Århus, in the middle of our street...

As you may or may not recall, I met a couple of Danes named Mikkel and Lasse while I was in Denmark. Since they so generously offered me a place to stay in their home town of Århus, and I was heading to Scandinavia anyways, I figured it would be a shame not to stop by for a while. Which is exactly what I did. I ended up spending about 5 days in Århus, and they were actually some of the busiest days I've had so far in Europe.

I started out doing something that has been strangely foreign to me for the past 5 months: work. Let me explain. Mikkel and Lasse have a friend named Matthias who apparently owns and operates a very lucrative vegetable shop in Århus. I never knew that the vegetable business could be so profitable, but there it is. Anyways, one day he got it in his head that he would like to go sailing across the Atlantic with his buddies, and then do some island hopping in the Caribbean. So he took out a loan equivalent to about $100,000 USD and bought a 52-foot sailboat, the Rosa. It sailed fine but was in rough shape cosmetically. So, since he had invited Mikkel and Lasse to sail with him, but neither of them could afford to pitch in to pay for the boat, they decided it would be better for them to help out by fixing it up. So that's what we worked on for the first few days. It was arduous work...mostly sanding the interior wooden surfaces and applying fresh coats of lacquer, but it was good to help out with the cause. When they actually embark on their transatlantic voyage in a couple years, I'm sure it will be one hell of a trip.

For some reason I completely neglected to take any pictures of the Rosa, so you will just have to use your imagination. Here's some help: It's a sailboat. It's 52 feet long. It's currently a mess. That just about sums it up.

The next day I got the chance to take part in a uniquely Danish experience. Every year at midsummer, the Danes celebrate Saint Hans, although nobody could tell me why. I guess he was just a pretty cool saint. Anyways, they celebrate Saint Hans by recreating a medieval witch-burning. They make a huge pile of logs, sticks and hay and stick a cross on top, from which hangs the effigy of a witch. Then they set the whole thing on fire and sing songs about Saint Hans. And get this...they even cram the witch effigy full of fireworks and noisemakers, to simulate the screams of agony that a real witch would no doubt be belting out at that point. So I guess the Danes are some sadistic mofos.

Here are some shots from the get-together:

Before:

After:

Great Danes. From left: Julia, Hanna, Markus, Lasse, Mikkel, Me, Søren, Anna, Ingeborg, Julia's friend (never got her name):

At some point during the evening, Søren and Mikkel got a hold of my camera. Here is the result:

We spent almost all of the following day at the beach. The experience thoroughly confirmed for me a suspicion that I had had all along: Danish women are HOT. I almost fell over as soon as I hit the sand. Seriously, folks, you have no idea. You have to go and see for yourself.

Danish women. Hot. Hot hot hot hot hottttttttttt...

Whoa, I'm sorry, I think I lost myself there for a moment. Yeah, so anyways, the beach. As the sun went down we scored some food and had a barbeque down by the seaside. It was pølser-licious. Here's Mikkel rockin' out with his gee-tar:

Somewhere along the way, one of us had the bright idea to spend the night sleeping under the stars at the beach. This idea worked fine...until it started raining at about 2AM. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it), we were all pretty much drunk, meaning we couldn't drive home. So we did the only logical thing we could think of: we slept under a railroad bridge. That was definitely a first for me. It's a strange feeling to wake up to the sight of pedestrians gingerly stepping over you.

Anyways, I pulled it together in time for me to catch the train to Frederikshavn, where I assumed I would be able to catch a night ferry to Oslo. This was not the case. Apparently they only run once a day, at 10 AM. So I had to spend a night in sleepy Frederikshavn. Not the end of the world, but more or less pointless.

The next day I made the 8-hour journey across the sea to Oslo. I spent most of that time sleeping and listening to my iPod, so nothing interesting to report there. But here's the view that greeted me as we steamed up the Oslofjord toward the city:

Well, I will say right now that the plans I've come up with for Norway are quite a bit different from my usual M.O., so I'll just leave that for the next post.