While we were in Trollhattan we had a quick visit for one night from Bart and Renata. They are from the Netherlands and we all including Orvar had met in Ushuaia. They are on a 2-week trip and were passing by on the way home.
It is finally time to really head south and of course we picked the day it is pouring rain. Despite that we still decided to make the 349 km trip to Copenhagen in 2 days. The first we went east and south on the small back roads 298 km to Almhult.
It rained hard almost all the way to the cable ferry at Sunnaryd. This was a lake crossing, but was one of the roughest we had. Actually holding the bike upright was difficult.
Almhult is the birthplace of IKEA and so we had to go there for some Swedish meatballs of course.
We opted for a cabin to hide from the rain, but the next day we woke to the sunshine.
We made the 182 km trip to Copenhagen into a 323 km day by really taking the small single-track roads. This was until we arrived near to the coast at Landskrona when we did take the secondary road north to Helsingborg.
Near the castle we enjoyed a farewell to Sweden lunch of open-faced shrimp sandwiches and the biggest piece of apple piece with meringue and vanilla cream you have ever seen.
We arrived at the ferry to see 4 bikes tearing up the lane number 2 and onto the ferry. As we drove up lane 2 they closed the gate! Good thing the next ferry was only a few minutes. The crossing is about 15 minutes and costs (gulp) 19 Euros each. Arriving at the dock in Helsingborg we could see a huge black rain cloud over the city. We had planned to take the long way around the coast and in fact missed the storm.
I had contacted the HUBB Copenhagen for some advice and we had been invited to the home of Henrietta. She has done the ride from Alaska to Ushuaia and received a lot of hospitality and she was paying it forward.
She is awesome! Not only is she an adventure rider, but also she is a Copenhagen roller derby skater!
Henrietta suggested we do a very Danish thing and rent bikes to tour the city.
Braille paths in the city center
She managed to get in all the sights including the Round tower,
The Rosenborg Palace (a summer house built in 1606 and surrounded by the King’s garden) and the changing of the guards there,
The domed cathedral
The Amalienborg Palace (home of the royal family),
The Opera house
The little mermaid (a bronze sculpture on the sea shore popular since 1913),
Nyhavn or new harbor, which is full of restaurants.
Christiansborg Palace, which is the home of the Danish Parliament as well as the Royal stables.
Then it was a visit to Christiania, which is a self-proclaimed autonomous neighborhood inside the Christanshavn area of Copenhagen. It has been a source of controversy since its creation in a squatted on military area in 1971. Its cannabis trade on Pusher Street has been tolerated by authorities, but is gang run and really has nothing to do with the people who live in Freetown. This is a very creepy area with guys in ski masks hiding behind army camouflage nets selling weed. No photos allowed of course.
From here we continued the tour and ended up on Paper Island at Copenhagen Street Food to check out the street food trucks. We met up with two other adventure riders Lars and Annette.
Beautiful, thanks again for taking us along.
Was that an electric bicycle?
Den, N/W Lake Ontario
Hi Den,
Thanks for coming along. Electric bike revolution is in full swing here in Europe. They are everywhere! Its funny because you see people on bikes flying up hills and you think wow are they in shape and then you realize that they are on an electric bike. Brilliant really, you still get a bit of a work out, clean and very cool.