MPTreks

August 17, 2016

The day did not bode well.  We had planned to hop on the ferry to the island of Aeros around midday.  The good thing was that most tourists had gone home, and they had cut the ferry fees in half.  The bad thing was that they fully booked their ferries.  We had our reservations all set at this charming 18th century thatch-roofed farmhouse near the village of Aeroskobing, and how were we going to get there?  We ended up negotiating our way out of our difficulties by driving half an hour to another harbor, waiting for several hours, and finally getting on board.  Fortunately it was a fart faerie (it means “fast”, and yes, we did resort to 6-year-old humor to while the time away).

Upon arrival to the port, our driving time to our destination had doubled.  Still resilient of spirit and in good humor as a result of our prolonged engagement fart-faerie-f-word humor, we set out to find the place.  Meanwhile, we tried eight times to connect with Michael on Skype and show him our idyllic new abode.  We failed.   This was a bad omen.

Throughout the land, golden fields of wheat and grass were being shorn.  Farm machinery was on the move, furiously mowing and threshing, piling, baling and hauling.  We urbanites enjoyed it for the first five minutes.  Then, I began to sneeze, drip, run and tear.  Those old allergies that I thought were a thing of the past, blew in with a vengeance.  I finally contained myself, my face wrapped with so much kleenex, I looked like a wounded veteran of foreign wars.  Bing!  Michael came through.  Just in time for the dramatic first view of our new place.  What fun!  The dialogue went something like this:  “Oh, I think it’s just up ahead. . . Google maps says we’re here…No, it can’t be right… That’s because it isn’t…(Other chit chat as the winding drive continues.)   Here it is!  This is IT!  This is it?  …What are we in for?…Where is the entrance? … How do we get in? …OMG…”  At this point, Michael had to go to work.

Well, we did get a text from our host telling us to go into the old stable to find the key.  We hardly could tell which building was intended for horses and which one was for us. After clever finagling with the old key, the door opened.  I went in with no problem.  Martin, however, being 6 foot 3,  had to double over like an appendicitis victim in order to enter the doorway.  Even I had to concede that these ceilings were designed by midget demons.  Not only that, but every time one entered a new room, there was a 6-inch threshold to trip on.  It was a strange warp of time to enter this house.  Flooring transitioned from bleached wood to tile to thread-bare rooming house carpet without warning.  Antique painted wood china cabinet coexisted with Ikea futon couch.  A wooden country kitchen table shared space with a glass coffee table held up with wheels which had been removed from a bed frame.  The bed mattresses which were not intended for us lay naked in their striped ticking.  This was not the best of Danish design.

Martin travels with every imaginable electronic device, cable, and plug.  (Not a surprise, knowing his former profession.)   Also true to his engineering nature, the first thing he does in a strange place is to investigate every light switch and electric socket.  The afternoon light was rapidly dimming.  The windows were small.  This was a prudent notion.  Half an hour later, he had still not figured out how to turn the kitchen lights on.  This was not an auspicious sign.  My nose was dripping.  I was afraid I might electrocute myself if I assisted.  Things were really not looking good.

Well, you may be wondering at the title of this story, “The Best Thing Today”.  It is, simply put, that one thing that can put right all ills of the day — that thing called “Dinner”.  We fled the place, twisted our way into town and flung ourselves through the courtyard gates of a place called — yes, it’s true — “Nunm”.  We had a bottle of wine and one of the best dinners of our whole trip.

August 16, 2016

The best thing about today was finding our new home there, just 4 kilometers outside of the city of Nyborg, but feeling like it’s way out in the verdant countryside.  The countryside in Denmark is a patchwork of charming small farms.  Gently rolling fields of wheat or corn or clover, interspersed with woods and ponds, surround whitewashed barns and houses with tile or thatched roofs, usually arranged in a U shape, with the house in the middle and the barns on either side.  Horses and cows graze on the lushest grassy meadows imaginable.

We drove through a copse of tall trees, past elaborately patterned brick barns and horses grazing near shady ponds.  We then found ourselves on a dirt road, wondering what the heck we were doing there.  Then we came upon the house.  Suddenly, we knew why we were there.  It quietly stood beyond its lawn and its ancient tree, welcoming us to come forth.  Our hosts appeared on the porch.  We had found our new home.

It had been the home of the Nyborg Castle gardener for two centuries.   On the bricks of the front porch, his pupils and apprentices had written their names and the dates, going all the way back to the mid-19th century.  The upstairs was awash with sunlight from tall windows and skylight roof-windows that the nineteenth century architect had never dreamed of.  The bathroom was filled with radiant heat from above and below.

One of the best things about the stay was the breakfast, served in a spacious country kitchen, and complete with candlelight, English eggs, Danish cheeses, ham, fresh rolls, four different homemade jams and tea hot and cozied.  For the next breakfast, we requested the company of our charming hosts, Anne-Lise and Niels, and breakfast was even better.  She is a seamstress and color analyst.  They have a thriving online business promoting  Kagan water machines and Nu Skin products.   They met in Odense several decades ago when she walked down the street to borrow a stamp.

August 9 – 15, 2016

The best thing about this week was Merete and John’s summer home on a fjord in Jaegerspris.  We arrived in a storm of wind that threatened to rip the clothes right off of my body.

Undeterred, they welcomed us with a Danish luncheon of mushroom casserole, onion tarte, crème fraiche cucumber, and the tiniest shrimp you’ve ever seen heaped on Danish brown bread. The shrimp are a delicacy, harvested right out of the waters in front of the house by John himself.

Then, off they went to take care of the grandchildren for the rest of the week. We then set about learning new routines of housekeeping. We washed our clothes in the kitchen sink, hung them out to dry until it rained, then decorated the entire house with socks, pants and shirts attached cleverly to anything that protruded from the wall. We lit the wood stove in the afternoon after walking in the rain—so cozy – and then when it turned into a sauna we got on our shorts and flung open everything that had a hinge. At night, we slept under fluffy down comforters — with the windows still wide open. The Danes sleep under down through all the seasons, and we were going Danish all the way. It was a struggle to keep our cool. At dawn, 5:30, the sun streamed in and greeted us, ready or not.

Every morning required a stroll down the vast green lawn to the quiet waters of the fjord. Along the way, we gathered raspberries and blackberries. We must have consumed the equivalence of $60 US Dollars in berries – growing in huge hedges that went all the way down to the sea.

We wasted a lot of US minutes staring at the sky.  The home was blessed with a wall full of windows and doors going out to the sea.  The island is blessed with wind, rain, sun, rainbows and the most astounding clouds.

At any time of the day, you can look out over the fjord and watch the show.  A stately parade of clouds passes by over the water, always progressing from west to east.  Great white, gray and black shape shifters move in stately procession.  Whales, giraffes, bunnies, witches, mountains, tarantulas, you name it.  Time and space loses meaning.  You forget where you came from and where you were trying to go.

Then, one night, after we had thoroughly marauded all of Merete’s delicious leftovers, we got a little hankering.  Was that ice cream I saw in the freezer?  I explored.  I found.  I produced the most delightful desert and I proudly presented it to my husband.  Creamy vanilla ice cream, dark chocolaty drizzle, almond biscuit garnish.  Am I The Gourmet, or what?  My husband, takes a few bites and remarks, “This is . . . exotic.” I’ve really proven my culinary ingenuity now.  I taste it.  A salty, almost coffee flavor graces the cream.  Hmm. . .  The bottle certainly looked like chocolate sauce.  (Granted, I wasn’t quite sure of the contents, since they were labeled in Danish.)  Oh . . . Not quite chocolate sauce.  Oh no, I do think it is . . .  meat sauce.  OMG, I just had just served meat sauce over my ice cream.  When I told Merete about our faulty marauding, I think I gave her an American–in-Denmark story that will receive uproarious laughter at many a dinner table throughout Jaegerspris.