Wind, Sand and Jellyfish, Hornbaek, North Zealand
Zagan the motorhome’s intrepid explorers are knackered. We’re in a free beach-side parking a short walk south of the fishing village turned resort town of Hornbæk (N56.092693, E12.46783). We’ve a view over to Sweden, and are sat watching international shipping floating in and out of the Baltic through the feisty Øresund. And yes, we’re knackered. Not so much physically tired as mentally. The kind of tiredness where, even when you’re parked up next to some world renown sight or other, you can’t summon the energy to go look at it. It’s not a new sensation for us, we call it being ‘travelled out’, and given a bit of ‘port time’ relaxing somewhere or other, it vanishes. In a couple of weeks we’ll be home in the UK, which we’re both looking forward to.
Beach-side parking just south of Hornbæk. We moved across the car park in the late evening, to face into the wind and get some cover from trees
The sun shone for a wee while yesterday, and we made the most of it with a walk along the clean, white sand beach into the town. Jellyfish were dead, everywhere along the coast, thousands of them, each of them wider than dinner plates. Danes walked small packs of dogs along the blue flag beach, smiling as they passed.
Mass jellyfish wash-up in Zealand
Above the town the oldest flag in the world flutters, like the other Nordic countries the locals love their nation’s flag, and full-sized flag poles stand in gardens everywhere. The flag itself is normally a long drawn out strip of fabric, easily flicked around by the breeze. Thatched roofs have appeared these past couple of days too, reminding us of English villages.
Denmark or England? OK, the massive Danish flag just out of shot gives the game away!
In town we tracked down a seafood diner/cafe/restaurant/takeaway (you ordered your food at an outside window, and decided for yourself where on the premises you ate it) recommended in our Lonely Planet. Heated by the sun through a huge glass window, we tucked into an enormous pile of deep-fried plaice, battered fishcakes and chips, having utterly ignored all the fantastic-looking fresh seafood on offer. On one wall a black and white photo showed a group of men using a rope and an iron contraption to haul a pool table-sized chunk of ice from the sea. I’d got a 10cl bottle of 45% proof Akvavit, a colourless eye-wincer of a drink. I got it partially to say I’d tried this Nordic tradition, and partly due to the new novelty of being able to freely buy rancid-strong spirits. I asked the chap serving us whether I should drink it before or after the meal. He gave just smiled, enigmatically, suggesting either or neither would do. It tasted pretty bad, and what is left is now sat in the fridge in the van being ignored.
Huge stock of seafood available
£30-worth of grub and drinks. We clutched our stomachs all afternoon and couldn’t face tea
Akvavit, which Ju later remembered you’re supposed to chase with beer. Presumably so you don’t taste how evil it is?
Not too much else is happening in here but a few practicalities are on our mind. Our two 85Ah leisure batteries are, we think, on their last legs and have dropped from over 13V down to 12V in one day. They’re a few years old now and need replacing. Both are tucked into the space under the van’s driving seats. When I looked at ’em previously I couldn’t see how to get them out without removing the seats, but it was a half-hearted effort so I need to have a proper look. We’re also down to our small bottle of gas. The wind’s picked up, hurling sand along the ground, and it’s getting down to 7°C at night, up to 10°C in the day. The heating’s been on, which is eating gas and using the batteries. There are a couple of recently-confirmed LPG stations on our way west in a few days, so we should be OK.
Wind-induced patterns in the North Zealand sand
Blown sand in North Zealand
Cheers, Jay
Ho man, them chips look like a dream. Not sure you’re enjoying that Akvavit as much as you’d like to mate 😁, I tried some Tequila…never again, I’ve tasted better during my break fluid phase. Time to burn some diesel me thinks? Happy days, kindest, Wayne.
The Akvavit was rank! Finished it off this evening and it was, again, rank. I’m sticking to the pilsner, or that brown brew you mentioned if I can find it. Hit the Netto today and they had stuff for less than a euro a litre, happy days! Yep, diesel will be burned, Viking ships and bog men to be seen. Raining, dark and cold here. Making us feel at home… Still seen no pigs. Man hugs, Jay
Totally understanding your comments re. Travelled out. Sometimes it’s good to just stop and chill and reflect for a bit. Re. batteries. We got our most recent ones online from Alpha Batteries. Very efficient and cheap. Removing the seats to get at them wasn’t difficult either. 4 bolts, then tip over to get at the connections.
Sometimes a huge plate of fried stuff is called for! Becoming ‘travelled out’ is one reason why we plan to mix our longer trips with periods of house sitting – a base, more room, long showers and a washing machine.
I used to travel a lot with my employer on business. Invariably I’d have a weekend to kill and spend it looking at the local sights.
I ended up with, what I call, “Church Fatigue”.
Now what I tend to do is find a bar with a view of said Church, Cathedral, Castle, and get slowly drunk as the un goes down behind it.
It’s one of my favourite pastimes.
Lee @ gohumberto
Oooh, you’ve given us a bit of inspiration there Lee, thanks fella! Jay
To be honest Jay…Sometimes I get slowly drunk and there’s no Church, Cathedral or Castle for miles. Still a great pastime though (You can always Google an image of a Castle if desperate).
Ooooh man, I reckon I could find myself waking up one day with a pen in hand having sleep-drawn one of Europe’s castles on my forehead; no need to Google any of ’em! :-) Appreciate the sentiment, we’re just ready for something a bit different I reckon, and from what I can remember, Morocco is more than a bit different… Cheers Lee, Jay
Beautiful photos, particularly of the sand. Scandinavia has so much to offer. I discovered your blog recently, but would love to recreate some of your European travels with my family when I am early retired in a few years.
I wasn’t aware there was a place called Zealand, but it makes perfect sense. How could you have a New Zealand if there wasn’t an old one?
Skål!
-PoF
Life is a balance, sometimes we wish for things that once achieved, we lose interest?
We both stopped paid employment at your age, we are ahead 10 years.
You have talked about humps, is this just one of them?
What we did, was especially in the U.K. Was a system, so we do our best to use it! Cheap coffee vouchers, reduced price food, collecting disgaurded receipts to our benafit.
Life is a game to be played.
On trips we have had focusases on let’s say stairs , then photographed them.
We have just had tenants who did not care about our property, just spent 8 weeks updating it.
So we are now planning our trip to Portugal.
Last year we had 6 months in New Zealand, and how you are feelings now, we felt at certain times then.
Once you get home you will feel we need to be away again.
Life is not easy, the blueprint got lot in cyberspace.
Find something you both like and use that on your trips.
We like to walk, so use our camper to achieve ambitions , i.e hadrians wall walk, we used public transport to achieve the route staying in the camper every night.
As I like the planning it ticked my box.
Hope I helped.
John