Travels with Spaniels: Mermaids, little girls and an 11 mile long bridge

A lovely walk with the spaniels along a public footpath between the sea and a golf course, (I hope we weren't responsible for the guy miscueing a shot into the rough as we passed by), then it was time for a trip to the local Aldi and the fun of deciphering Danish food labels. One plus point in Denmark is that fresh milk is a given, unlike most of France, Spain & Portugal where UHT reigns supreme. Then it was goodbye to Middlefart as we set off along the E20.

Makes the Dart Crossing look a bit small

The trip along the E20 took us over an engineering miracle, the 11mile long Storebælt bridge connecting the islands of Zealand and Funen. Essentially it's a box girder bridge to the small island of Sprogø in the middle of the seaway before the road soars over a massive suspension bridge, with the longest span in Europe. Before the bridge the only way to cross was via a ferry which took more than an hour. It is now doable in about 12 minutes, albeit at a cost of 245DK (£29) for the motorhome. We had decided that we would break the journey to Copenhagen in two as we wanted to arrive in the Danish capital early on the Monday morning, so we overnighted in a car park in Ringsted which, strangely, provided free electricity but no fresh water or toilet dump.There had been four vans there when we arrived but a further three joined us late in the evening so we were quite a community.

Terrible view

Monday morning saw a game of ball in a field next door to run some energy off the spaniels before we set off for the 60k drive to Copenhagen. We had hoped to stay in City Camp, a well known stopover close to Copenhagen centre. According to its website it had relocated but, after driving round the supposedly new location, all we saw were railway marshalling yards so we drove out to the Nordmolen Svanemollehavnen, a marina about 5k from the centre. In the event this was a great location as we managed to grab a space overlooking the harbour. We were glad we had decided to arrive early as by mid afternoon it was full.

Having parked up we walked the short distance to the nearest metro station, the pups had to have a child ticket each to travel, and went into Copenhagen centre which was very busy. The thought of going into the Tivoli Gardens was scuppered after seeing a) the high price and b) the 'no dogs allowed' sign. Instead we walked back in the general direction of the marina, using a series of parks to get off the road as much as possible.

Two and two spaniels please

The walk took us to the Kastellet, supposedly one of the best preserved fortresses in Northern Europe. It formed part of the defence of the city when the Royal Navy bombarded it in 1807 in order to seize the Danish fleet to prevent it being pledged to Napoleon, Denmark being neutral at the time. In the event, Denmark did join the war on the side of the French, but contributed little as it no longer had a fleet. Luckily, we didn't meet any modern Danes who still held a grudge against the British for that little encounter.

Below the Castellet is Copenhagen's most famous landmark, the Little Mermaid, the amount of fuss about which is in inverse proportion to her size. The quay in front of her was packed, there was one of those gargantuan cruise ships in the bay and boats filled with tourists kept turning up to be told by their guides that this was the best part of their trip. That didn't really say much for the rest of their journey.

Waiting for the British fleet to return

The other big attraction was Elsa who seems to specialise in collecting admiring little girls. While we sat on a bench sipping Carslberg, definitely nowhere near the best in the world,Elsa was holding court behind us ably assisted by Max who wasn't too sure what all the fuss was about but, nevertheless, played his role.

The spaniels charming the locals

Eventually we managed to persuade her and Max to walk the rest of the way back to the marina, stopping only at a Netto for essentials (wine) and luxuries (milk). Given that both of them had covered more than eight miles of city streets, with all the smells and distractions, we thought they had done pretty well.

Having had a fairly brisk journey over the first week of our travels we decided, despite the £30 a night charge, that the marina was worth a two day stay so we could do a little more exploring in Copenhagen.

One other little occurrence was the loss of the plastic cover on our gas vent. However, a quick e mail to a dealer in Malmo has ensured that a replacement will be waiting for us when we arrive there on Thursday.