A place to 'relax'~ Denmark part 2

The city mice in my family really enjoyed the energy, noise and movement in Copenhagen. While the country mouse {moi}, also enjoyed the bright big city, I felt quite at ease for 2 days in the countryside.

Welcome to 'Relax', our friends' perfectly named family vacation home, located in Skodbjerge, Denmark. This is on the far Western side of Denmark, on a narrow strip of land with the North Sea to the West and the Ringkobing Fjord (large body of water) to the East. This precious, thatched roof cottage by the sea is where we rested our heads (literally) and unplugged for a few days.

The front of the house as seen from the dune paths~ and the back of the house, with our clean clothes blowing in the North Sea breeze.
It doesn't get dark here until around 11pm so we had nice long, lazy days.



You can see the back side of 'Relax' in the photo on the left. Elise and I having glass of wine on the beach while N searches for treasures. In the photo on the bottom right, we had a festive family dinner with fresh breads, a variety of local smoked fish, and cheeses.
On our way from Copenhagen up to Skodbjerge, we stopped in the city of Odense, Denmark. This city is full of amazing, old, architecture and history.

Some of these old buildings are so warped they look like a strong gust of wind could topple them in seconds. But most have been standing since the late 1800's.


One of my favorite streets in Odense. I could've stayed here and taken photographs all day!

The yellow house above is where Hans Christian Andersen lived.

It's common to see the year that the buildings were completed right on the front of them. As you see below, this building dates back to 1883.

Another great cobble stoned street in Odense.

The main square in downtown Odense. In the photo on the bottom left you'll see my lunch. This is the typical, Danish open face sandwich. Pate, meat, capers and pickled beets~ it was delicious! OK- back to the coast. This beautiful church sits just beyond 'Relax' and is where Elise's sweet father was laid to rest about 7 or so years ago. The surrounding cemetery grounds are beautiful.

Note, another old building~ built in 1869 and updated in 1947.
Just seeing these images again brings my blood pressure down a notch. It was surreal there. So quiet and peaceful and so much simple beauty surrounding. Things seem much more simple in general in Denmark. Just a slower pace with more focus on the people with which you surround yourself and the quality time you spend with them.
Proof that this is an entirely different world~ roadside potato stands using the honor system! We took a bag of potatoes and left some money in the can.

We had to experience some of the local Nordic fish so a visit to the local fish market and a lunch of fish-n-chips was in order. This is also where we purchased the variety of smoked fish for our outside dinner in the collage photo above.
There was a lot of talk of the vikings up in these neck of the woods. So the viking museum was a must-see. We actually found some very unusual things to bring home in the gift shop here. This wasn't your typical museum but more of a re-creation of the way the vikings lived.

Some replica boats full of history and crazy stories about what took place on them years and years ago.
We learned all about the viking way of life here.

We parted ways with our good friends at the end of the week and flew back to London to spend our final long weekend.

It was so sad to say goodbye to scenes like this, but it will be forever in my memory and has morphed it's way into 'my happy place' image for times when I need a mental escape.

Goodbye to these happy and loving spirits~ at least until we hook up with them in Houston. So sad that you have to travel around the globe to spend good quality time with special friends who just so happen to live only 30 miles away. ☺

I'll be back next week with photos from the London leg of the trip.

Happy weekend everyone!

xo~
Tricia

Copenhagen

As most of you already know, part of the overall theme of my blog is travel. With a small family of 3, the logistics of family vacations is relatively simple for us. Financially, we make adjustments in other areas of our life in order to fit these family getaways into our budget each year.

I love to capture special places and moments on my digital camera during these trips, but sorting through them all upon returning home is overwhelming. I typically upload all of my pictures onto kodak gallery and am able to name the photos and send them out to close friends and family within a few days of returning home. But figuring out how to break it all down to share with my blog readers always throws me off. In the past I've broken trips down by category (people, places, things) or by sites (churches, famous sites, restaurants) or by cities visited. I've already shared a few posts with you about things (here~bikes in Copenhagen) and people (here~ Denmark and G Britain) from this recent trip. There are far too many photos to post individually, so do I put them all into collages? Will you miss the overall feel of the city if the photos are condensed into collages? I'll likely do a mixture of collages and full images just to not bore you, like I'm doing right now. ☺

OK- on with it. I'll continue with the 'city' theme this time and will break our week long journey into 3 posts.

~Copenhagen~

Our former next door neighbors (and dear friends) go home to Denmark to spend summers at their family home on the coast. I'll share that portion of the trip with you in the next post, but for now I'll focus on the 3 days we spent with them in Copenhagen (with an edited version of their sweet family).

Copenhagen is one of the most environmentally savvy cities in the world, is consistently ranked as one of the best cities for quality of life, and 35% of locals transport around the city via bicycle. The city is surrounded by 5 lakes and the bay, which feeds into the Baltic Sea.

Round Tower on Copenhagen's pedestrian street:
Artwork on display inside Round Tower:
The view of Copenhagen from the top of the tower:




The Copenhagen Jazz Festival was in full swing during our visit. Music could be heard all over town.

Norrebro~ An eclectic town on the other side of the lakes in Copenhagen, within walking distance from our hotel. Here we had the best cup of coffee on the trip, had a typical Danish breakfast of fresh baked bread with cheese, and tasted some delicious local caramel candies.

Boat tour out of Nyhavn Harbor:

We toured Rosenborg Castle and spent time meandering through the attached King's Castle park.

Park and cemetery where Hans Christian Andersen was laid to rest:

The Danish Parliament Building:

We shut the city down our final night with an evening visit to Tivoli Garden:

I was so thankful to be there with Danish friends to point out the most interesting historic sites and help steer us away from the touristy (and quite expensive) cafes. Many of our meals were done the European way of picking up a fresh loaf of bread at a bakery, then some cheeses and meats and a glass of wine. We'd stroll the streets eating our food, people watching and site seeing. We wanted to drive over the bridge into Malmo, Sweden but time just didn't permit.

Copenhagen had just experienced major flooding 2 days before our arrival so many shops were shut down and our hotel sustained significant damage in the garden level rooms. Nonetheless, the weather was perfect during our visit and I managed to squeeze in a few early morning runs along the lake just outside of our hotel. Great people, stunning architecture, and another educational and fun adventure for our family.

Cheers for now~

Tricia

Escape to Provence

It seems as if the whole world has been on the road for the past few weeks. While we're all in full summer travel mode, let's take a {cyber} weekend escape to this lovely abode in the heart of Provence.

Ooh la la that stove. It looks very similar to Linsey's La Canche stove (here)....sigh. ☺


It's so cozy, I could move in today!

Just wait til you see what lies beyond those French doors outside.

Heaven awaits. Olive trees, lavender and wisteria...the stuff that Provence is made of.

Do you see all of that purple out there, past the pool? Simply divine.

Wishing you a dreamy weekend friends!

Hugs~
Tricia

P.S.- I'll still working on all of my trip photos so stay tuned for another mini getaway via moi.

If you love this place, it's for sale, check it out:

source