Day 17 - Aalborg, Denmark

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Another day of trekking through the beautiful town of Aalborg awaits us. First we met up with the Danish couple we spoke about yesterday and then the new arrivals, a couple from The Netherlands that were only staying here last night as they were off on a cruise to Norway at lunchtime today. After breakfast we walked in to the town centre to get a bus to Lindholm Hoje (pronounced Lind home hoy) a Viking burial site dating back to AD400, nearly 1,400 years before Captain Cook discovered Australia.

To get to the town centre we walked through the park at the rear of the Cultural Centre called Kildeparken. It is said to be the oldest park in Aalborg, over two hundred years old. The park is beautifully kept and manicured and basically free of rubbish and graffiti. On our walk through the park we encountered a group of school students, probably 5 or 6 years old. We spoke to one of the teachers as one of the boys was busy watching a bird and oblivious to his classmates moving on. We just wanted to let her know he was there, she had it all under control of course. She then picked our Australian accents right away and we were talking to her about her brother who lived in Melbourne for a few years. We got a wave goodbye from the class as well as a number of smiles. We proceeded to the bus interchange near the railway station for the number 13 bus to take us out to Lindholm Hoje. We're just old hands at this now and just gave the driver the exact 44 Krone for the fare ($9 AUD) for the 15 minute ride North of Aalborg over Limfjord, beautiful waterway that borders Aalborg to the North.

The bus stops at Arkildsal and according to Google Maps, Wayne's newest best friend like his Amex card you don't leave home without it, it is an 800 metre walk to the museum centre. However, if you're in the area, we strongly recommend seeing this museum, proceed up Vikingevej past the turn off on Vangen for about 50 to 80 metres there is a very old rickety wooden gate on your right. Go through the gate and walk up the hill a little directly in front, it is easy to see as it has wooden step treads up it. This will take you in to the Viking burial site itself. From the top of the hill, it is a very gentle slope, you'll see the white modern building that is the museum and café. On arriving at the museum we were greeted with the sounds of gunfire, not very Viking, as there is a military training facility around a kilometer past the museum.

Like we said if you have any kind of interest in Viking history this museum is a must see. The admission price is 75 Krone for an adult ($18 AUD) and this gets you admission in to the two exhibition areas where you can stroll through reading all about the site's Viking history and how it was discovered. The story is incredible as the area is prone to shifting sands with the wind so the burial sites were not discovered until the late 1950s. Archeologists then painstakingly unearthed the hundreds and hundreds of burials with some of the older discoveries in the museum. We also stopped at the café for a coffee

On exiting the museum we met an American mother (we cannot recall her name) and her daughter Angela. We spoke to them at length about what he had just described above and then they wanted to know all about Australia and what bought us to Aalborg. We spoke to them for at least 30 minutes but then said our goodbyes as we wanted to visit the burial site and get back on the bus to Aalborg for some lunch. We waited around two minutes for the bus and the lady driver of the bus was very friendly and unlike our first driver her English was nearly perfect.

We had lunch at Salling Café, the same place we had morning tea at yesterday and lunch was as good as our morning tea. After leaving Salling we headed for the Franciscan Monastery Museum with the Monastery dating back to around 1250. Today the museum is located around 3 metres below ground with access to the museum only available via a lift. Entry to the museum is 40 Krone ($8 AUD) and you pay that to ride down in the lift via coins on the wall near the lift entrance. This museum is equally as amazing as Lindholm Hoje as it literally sits within the excavations of where the Monastery was.

After leaving the museum we headed back to the B&B as it was getting close to 6pm. Shops are generally open till 7pm in Aalborg but do your own research on this as it could change depending on the time of the year. We traced our steps from this morning back past the Aalborg Station through the pedestrian/bicycle subway underneath the tracks and back out in to the park.

Another great day of adventuring over we're now back in the B&B and planning tomorrow.

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