Esbjerg
Trip Start
Apr 17, 2007
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Trip End
Dec 05, 2007
Esbjerg, Denmark
Sunday, May 27, 2007
After a long drive through the road works of Germany our first night was in a little coastal town called Esbjerg. We must have spent at least half an hour in the shower each... it was heaven! And an extra bonus was the free internet!! Camping grounds in Denmark are remarkably set up and the people are just lovely!
The next day we checked out Ribe, the oldest town in Denmark! Right in the centre they have a cathedral which has sunk and now sits almost a meter below the rest of the streets! There were some quite wobbly buildings but the place had a good feel to it!
The main point of this trip up north was to visit 'Zealand'.... (the old one)....so that's where we headed next! A long drive across many bridges, only to get to the end and find we have to pay a 200 Danish Kroner toll (around 20 pounds!)That stung a little bit! Wallets a bit lighter we trundled up the motorway to meet up with some friends... Muss and Cathrine, they day was still young so we headed in to town to have a nosey round... while roaming the streets Rod noticed a couple of short dudes...and recognized them to be Good Charlotte! After a bit of a chat with them they offered us free tickets to their gig the next night... we were stoked to be offered freebies! Later in the night we headed to a big festival on in Copenhagen.. (good timing by us!). We were blown away by the parade that went on... singing and dancing was compulsory! After a few beers and a bit of salsa dancing and we headed back to the vans.
After a bit of a late start we headed back to Copenhagen to check out some sights... we walked down the canals and took in some history at the Jewish Museum. I had read about a area called 'Christiana' in the lonely planet and we decided to go for a look. Basically back in the 70's a group of hippies declared this area an 'independent state' the Danish government let it ride to see what happened. Christiana comprised its own government, laws and school systems.... Allowing drugs and the lure of no taxes or rent attracted more and more people, who got use to this free and easy lifestyle. However a police raid in 2004 tamed things down a little.... Thankfully!! I still felt a little uneasy... Rod was a little more easy going. We relaxed and had a beer... leaving a lot less apprehensive and glad that we had experienced Christiana... does it class as another country Bryce??? The bad influence of Muss came out that night, many vodka shots were downed as we got ready for our 'free concert!'.... only to get there to be shot down! No names on the guest list!! Good Charlotte has now been renamed Bad Charlotte in our books... and they were to be boycotted at the up and coming Rock am Ring festival in our silent protest! Rather annoyed and red faced, we headed to the pub to drown our sorrows!!
Another very late start and we headed for Roskilde to check out a viking ship museum. Five viking ships had been pulled from the Roskilde fjord in 1962 and rebuilt like a jig saw.... A very cool museum!! The White Cliffs of Mon were next on the agenda... we learnt how Denmark was formed in the last ice age, the white cliffs were quite a remarkable sight!
Next was a ferry to Germany to meet Zeko and Jen for the much anticipated Rock am Ring Festival.... We stocked up on duty free beer and we were away laughing....
