63 degrees, sunny, windy with sprinkles (of rain)
Well well well. I have made it back from my first study tour with my European Politics class. We fit a lot in two and a half days.
We left Copenhagen thursday morning and drove to Jutland which is the part of Denmark that is attached to the European continent. The only way to drive to Jutland from the Islands is across the Store Bælt Bridge- the third longest bridge in the world and our first destination.
The Bælt Bridge also includes a train tunnel that goes under the water making passage from Jutland to the Islands exponentially more accessible today than ever before with the ferries. Structurally sound, architecturally interesting, good for Denmark's economy, nice location, etc. For all of these things it gets an A. But, F to the government for the $45 dollar toll to cross it and an F to the bridge company for flooding the tunnel during construction and then setting it on fire once it was finally drained. Also, an F- to the drunk russian captain who drove his ship into the bridge.
The next stop was the Dybbøl Banke, which was the sight of the Danes heroic military stand against the Germans in 1864. Let me give you a brief recap of the battle. The war began in March so in February the Danes began to build their fortifications. Naturally, they call up GERMANY for their supplies. The Germans, needing only half a brain for this, figure out what type of fortifications the Danes will be building and how many it is possible for them to build. Ok. So not a great start.
The war starts, a few battles are fought, and the Danes retreat to their position at the Dyybøl banke. This is were they have built all these fortifications with German lumber. So the Germans blow up most of these right off the bat. The ones left standing are declared off limits by the officers so the soldiers had to stand outside and many froze to death. Right. You're probably wondering how they stacked up in combat? Well, they didn't fire the cannons because they were so inaccurate that setting them off would a) not hit the germans and b) draw attention to their position and prompt the Germans to shoot at them. So the cannons are out of the question. Their guns were also slightly older than the German's. While the Germans could simply load their guns by dropping a cartridge in, the Danes had to STAND UP, pour in the powder, then the cartridge, push it all down with a ram rod, and then fire. If you made it through all that without being shot, props. To make it worse, many of the Danes were highly untrained soldiers and many of them forgot to remove the ram rod before shooting. The historians who searched the battle field many years later were initially confused to find so many ram rods left on the field, but I'm sure the German's were more perplexed at the time.
As you may have figured out on your own, the Danes lost this battle (and the War).
That night we went to dinner at Royals BBQ and Restaurant. Once the group was seated, the serves excitedly told us that we would be eating hamburgers for dinner. You would think, or at least I did, that a restaurant with BBQ in its name can probably serve up a good, if not great, hamburger. Incorrect. Hamburger = beef patty with a huge piece of butter on top, no roll, and a FEW veggies on the side. It's whatever.
On to Kiel where we went to two presentations about the German government and Germany's role as a member of the EU. All good stuff. Had lunch on the water, walked around and then hopped on the bus headed for Lubeck.
Lubeck is beautiful, just beautiful. It is one of the few northern German towns that wasn't bombed during WWII.
That night there was a big festival with lots of music, beer, sausages, and doughnuts. So we spent the night hanging out, eating, dancing and getting a good dose of German culture. Our teacher, Jacob (pronounced yacob), (former cabinet minister of the Danish gov't) came with us to the festival.
He is called, by some, the George Clooney of Denmark.
The next morning, a little earlier than we would have liked, we began a walking tour of the town led by a strange and hilarious man.
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| Biggest. moustache. ever. |
He has a HUGE moustache and a deep froggy voice and if you combine those with his tenuous grasp on the english language you end up with a unique walking tour experience. I had a great time on the tour which at times made no sense or was just straight up inappropriate.
We ended the tour at the Schiffergesellschaft (give that name a try), an old restaurant that was used by mariners for hundreds of years. It reminded me of a scene out of Moby Dick. It was very dark inside with lots of candles, paintings of the sea hanging on the walls, and lots of model sailing ships hanging from the ceiling.
From here, we headed back to Copenhagen.
The End.
-Allison
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