Aalborg; Monday, 02 August, 2010

First stop of the morning, after another hearty breakfast, was the cycle hire shop to pick up a bike for the day. Then with bike I cycled the 5 or so Kilometres out of town to the Viking burial site at Lindholm Høje.

From there I cycled back into town stopping off on the way for several photo stops before heading for the churches in the city centre, the Budolfi Domkirke and the Vor Frue Kirke.

Then it was off over to the castle to visit the one part which I hadn’t been able to yesterday (as its only open 10:00-15:00), the dungeon.

By now, I had pretty much exhausted all there was to do in Aalborg on a Monday (all the rest of the museums are closed) so I decided to continue my Danish journey north. I cycled over to the station, parked my bike up and picked up the train to Frederickshavn. From there I changed trains and continued heading north to Skagen, the most northerly town in Denmark.

I had looked, before leaving Aalborg at what the cost of taking my bike on the train would have been and it was quite expensive, it would also have been an issue as the train was pretty full with bikes already.

So with one bike on hire parked up at the station in Aalborg, I hired another bike here in Skagen to help me see the place. Equipped with bike I continued to head north, all the way to the beach at Grenen. This is the point at which the Skagerrak, a part of the North Sea, and the Kattegat, the channel that leads to the Baltic meet in a crashing of waves and currents, or at least there would be a crashing of waves and currents if it wasn’t such a beautifully calm and clear day! The two seas just gently lapped at each other. I was quite surprised how orderly Denmark ends, in other countries the end is high sea cliffs crumbling into the waters, but here it’s a gentle slope down into the sea (I think it might be called fully accessible!)

From Grenen I cycled back through Skagen and south to the Buried Church. The town is surrounded by Sand dunes, and over time these have drifted, quite quickly at times, so that by the early 19th century the church had been almost swallowed up by the sand. The church elders flogged off the innards of the church and dismantled the main building, but left the distinctive tower still standing as it was an aid to shipping. Today the floor of the tower is several foot below the ground level, and the dunes are continuing to creep in on it.

Then it was time to head back to the station, drop off the second bike and head back to Aalborg where I picked up the first bike and headed back over to the hotel, via a quick twilight tour along the waterfront.

Exhausted from almost a whole day of cycling I headed for my bed and a good night’s sleep.