Sunday, September 02, 2007

Our Danmark Trip
We had a great time in Danmark. Take a look at some of our pictures.


Our first day there we went to a town called Skagen which is located at the very Northern tip of Denmark. At this point two seas, the North Sea and the Baltic Sea, actually meet. If you look close you can see waves from each sea crashing together.





Next we had a chance to go see a village that has been preserved to looked just as it would have in the 1700. All the houses were yellow with orange roofs so the sailors could spot land while out at sea. The streets were all cobble stone and were very narrow.

















We visited lots of churches where Dan's ancestors worshiped. At every church there were beautiful graveyards. We all thought we were going to be able to find grave spots of some of the ancestors but we found out that grave spots are rented by families for 25 years and after that they are rented to someone else. They remove the grave stones and stack them in the rear of the grave yard as you can see below. In the picture with Dan & Dave they are standing where thier Great-Grandfather was christened. These churches were all built in the 1300-1500 and are still used today.





















We stayed in cool guest houses in the small town of Blokhus. The houses were close to the beach so we went to check out the beautiful sunsets almost every night. A couple of the nights it was very windy as you can see.



















We happened to drive though a town where a bunch of people were standing on the side of the road waiting for something so we decided to stop and find out what was going on. It was the annual Denmark bike race passing through the town.


In an attempt to cure bordem Dan & Dave found the trap doors to the bell tower of one of the churches we visited. It was pretty high up. If you look closley you can see their heads in the window.






















We went to the only National Park in Denmark. The land was purchased by Danish immigrants and handed over to the government on the condition that it would be preserved. Every 4th of July they have a big celebration with thousands of people in honor of the USA. Our uncle Mark performed at this celebration with the Singing Mormon quartet when he was on his mission. This monument represents the many Mormon immigrants that came to the US. We went to a natural spring where we refilled our bottles. We then hiked through a beautifull forest that cannot be described by the pictures below.







































We had the chance to take our car accross on a barge. This warning sign is a little different than we typically see in Utah.







We went to an out door museum that described more of how things were in the country life during the 1700s.


















This is a Cathedral that we visited when we got to copenhagen. We also visited the Church of our Lady where we saw the original Christus.






























We went to the Hans Christian Andersen house. He's the author who wrote "The little Mermaid", "The Ugly Duckling", etc.








We went to the Fredricksbourg Castle. It was very amazing. One of our favorite things there was the room with the Carl Blok paintings. As you can see in a picture below his paintings are very familiar painings used by the LDS church.





We went to the Viking Museum and Amy talked us into dressing up.

























We went to a 7-11 in Copenhagan and Danielle bought herself a 3 dollar small slurpee.










It's very common to ride bikes in Copenhagan. This is how it looks at rush hour.

On our bus and boat tour we had a chance to see the changing of the guards at the Queens Palace. We also saw the Little Mermaid staute which was sculped in honor of Hans Christian Andersen.





As you can see we had the chance to go to the Temple while we were there. The temple is actually a restored church building that our dad and his brother, our uncle Jerry, attended while they served together.