We left Copenhagen on Tuesday. Denmark is made up of hundreds of islands and one peninsula. We took a train across the island of Zealand, then across the island of Funen to get to the peninsula, Jutland. Our first stop was Legoland in the town of Billund. Legos were invented by a Danish man named Ole Kirk Christiansen in the 1930s. There are other Legolands in other parts of the world, but this is the original Legoland that opened in 1968. We split up at the park. Helen and Zina rode the roller coasters and Sarah and Becky rode the boats and train. In the photo, Helen and Zina are standing under the I in Billund.
We met back together for lunch. Legoland seemed like the perfect place to try one of the famous Danish hot dogs. There are 4 times as many pigs in Denmark as people. The airport in Copenhagen smelled like ham when we walked through it. Zina's plain hot dog came in a tube shaped bun. Helen had her hot dog with onions and bacon. Becky's hot dog was Danish style with relish, mustard, onions and slightly pickled cucumbers.
After lunch we walked through Miniland together and admired the cleverness of the Lego sculptures. This is a replica of Nyhavn in Copenhagen.
Tiny cyclists ride along the mini streets.
This is a replica of Amalienborg Palace.
Tiny soldiers stand guard outside the palace.
Here is the Eiffel Tower. We're pretty sure they could build anything out of Legos. Zina and Helen rode more roller coasters until time to go.
We got back to the train and headed north to Aalborg. We stayed in hotel that was built in the 1700s. Our room was on the 5th floor. In Europe, the main floor is called 0, so the 5th floor would be the 6th floor in America. In any case, we were at the top. This was the view from our window.
Aalborg is off the beaten path for American tourists. We came this far north because our great-grandfather, Anders Peder Larsen, was born near Aalborg. Generations of Larsens before him lived in this area. We wanted to look around and see what we could learn about their life in Denmark. Our first stop on Wednesday morning was the Aalborg Historical Museum. All of the displays were in Danish, but we learned Aalborg is a very old city, founded by Vikings in the 900s. Merchants dominated the city during the middle ages, then it prospered from the herring industry. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, it was a hub for manufacturing. Today it is the 4th largest city in Denmark and a university town.
Helen put a pin in the map to show where we came from. The map had pins in Saturn and Jupiter so we don't know how accurate it is.
This is a model of a Danish classroom from the 1920s.
Next we walked up the street to Vor Frue Kirke. The name means something like "Church of Our Lady" and is a common name for Lutheran churches in Denmark. Our great-great grandfather, Laurits Larsen, was baptized here.
The church is well cared for. A church employee told us the church collects taxes from the residents of Aalborg so even if church attendance is low, the church has resources to maintain the building.
The altar was painted by Frans Schwartz, a Danish artist. The paintings from the altar toured the United States in 2013-2014, including a stop at BYU. While the paintings were on tour, reproductions hung in the church.
This is the baptismal font.
Across the square from the church is the state records office and Danish Emigration Archive. Between 1850 and 1920, over 300,000 Danes left Denmark and came to America. Denmark was a small country, with about 1.4 million people in 1850, so this represented a significant percentage of the population. The Emigration Archive collects photos, letters, biographies, newspapers, books and anything that describes the emigrant experience. It's the only office like it in Denmark.
The archive had just installed an exhibit that described the emigrant experience. Unusual for Denmark, the exhibit was in English and Danish so we could read the displays. This photo of a ship on its way from Denmark to the US caught Becky's eye because she recognized the name "Hellig Olav."
Back home in the US, Becky looked through some images saved on Ancestry and found the passenger list for the Hellig Olav, leaving Copenhagen on 4 June 1908. Number 17 on the list is Anders Peder Larsen. Built in 1903, the Hellig Olav could carry 130 1st class, 140 2nd class and 900 3rd class passengers.
Zina and Helen napped while Becky and Sarah talked to Jane, a knowledgable archivist, and looked at the exhibit. We are reminded of something we read at the archive, "An emigrant, for the most part, rarely does as much for himself as for his descendants."
Limfjorden divides Aalborg in half. After we left the archive, we walked along the fjord.
We could see hundreds of jellyfish swimming in the water.
The Utzon Center is next to the fjord. Jørn Utzon, most famous for designing the Sydney Opera House, grew up in Aalborg.
We stopped to look at the Aalborghus Castle. This castle was built by Christian III in the 1500s to collect taxes in northern Denmark. It looks like a warehouse. Instead of imagining piles of gold, imagine piles of wheat which is how the local farmers paid their taxes for centuries.
The castle is still used for government offices. The dungeon underneath the castle is open for visitors. It felt pleasantly cool inside on a warm day.
This is a tunnel underneath the castle.
At the Aalborg Historical Museum, someone recommended we go to the Franciscan Friary Museum. An archaeological excavation in the 1990s uncovered a friary from the 1200s. The museum explains the history of the neighborhood from viking times until the 1500s when the friary closed. The museum entrance was the most unusual we encountered. We paid our fee in a coin slot which activated the elevator and took us underground to the museum. The photo shows the elevator from street level.
The museum exposed the foundations of the friary and showed layers of human activity stacked one on top of the other. If you think you see bones sticking out from the excavation, you're right. In the middle ages, many people paid to be buried in the friary because they thought it was closer to heaven than ordinary ground.
The last museum we visited in Aalborg was called Linholm Høje. This museum was dedicated to Aalborg's Viking heritage. Many of the most spectacular archaeological finds have been moved to the National Museum in Copenhagen. This museum contains a collection of everyday Viking tools along with interpretive exhibits about Viking life.
We got to the museum about 20 minutes before it closed so they let us in for free. Except for a brief pamphlet printed in English, the museum was in Danish so we might not have learned more from staying longer. We think this is an example of a Viking tent and that the mural shows Vikings meeting to trade.
We could spend as much time as we wanted outside on the museum grounds. The museum is built on the site of a Viking village that was occupied from 400-1000 AD. It's the highest part of Aalborg. "Høje" means high.
Some unusual looking sheep grazed on the grounds.
The hillside leading down from the museum is a Viking cemetery, although few people are buried here. The Vikings in this area built cremation rings and burned the bodies of the dead on the stones, along with trinkets and food or other offerings.
Inside the museum, a mural showed a person prepared for cremation.
The vikings built circles and ovals for women and triangles and ship shapes for men. There are 700 grave sites on the hill. This is the largest Viking gravesite in Denmark and is evidence of Aalborg's long history.
This is a photo of our hotel. It's been remodeled many times. The yellow section at the top is where our room was located.
The hotel had a lousy elevator and spotty wi-fi, but made up for it with an amazing smorgasbord for breakfast. The food covered 2 round tables like the one in the photo, along with two long tables along the wall.
This is Jens Bangs' house. It was built in the 1600s by a wealthy merchant and is probably the fanciest building in town.
Jens Bangs' half-brother, Jørgen Olufsen built this colorful house. Jørgon Olufsen served as mayor of Aalborg.
We felt like we made some connections in Aalborg and learned a little more Danish history. When we got to Aalborg, we saw American flags decorating the streets, which we didn't see anywhere else on our trip. We learned that Aalborg and the surrounding area have celebrated the American Independence Day since the early 1900s. Many Danes who had family that emigrated to America saw the holiday as a way to stay close to their family members living far away. We were lucky to visit just before July 4th and see the decorations. We'll remember the flags and our own connection to this beautiful city.
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