Thank You For The Music
Aalborg – 9th May
As Aalborg is Denmark’s fourth largest city I thought that, if it had a castle with grounds that you could wander in, it would be worth a visit. I was wrong, the castle is right in the busy city centre and the advertised grounds were merely a front lawn with a big cruise ship across the road which had disembarked hundreds of people to see the grass. There must be nothing more annoying than somebody parking their cruise ship outside your window and blocking your expensive harbour view. Due to lack of parking and my waning interest we took some drive by photos only.
The next stop was supposed to be the Budolfi cathedral (12th century), which is Denmark’s smallest cathedral. However given the fact it is Ascension Day, a church, especially one with 48 bells, probably isn’t the best place to go. It is a public holiday today and if Denmark is anything like France the locals will bridge the gap and make a 4 day weekend of it. So far we know Denmark isn’t quite like France, they don’t close for 2 hour lunches and all the essential shops were still open today. We filled up the car with petrol (95 super) and the cost per litre worked out to be NZ$3.55, looks like we may be walking or taking the bus more.
Today’s ABBA tribute is ‘Thank you for the Music’ (1978)
Thank you for the music, the songs I’m singing
Thanks for all the joy they’re bringing
What would life be?
Without a song or a dance, what are we?
So I say thank you for the music
The song is significant for our geocache stop in Aalborg on the fringe of the city. There is an impressive “music park”, so called because there are a number of trees with boxes at the base of them detailing a musician’s name, the date they played a concert in Aalborg and a green button. You push the button and the music plays, below are two photos, the trees (above) and NZ’s representative (right), followed by one of two videos showing three selections. [Ed – see note about 2nd video]
Yes, like a kid in a candy store, I raced around and pushed all the buttons; someone had to drown out Cliff Richards singing about his summer holiday.
Oh and by the way that is not snow falling but blossoms stripped by Denmark’s annoying winds.
Our last stop was a geocache on a forest trail in Dall which the owner had based it on the song ‘The Gambler’ by Kenny Rogers and called it ‘On A Warm Summer’s Evening’. At 3.30pm on a cold Spring day we went in search of the cache on a flat (no mountains here), dry (sandy base) track. Possibly that is one of the reasons Danes are so happy, they never have to walk up hill and the sandy soil soaks up all the rain. The photos are of:
1. The people counter on the post – it probably counted me several times.
2. The electric fence sign at the end of the track, I’m sure Roger will be fine; it was only a little tingle.
3. Part of a trail sign “hold god afstand til dyrene”, translates to keep a good distance from the animals (and the electric fence Roger).
The only animals we saw were a dead mouse and midges on the track, and deer and fox roadkill on the motorway.
Translation lessons; Bog = book, Holder = keeper, so an accountant (book keeper) is a bogholder; Roger thinks they are aptly named.
Our next stop was across the other side of the Limfjord river, to Lindholm Hoje, Scandinavia’s largest Viking burial ground. It is full of Vikings and Iron Age bones; men are in the graves with stones on top forming a ship pattern and women in the graves with stones forming an oval or circle pattern. They are different from the Kings burial mounds at Jelling because obviously nobody in the 900s is going to dig and pile up tonnes of dirt with a rustic hoe and a handcart for a commoner. Ascension Day drew lots of people out to the Viking cemetery café in the middle of nowhere.