Thursday, May 15, 2014 - Odense (Mark)

Our only full day in Odense, we planned to make a day trip to Egeskov Castle toward the south. But first things first: breakfast. I strolled to a nearby supermarket called Kvickly to pick up some pastries and sandwich bags. Turns out in Denmark, sandwich bags are paper, not plastic. We packed our lunches and made our way to the train station.

We caught the train to a small town called Kvaevndrup in the south of the island of Funen. The bus schedule doesn't really coordinate with the train, so we decided to walk. The landscape of gently rolling hills with patches of forests and occasionally punctuated with wind turbines was very idyllic, and pleasant to watch. In spite of no sidewalks, we enjoyed our 2.5 km walk to Egeskov Slot.

No sidewalk, but not much traffic either.

You think this is all Funen games?

The palace itself is gorgeous. It is a renaissance-era water castle with well maintained gardens. Our entry got us full access to inside and outside of the castle. The interior features all sorts of hunting trophies, old furniture, ornamental armor and other sorts of things you'd see in a building of this sort. Our favorite was an enormous and intricate dollhouse that took 15 years to complete. It is supposedly the biggest in the world. Liz has included a YouTube video that shows better detail than we got with our camera.

She's grrrrreat!

None shall pass!

Apparently if the mannequin is removed the castle will fall down. It fit nicely in our suitcase.

Outside the castle was slower going because the grounds weren't designed for strollers. We ate our lunch on the grass in front of the castle. There were hordes of Danish kids from school groups at the castle today. They didn't seem too interested in the castle as we found most of them at the nearby playground. Liz took two attempts to get water as the kids made lines at kiosks extremely long. She also spent a few minutes looking at some dresses on a special display, where they had fragments of Marie Anoinette's last dress (however that is defined).

We also peeked into a few of the museums, where large collections of old cars and motorcycles were on display. We decided to walk again to the train station, which was tiring but the bus schedule didn't really work for us.

Upon returning to Odense, we popped into the Christmas store near the HC Andersen museum and settled on a cute elf doll to bring home with us. We then returned to our B&B and collapsed for a rest.

When we finished our break, it was time for food. We didn't want another grocery store meal, so we went to an international market outside the town hall. This was a temporary market, open only the week we were there. By international it basically meant "other countries in Europe." The only non-European tent I saw was Thai. We were hoping to get some Paella but they were sold out of the seafood and chorizo paellas, left with only an unappetizing variety with cheese and potatoes. No other tents seemed to be selling anything meal sized, so we found a nearby pizza place. Liz got a curried chicken salad; I got a pizza with prosciutto, arugula, and parmesan. It was good, and Claire liked it too. It was her first pizza!

Observations:

• At the train station, we noticed Thomas the Tank Engine running on a track nearby. It was a special event for kids, that week only.
• There must be an election soon, because there are campaign signs everywhere. Like other European countries, campaign signs are just a picture of the candidate, with their name and party listed. That's it. No slogans. In America, campaign signs almost never show a picture, and usually have a slogan.
• The most popular form of baby carrier is a pram, and there are lots of them. They sure are bulky, and take up a lot of room on trains. Umbrella strollers like ours are less common.

Thomas stares deep into your soul.