the michelin man

one of the boats on the canal side

christiania

After leaving Tommerup early this morning we took the train across to the island of Sjaelland, to stay in Copenhagen for four days. We visited Copenhagen for a weekend the last time we were in Denmark and loved it and so have a huge list of places we want to return to and new places to see we missed last time. Having had consistent snow for the last five or six days Copenhagen is just as heavily laden with snow as Tommerup was. This shot, taken on the canal side gives you a glimpse. On the right hand side you can barely make out the car's numberplate as it sits buried in snow.

our last night in tommerup

creative license

Woz getting creative with his zoom lens

a child's dream

out and about downtown tommerup

shovelling snow

... and after

Just a day or two later everything is covered in a thick blanket of snow, and it's still snowing!

before ...

Woz took this shot of Rob and Gitte's house on Christmas morning, and just a day later, as is the tradition for Travis on his birthday ... it snowed. Heavily.

bogense

On our way home we stopped off at a beautiful little seaside town called Bogense. The fading light of the European winter prevented us from taking too many shots here as we arrived just on dusk, but this shot of the lights of the street and the Christmas tree caught our eye.

something that caught woz's eye

one of Woz's shots

christmas day

Today was a very sureal day. In Danish tradition we celebrated Chistmas last night, on our Christmas Eve. The day passed much like Christmas Eve in Australia in that everyone busily wrapped last minute Christmas presents and caught up on bits and pieces they needed to, but it wasn't until evening that it began to feel like Christmas as everyone sat down to a decorated table to have a traditional dinner with a traditional rice pudding. After dinner everyone sat around the tree and the presents were opened. Although this was our second Christmas in Denmark we still weren't used to it, that and the fact that the temperature was hovering around zero.

I guess the main difference is that in Australia (and loads of other countries), Christmas Day, from the moment you wake seems to be 'special' in that it begins then with the opening of presents, and depending on how young you are or how young your children are, it may start at dawn. In my childhood experience, the day was then jam packed with different things, church, a traditional lunch, more presents, then another large dinner, then sometimes more presents.

So today, not being Christmas Day (at least in Denmark anyway), we decided to take advantage of the beautifully sunny day and go for a drive to the neighbouring island, Jutland where we ended up in Frederecia. It wasn't until we had arrived in Frederecia and were trying to find a coffee shop for a drink on the isolated streets that I realised it was Christmas Day. I had completely forgotten. It was a public/bank holiday and so the only thing open we were able to find was Burger King where we managed to spend an hour and a half chatting away. We had a great day out, all of us with our digital SLR cameras happily snapping away and patiently waiting for each other as each of us caught excitement in different views or objects we found. I took the shot above, of a beach we walked along. It's not the most exciting shot I've ever taken, but sums up the 'serentity' of the beach on a day when there was no one to be seen.

good to be back

It's nice to be back in Denmark, where people are incredibly friendly, where a phrase book is never necessary and where the Danish flag is always flown high with pride!

This year we have returned to Tommerup to spend Christmas with my Uncle Rob, Auntie Gitte and cousins Travis and Catherine. So far it has been a very relaxing time, and we can hardly comprehend having so little to do after the busy year working and renovating the boat. So far I've been catching up on a lot of reading and Woz has been working with Travis to do up a moped he has bought for his 16th birthday.

woz on the beach 

basking in the warmth

The following day we headed off for the beach and found a beautiful little seaside town. It was 20 degress, a good 15 degree hike up from the averages we'd had for the last few weeks and so it really felt like summer. We eagerly threw off our shoes and ran through the water wishing we had thought to pack bathers when we saw the locals rugged up in snow jackets, hats and scarves, pointing at us from the shore and even taking photos as we frolicked in the sun!

a casual stroll

After seeing the sun set we decided to walk part of the way down the mountain and enjoy the warm night rather than take the bus. On our way down a very friendly young Sicilian couple stopped their car to offer us a ride down the mountain (or at least that's what I think they said given it was all in Italian!) and although we felt perfectly safe in accepting their offer we were enjoying the night and the view and continued our trek down the mountain. But long after the sun had set we didn't see a single bus we discovered the very friendly young Sicilian couple obviously knew something we didn't and we realised we would have to make it down the mountain on foot. I think it took us around 3 hours to walk down the mountain and then back through the town to our hotel and so by the time we got back we were completely exhausted. It was a long day, but so much more adventurous than taking the bus with the rest of the tourists!

off the beaten track

We discovered this little spot at the end of a "track" through the forest which only Woz would dare to venture through at dusk in such a remote and foreign place. We stayed there for what seemed like hours and watched the sun set and didn't see another person.

hidden treasure

We had heard that we could take a bus which would take us up one of the mountains so we could see the view so on Saturday afternoon after strolling through the markets in the morning we did just that.

The view on the way up the mountain was gorgeous. We were able to look out over the town, it's surrounding mountains and the vibrant blue ocean. The top of the mountain seemed offer very little but it's view with a few shops scattered along an otherwise barren, winding dirt road. But as we looked around we discovered a church. I'm not much interested in churches having seen so many now but we decided to go in anyway. Inside was incredible. From the outside looked like a typical european church, but behind its stone facade was a cave which formed a beautiful natural cathedral.

where would we be without woz's trademark market shots?

the local fruit and vegetable market

local produce

our plane and one of the mountains we could see as we flew in

and that was sicily ...

A few weeks ago Woz and I were flown to Sicily courtesy of his boss who shouted the office a three day weekend all expenses paid as their annual Christmas break-up. We had an amazing time, flying to Palermo via Rome, a place I can honestly say we would have missed out on had we not had this opportunity. There are so many places to go and see and Palermo wouldn't have been high on our list but we were so glad to experience it.

We flew in on Friday afternoon and I can already tell I am not going to be able to describe how beautiful it was. This next part could take me several hours to compose. We had been flying over the ocean for quite some time and were decending without view of land in front of us, and then we saw it ... sharp cliff faces and a beautiful little Sicilian town nestled amongst the mountains. It was breathtaking and so much more beautiful than we had expected.