We got the 10AM train to Odense and arrived about 11:20. As soon as wetepped off the train we knew we liked this place. Both the library and the hostel are right next to the train station. We checked in to the hostel (which is one of the best I've ever stayed in) first and then we looked at the Odense information guides to check out times and prices for the places we wanted to see.
Odense is known for the Hans Christian Andersen house and museum but they also have the Carl Nielsen Museum (he was a Danish composer). I was really looking forward to visiting the Nielsen Museum but it was closed today. It is open only on Thursdays and Fridays so I can visit it on Friday when we come back here.
Next, we called Nadine. Shari and I have talked on and off about visiting Nadine in Amsterdam, maybe in December or maybe between Denmark and Germany. Today on the train I asked what she thought about going there this weekend after we leave Aeroskobbing and we both agreed it was a good idea. When I called Nadine (never actually expecting to get her because she is so busy), I was pleasantly surprisied when she answered her phone. I was so happy to talk with and she is going to be around on Sunday. We will come back to Odense on Friday morning and then travel to Amsterdam on Saturday. We plan to stay in a hostel Saturday night and then meet Nadine on Satunday and stay with her for 1 or 2 nights.
After I talked with Nadine, we walked down to the Hans Christian Andersen museum (it's great here, nothing is a very far walk) to see the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale show. It was terrific. The narrator was dressed in a suit and top hat and the actors were in costumes that represented characters from the various fairy tales. The narrator told some of the stories and there was lotsof singing and acting the parts of the fairy tale folks. It was all in Danish and it was very entertaining. Everyone sat on the grass in front of the theatre - lots of kids and their parents, and Shari and I both enjoyed it as much as the kids. More free entertainment.
We walked around town a bit after the show and bought food to cook at the hostel. Then I took a nap and Shari went over to the park to write notes. We used the internet at the library from 6-7 (it's amazing how fast one hour goes when we are on the computer) and then we tried to make reservations at a hostel in Amsterdam. We tried a few of them but they were all booked for Saturday night. I called Nadine again and luckily she answered. I explained our problem (nowhere to stay in Amsterdam on Saturday) and she said she would change her travel arrangements and come back to Amsterdam earlier than planned. She will met us at the train station at 7PM on Saturday night. It is so nice of her to rearrange her schedule to accomodate us. I'm really looking forward to seeing her.
Then we went back to the hostel to cook dinner. I had one of my best dinners since we've been traveling - pork chops cooked with fresh ginger, garlic and orange juice, a baked potato with lots of butter, a great salad with a dressing made from a packaged herb dressing and creme fraiche. After dinner we watched a TV show in English with Danish subtitles, and then I got a McDonald's caramel sundae for dessert.
This hostel is great. There were only 3 other people cooking while we were using the kitchen and we were the only ones watching TV. It is a clean,spacious and well-run hostel.
7/30: We didn't need to check out of the hostel until 10AM so we had a fairly leisurely morning. We took showers, cooked eggs and toast, and packed our small packs with stuff to tale to Aeroskobbing. We left our big packs in the storage closet at the hostel and went back to the library to use the internet again for 15 minutes. They have a few computers that anyone can use for 15 minutes without signing up, and then they have another set upstairs that you can sign up to use for one hour at a time. It's a great library and so conveniently located.
Next we walked through the park to get to Town Hall where the walking tour started at 11AM. It was a very interesting 2 hour walking tour. Odense is a lovely city. It's the third largest city in Denmark, but it has a small town feel to it.
The rest of the day was travel - a train from Odense to Svenborg and then a ferry from Svenborg to the island of Aero. People are so nice in Denmark - a young woman talked to us for a bit on the train (I think she wanted to practice her English) and then we talked to a man in Svenborg for a while. We asked him directions to the ferry terminal and ended up having quite a conversation with him (his son goes to school in Idaho) about travel, crime, the weather, and how lovely Svenborg and Odense are. Today was a perfect day - sunny, breezy but not too hot. The ferry ride took 75 minutes and we sat on the top deck. It was a car ferry so it was a good size boat.Getting off in the town of Aeroskobbing reminded me of Martha's Vineyard.
Aero is a wonderful little island (30 kilometers long by 85 kilometers across). It has 3 main towns, with a total population across the island of 7,200 people. The town of Aeroskobbing was a properous merchants town in the late 17th century. It has been preserved in its entirety and according to the literature is one of the most handsome towns in Denmark. Its narrow cobblestone streets are lined with 17th and 18th century houses, many of them are listing, half-timbered structures with hand-blown glass windows and decorative doorways. The hostel was about 1 kilometer from the ferry and it was 6:30 when we got there after stopping at the store on our walk from the ferry.
Shari had picked up a brochure on the Aero jazz festival and there was a performanace tonight in a building near the ferry that I thought I might want to see. It started at 8PM, so I had some butter and crackers after we put our stuff in our room, and then I left to walk back to the ferry area. On the way I passed a building where they were playing jazz so I went in to investigte. Some people were sitting at a picnic table out back and I went up to one woman and asked what the place was. She said it was a school for music and theatre, and the students were just jamming in the room in front of us (the door was open and the music sounded terific). She told me she was going to see the jazz festival performance (a group called Tilt) and 8PM with her daughter and husband. Her daughter told her that Tilt was very good but they weren't really a jazz group. Tilt is a group of 4 - percussion, guitar, bass and vocals - and I went down to where they were warming up for their show and decided I liked the music at the school better. Besides, I could sit and listen to that for free versus 50 kroner for the Tilt show.
I bought 2 beers at a store on the way back to the school and I went and sat at the picnic bench. I drank beer, wrote notes and listened to absolutely terrific music. I don't always like jazz, but this was great, especially the saxaphone player. It was cool - a few people came to listen to the music (some brought beer like I did) and then they wandered off and other people came and sat or stood for awhile. It was a nice mixture of students and tourists and locals, and by 9PM I was the only one still there. I stayed until 9:30 and then walked back to the hostel. I warmed up the pasta that Shari has cooked, ate dinner and went to bed.
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