After leaving the plush comfort of Kent and Leslie's apartment in Amsterdam, Devin and I boarded a night train headed for Copenhagen, Denmark. School just let out for the summer in Europe, so all the trains were pretty much booked solid. We ended up paying a pretty penny for a pretty nice private sleeper car. It's so strange to get on a train and have a room with a bed and sink. We showered on the train too. In the morning there was breakfast, brought right to our door. Who would have thought that we'd get room service, complete with drink orders? Speaking of drink orders, I've really gotten used to having hot chocolate for breakfast every morning. I'm pretty sure that most of the milk we've been drinking is whole though. I can hear my arteries choking from the excess of fat and cholesterol.
We were really excited to hit Denmark, the first country of our Scandinavian adventure. Too bad it was pouring down rain. We stood in line at the ATM for twenty minutes, only to be disappointed with the terrible exchange rate and sky high prices. We were warned that Norway was even worse! Luckily we had rain jackets. We walked through the streets of Copenhagen with our backpacks covered in plastic ponchos. I'm sure we looked like a couple of hobos. You know, the kind that your parents warn you to stay away from. After walking a while, we heard bells and whistles in the distance. We were suprised when several bus loads of college students drinking beer and wearing sailor uniforms stormed the statue in the middle of the square and began screaming in celebration. Apparently they had just graduated from college, and this was their way of celebrating. This went on all day, and every once in a while during our five mile hike to the ferry port we could hear them in the distance.
Also on the way to the ferry, we saw a gaggle of gaurds headed to the royal palace for the changing of the gaurd. We follwed them several blocks until they turned off on a side street. Hans Christian Andersen, the fairytale author, is from Copenhagen as well, and there is a famous statue of the Little Mermaid. Unfortunately, this is not the Disney version, sorry Marge, but we stopped to take a look nonetheless. She was pretty small and slightly disappointing, but we had made it to the harbor by this point, so we were headed in the right direction.
After some more walking (I'm starting to get some killer calves) we finally made it. One small problem: we hadn't booked our ferry in advance, and there were no spots left. We took our chances and went on standby. Five minutes later we had a room. We boarded the "ferry" and quickly realized that we were on more of a cruise ship than just a simple boat. Since we had already spent more than we should have and were on the cruise, we decided to top it off with the all you can eat buffet. Trust me, we ate until nothing else would fit inside our stomachs. Then we opened up our day packs and snuck a few more meals inside. We grabbed all the bread and fruit that we could fit. Devin thought that it would be a good idea to get some fish too. I refused to make my bag smell like seafood counter at your local HyVee. Off to the deck we headed to watch the sunset at 11:00 at night. We can't get used to the long days here. It's full on sun at 5:00 in the morning and light until past bedtime.
We woke up in Oslo, Norway where we vowed to spend no more. We trekked through town, seeing the sights along the way. The scenery is incredible! The mountains come right out to the sea, and the sun is warm and the air cool. We jumped on a train for Goteborg, Sweden. We were both exhausted. I fell asleep on Devin's shoulder. He woke up when he felt my drool running down his arm. Sorry, Dev! After transferring to a bus, the rail line was under construction, we arrived in Goteborg. Yet another long walk lead us to the ghetto and our hostel. As we were laying in bed that night, we looked out the window and realized that the sun was still up at 11:30. Since we had eaten nothing but bread that day, we went to bed dreaming of eggs in the morning.
We made ham, egg, and cheese sandwiches in the morning from the items we found at breakfast. Goteborg is nice, but there really isn't a whole lot to do, so we loitered in the ferry station for a few hours before another long hike to see the statue of Poseidon built for the 1923 World Expo. Protein bars for lunch again, and then we hiked to the ferry. The walk was long and hot, and of course I was getting grouchy. I rightfully earned the name Scorpion Woman from Devin. Our luck changed when we got to the ferry. We had paid for the cheapest below deck room possible. However, when we were given our room keys we noticed the tag "comfort class." Apparently we had been upgraded to the private top deck, free of charge. Let's just say that we were not lacking in amenities. We enjoyed our journey on the sun deck. It was so windy that I could lean all the way forward and spread my arms like I was flying, and the wind held me up. Awesome.
We arrived in Kiel, Germany. We're back to the Euro and back to smaller prices. It's off to Belin and then to Eastern Europe. Our whirlwind tour of Scandinavia was tiring, and we're ready for a day or two of R&R.
