Denmark Part 2
Thankfully the weather was still being kind as we made our way out of the village to get to the Great Belt Bridge for the return crossing. We managed to see a few more gorgeous villages with thatched cottages everywhere – these looked slightly different to those I’d seen in the UK, they had wooden battens fixed to the crest of the roofline for extra bracing I think – they did look very cool.
We managed to stop before we reached the bridge so Mr Gadget could stick 360 cameras to the side of the van to get a good view. It really is a Great bridge – haha.. It’s a bridge of 2 halves, the first (going back) is a lovely suspension type bridge and the second part was a more traditional bridge with less going on over your head 🙂 We were over the bridge in no time at all and made our way onto the Island of Funen where we drove through the outskirts of Odense and through a small town where we stopped for fuel called Middlefart – I could tell by this time that I am never going to grow up and giggled every time I saw the name (I really don’t know why the word fart makes me laugh, in Germany the exits were signed “Ausfahrt” which did the same..) We then drove onto the Little Belt Bridge which was similar but.. Well.. smaller, than the Great Belt Bridge and it took us over to the Jutland Peninsula where we headed to the West coast.
We had a lovely drive to Sondervig through Rinkobing which was a lovely mix of old and new houses, a lovely museum and a cobbled square. On our way through we spotted a Lidl so stopped off for a few more supplies (mostly ham and cheese.. I think we have a problem.. haha) We could see the Rinkobing Fjord as we drove along with kite surfers gliding along with what looked to be dozens of wind turbines in the background – we’ve seen so many here and considering in Denmark you are never more than 52km from the coast they certainly seem to be making the most of the winds from offshore.
As we were driving into Sondervig we noticed the words “steakhouse” in MASSIVE letters on the roof of a building to our right so we made a quick turn around and thought we’d treat ourselves to a meal out with a car park we could fit the van in! Yaaaaay! We checked out the gigantic menu in the car park which looked very nice and made our way in, past the crazy golf course, by the go-kart track.. This was starting to get a bit weird.. In the front door, through the reception for the 10 pin bowling, right at the arcade and into the Steakhouse itself which was empty.. Turns out we found a Danish “Butlins” (other holiday parks are available..) with the 2 story apartment blocks with external balcony, launderette and all the aforementioned entertainment, it really took me back to holidays in Wales with my mum and sister . It’s not somewhere John and I would normally go as it was far too peopley but the steaks were absolutely perfect – the staff were incredibly friendly and we only had to use the camera option in the google translate app once 🙂 yay! It was a perfect stop off before we found our spot for the night, we could see the weather closing in and had a few places earmarked already so wanted to get going – at least we did it with very full bellies and the knowledge that we had a massive stash of “pudding” options in the van.
John wanted to stay on a little strut of land that was Hvide Sande as there were some lovely looking sand dunes and a lighthouse and many little car parks dotted around – we had the sea on one side and the Fjord on the other and it was a beautiful area!! We tried a few places before we found the small car park – with very clean toilet with paper towels and soap which was fab! It was hunkered in behind the dunes a bit which we felt might be needed as we could see the storm clouds rolling in. When we were driving around we could see lots of what looked to be holiday cottages – these were very simple abodes some with the obligatory thatched roof and others with tile, some looked traditional and others looked like the inside of an ikea catalogue with hot tubs on the veranda and massive outdoor seating areas – it looked amazing! After we parked up we did the usual routine of charging all the tech and backing the footage up – I made drinks and chose a film to watch while we settled down to chill out for a bit (although I did fall asleep watching it.. Must have been the massive meal! haha) The rain just started as we settled in for the night – it was still light outside when we got into bed too which still felt strange but we were thankful for the blackout blinds in the van. We could feel a little buffeting from the wind blowing around us and could feel it start to pick up a little more, rain was lashing the windows and we could hear a low grumbling working its way towards us. There were no street lights where we were parked up so when I peeked out of the back blind I could only see 2 glowing red eye like lights from 2 of the wind turbines over the way, the rest was pitch black and as my eyes were adjusting there was this massive flash of light from over the sea to our left which earned a “whoooaaaaaaaa” from me which in turn woke John up a bit 🙂 I lowered the blind a bit more and checked the time – 3.20am.. So that’s us staying awake for a bit then. We propped ourselves up on elbows and watched the storm roll in and over us – massive claps of thunder rocked the van and sheet and forked lightning lit up the dunes around it – it was absolutely spectacular! We watched until it died down a bit and had captured some of the lightning show on our phones. It was well worth being rudely awakened for, considering I was petrified of thunder storms as a kid, i’m glad as a slightly more grown up person that I’m over it!
The morning dawned clear and bright having been washed sparkly clean (well.. As clean as sand dunes can get anyway) Coffee was made and we slid open the side door so we could hear the lovely sound of the birds calling to each other better. We saw what looked to be classes of school kids riding through the dunes on the designated cycle paths – what a great way to get about! And I tried to find the bird that was chirping soooo loudly that we could barely hear each other speak inside the van – it sounded like R2D2.. it was a crazy captivating sound. John cleaned the flies off the windscreen and I cleaned up the car park a bit to say thank you and headed off to our next stop – The Sondervig Sand Sculpture Festival 2019!!
We travelled back up the way we came and slightly past the Steak House we ate at the day before, we were hoping we would be able to catch one of the few bakeries we had seen on the way down to be open, but this day was Danish Celebration Day which seemed like a bank holiday of sorts as only the bigger places were open and the little villages looked like a typical Sunday in 1985.. Empty! So we missed out on the bakeries which our waistlines were probably thankful for that – haha.. We’ve done nothing but eat bread since we hit up the French Supermarket! Thankfully the Sand sculpture festival was open – Yay! The theme was AI and technology which was right up John’s street as you can imagine.. What was also right up John’s street were the 4 foot high sand boobies in the sculptures – hahaha.. They were very very well made and they had photo boards up about how they prepare and set up and it really really s just sand and water, super compressed in a wooden form then the form removed so the sculptures could begin..! The detail in these things were amazing – from robotised dogs and AI hiding in plain sight to entire towns made from 1’s and 0’s to AI babies and humans fighting back.. It was really very cool! We had a good look around then decided it was time to head off to Romo to grab some lunch.
It was a lovely drive down to Romo with the sea to our right and through many little towns and villages. We passed through the outskirts of Varde, through Ribe which was quaint and quiet, and right onto the road to Romo – Romovej which has water on both sides, a little spit of land to take you there (google advises me that it’s called an Isthmus don’t you know..) John wanted to get some drone shots of the van crossing this beautiful land bridge (of course.. He never fails with the chance to grab a decent shot of something) So I abandoned him at one of the big parking areas along the way, and drove as slow as I could to the end of the bridge, turned around and drove back, slowing down when there were no other cars around near John, to the other side, then turned around and drove back to pick him up – this is the life of Bee Roll Mandy you know.. Faithful filming assistant to Gadget John – just so you know – that land bridge, Isthmus thingy was 9.8km long..! So not just a quick nip about, I think John might have thought I was leaving him there – haha.. John jumped in the van and we then followed the road and the cars, vans and caravans to Lakolk Strand which might be the biggest beach i’ve ever seen covered with vehicles..!!
This beach was something else – it looked like something out of mad max or burning man festival.. There were HUGE kites flying, anchored to cars and every type of vehicle you could imagine, all parked up enjoying the sea and the sunshine – there was even a car and caravan that had a picket fence around them to keep the dogs in! It was brilliant! We set up close to the shoreline and I made us some sammiches while John played with his drone.. It was soon very apparent that the tide was on it’s way in as we watched it curl towards us with each wave – at that point, John grabbed the drone, swung the drivers seat back ground and told me to hold on! Haha – we then set up as far away from the shore line as we could – still with the most beautiful views and the sounds of the sea and seagulls swooping to entertain us while we ate. I decided at this meal that I was going to stop sharing packets of crisps with John as it makes me too jittery – these cheesy nick nak type crisps are literally the best in the whole wide world so it’s only right and proper that we have an equal share and when two of you are digging into a bag there is no way of telling – so I told John no more sharing.. I think he took it badly – haha.. He had a little old pout on so I told him I didn’t want to be eating his crisps which I don’t think he believed at all!!! I’d been for a paddle and we were sat enjoying the view and John was about to get the drone out again when we noticed that we couldn’t see the horizon any more.. We could see the sea but with ghostly apparitions walking around as there was a steamy mist (Called Advection Fog.. it’s nice having a Dave you know :)) that was rolling in over everything – I grabbed my Go Pro (mine now.. Not John’s – it’s mine!) and headed back up to the sea to get a good view of it – it smelled like a spa! All salty and hot and thick.. The way this stuff was rolling in was incredible – I was expecting White Walkers or Dragons to be charging out from it, it was so dense! All around us Kites were being pulled down, windbreakers packed up and kids bundled back in to campervans and cars and we took that as locals knowing that there is no point in staying! So we packed up and joined the mass exodus through the now empty man made roads on the beach back to the main road – that definitely was something out of Burning Man, massive truck conversions, motorhomes and cars just appearing out of the fog from nowhere. That was an experience to say the least – how very cool!!!
We didn’t want to travel too far from here for our last night in Denmark so we travelled back over to the other side and made a prompt right to follow the sea down to our next spot that John had found on google maps. A lovely car park overlooking the beach where we could see the peninsular of Romo which also had a toilet too – it was called a Wohnmobilstellplatz (caravan parking..) the closest village being Hjerpsted. There were already 3 other vans parked up there and a couple of cars – we waited for a couple getting into their car to leave as they had a lovely spot to the side of the others where we chose to spin round and point the rear doors at the sea so we could wake up to the lovely views, we could see them out of the side door too and spent a lovely evening listening to the waves once again, eating some nice food and catching up with some YouTube videos and of course a time lapse of the sunset..
We woke up to a gorgeous sunny day once again, we dressed and threw the back doors open so we could make the most of the views again. The coffee power was strong so the nespresso maker was out in force (unfortunately disturbing the peace a little, at least it’s quick!) We emptied the loo and put one more coffee on to go with breakfast and thought about where we could get to for our next stop as we knew we’d be well into Germany or even The Netherlands if the traffic was OK. As we were chatting 3 people carriers pulled into the car park and an entire class of 5 year olds tumbled out!! Well.. I’ve never seen 3 motorhomes pack up so quickly in my life.. We were soon after them but not before we had a chuckle at how quickly they scooted off!
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