Denmark Vacation

Before I tell about Denmark, I have very important news to share... David and I experienced our FIRST earthquake on Tuesday May 29th in Venice. You can read about the earthquake now in the news, which was not in Venice itself, but we felt the tremor for perhaps 5-7 seconds in the morning as we were preparing to go into the city. It was a fairly large earthquake at 5.5 magnitude and currently the Italian news reports that 16 people have died and around 200 have lost their homes, but where David and I were it was nothing serious. However, we certainly felt the ground shake around a bit, and when that stopped, the dresser in the room just kept shaking for maybe 3 seconds longer. We thought perhaps there was just someone in the family who was really obese or a rowdy child who ran down the stairs, but now we have confirmed that it was indeed an earthquake. We are both thrilled, especially because no damage was done to us, and now we know what an earthquake feels like. Very cool.

On Wednesday morning we left Venice very smoothly and arrived in Denmark half an hour early which was very impressive because the flight was only supposed to take 2 hours. Jens and Helle picked us up from the (Jens is my Mormor's brother) and we spent a wonderful afternoon talking with them about our studies and our career plans as well as our lives back in America. Then we moved to Peter and Trine's house (Peter is the son of Jens and Helle) and we will continue to use their house as "base camp" for the rest of the trip as we go around to see different sites and families around Denmark. Today Trine took David and I and her two sons (Mikkal and Emil) around to see some Danish castles and Emil's school, and to finish the day David and Mikkal and I played the Danish version of Monopoly. That was very very fun, and with Mikkal's translation of the "chance" cards we had no linguistic problems at all. Also, I won, so it was extra good.

It is already quite late tonight, so I will just show you some pictures so that you can see where we have been:

This is the Jelling Rune Stone monument that Jens and Helle took us to on our way back from the airport. This is a UNESCO World Heritage site so it was really fun to see. It represents the historical transition in Denmark from paganism to Christianty.

This is Valdemars Slot (Castle) that Trine took us to today. It was very ornately decorated in the inside and David and I enjoyed it very much. 

I loved this picture of the toy cannon in the driveway leading up to the manor.

David and I in front of castle number 2 of our trip. This one was the most ornate, but we could not go inside. We just got out of the car to have a little look around, and Mikkal took this photo of us.

This was the pretty city by Nyborg Slot, the third castle that we saw today. (You can see the actual castle below, which was also very interesting.)

This castle was built as more of a defensive fortress, and was built in the 11th century! It was very fun to see

This is Emil, the younger of Peter and Trine's sons, as he played on a cannon in the yard of the Nyborg Slot. He is 9 and therefore is full of exploring energy!

Unlike Emil, however, David and I are not full of unlimited energy and we are going to go to bed now (after all it is already midnight and we must be up somewhat early tomorrow) so I will end my post here. Tomorrow we should be going to Lego Land because Soren and Lise (Soren is the other son of Jens and Helle) have managed to get us both free tickets into the amusement park. We are very grateful and excited! I hope to post more pictures soon. Best wishes to you all!