ...

... we have to do for the next few weeks, but I also knew that anything remotely resembling personal space or free time was about to go flying out the window.

The first few days in the hostel were a constant stream of amazing CYD’ers trickling in, reunions, cozy fires, exploring our industrial surroundings, and basically watching our common area shrink and shrink and shrink. It’s so amazing to have everyone together and ready to ...

... and awesomeness of it. Then right across the street there was a gigantic bike parking lot. It was dark when we arrived (it is almost always dark actually) and so we couldn't even see how far the bike parking lot went... it just disappeared into the darkness. Just like all the days do. :-) Nights in Lund were a heck of a lot of fun too though, so having them be ridiculously long wasn't such a bad thing. We made ...

... of a grocery store; an older Danish couple stopped to chat with us and asked us if we were Americans. They apologized for the weather and talked about our biking destination, informing us that they had met another American from Washington, D. C. the day before and had given her directions. They were happy to talk to Americans, especially about Obama, but were sure to ask why we had come to Denmark.

Throughout my time in Denmark I noticed ...

... lost but as luck would have it, we ran into the trip leaders and followed them back towards Gudhjem, parting to stop at Østerlars, a large round church that architecturally is very common in Bornholm.

Bornholm is a very quiet island seemingly more fitting for summer/weekend/retirement homes. We didn’t see many cars or children throughout our whole ride. I also noticed, characteristic of the rest of Denmark, the Danish flag flying high everywhere we went.

We ...

... streets and shops and followed the shoreline to the edge of the village. There we found a path that climbed to the top of rocky bluffs overlooking the sea. The sun was bright and the water reflected a deep blue as we followed the walking path through woods and meadows. Wild apple trees were beginning to drop ripe fruit which was attracting hungry yellow jackets. Once or twice we had to wade ...

Well, don't think I'm superstitious or anything (it being day 13), but today the weather was so bad we couldn't even dock. It had rained pretty steadily during the night and by morning the winds had picked up significantly. The sea became very rough with large swells and whitecaps. The Harbormaster closed the port at Bornholm, Denmark, so we went a little bit down the coast but it was still too ...

Luckily for me, everyone else biked way too hard the day before and/or also got sick. Therefore I had plenty of other people to be lame with and take the bus. We went to the biggest tourist site on the island, way out on the northern tip. Hammershus is the largest fortress/castle ruin in Northern Europe. It ...

... the patterns of any church architecture, but many of them still have original frescoes. Osterlars is the biggest of them all. The interior has been renovated and is now a fully functioning Lutheran Church. The other six days of the week an old man works a tourist desk at the entrance, collecting 10 kr per person and giving you the church's and his entire life story. The weirdest thing about these ...

... pictures as I was being lazy. However, after my nap, I did walk through the whole town. The tourist season is practically over and there weren't many bikers on the island besides us. However, the senior citizen tour bus business was still hopping. I saw lots of old people hobbling around the island and buying souvenirs. Basically, everything was cute and quaint...and all that nice stuff. Actually, it was a very nice place to be ...