Westwards

The last three months in life and on the blog – July to September 2017

Having already spent the spring in Okinawa and Japan's top sightseeing destinations, we went back to Japan in June and July for the mountainous and northern regions: Chubu and Tohoku are also areas we cover in the Stefan Loose Japan Travel Guidebook and we spent a few weeks researching for the new edition.

This also meant discovering a couple of hidden gems: We visit the must-see destinations of Japan and the tourist hotspots quite often with our tour guiding work, but Chubu and Tohoku are off the beaten track.

Amongst others we explored the Fukui Dinosaur Museum and the traditional farmers' houses of Gokayama, the former "Imperial Headquarters" tunnels near Nagano, new post-tsunami developments in Sendai and Matsushima, the UNESCO World Natural Heritage area of Shirakami Sanchi and the remote Ogi Peninsula. We also visited a historical silk mill in Tomioka (also UNESCO-designated) and then added a few days in Kyushu for more industrial-age sightseeing. A personal highlight was a visit to the Furofushi outdoor hot spring in Koganezaki.

After the work part we went to Kyushu in the south of Japan for a few days. Visiting the highly active Sakurajima volcano near Kagoshima, we were caught in a rather strong earthquake (no serious effects, though). One highlight of our visit to Nagasaki was a boat trip to Gunkanjima , the deserted coal mining island that was one of the most densely populated places on the planet once. We also went on a tour inside the enormous Mitsubishi wharfs and visited several other Meiji-period industrial sites belonging to Japan's newest set of UNESCO World Heritage properties.

From Kyushu we took the ferry to South Korea that we had last visited in 2004. Some places we re-visited had changed tremendously such as Gyeongju and Haein-sa. We also made a trip to Gongju and Buyeo to look for remains from the Baekje Period (c. 18 BC–660 AD), where we were quite disappointed as most of the UNESCO locations were bare of any discernible historical remains but sported modern recreations of what some people think Baekje buildings may have looked like.

 

Church of Gracanica near Prishtina

After so much cultural tourism and research traveling we were looking forward to a few weeks of hiking on the Peaks of the Balkans long distance trail. However, the day we arrived in Prishtina we had to change plans: Natascha's sister, who had been diagnosed with ALS only four weeks earlier, had suddenly been hospitalised and was in a bad condition. ALS is an incurable and swift nerve disease that gradually reduces the functioning of nearly all muscles, most dangerously those necessary for swallowing and breathing.

After suffering for days – fully conscious! – in the machines of the intensive care unit, she died a week later in a palliative station.

Natascha went to Uzbekistan for some tour-guiding work at the end of September while Isa has been wrapping up the guide book research for Japan.

And here comes a list of the blog posts of the last three months, sorted by countries:

Denmark

We have no intention of adding to those highly original "5 things you must see in Copenhagen" lists – every guidebook would have a better base for such recommendations. Instead, we compared what we personally liked most about our recent trip to Copenhagen: some may have been "must-see" places, others were not. Our personal Top Five in Copenhagen

Japan

With so much research crammed into our weeks in Japan we still made it to some places on the far ends: The UNESCO World Heritage beech Forest of Shirakami Sanchi in the far north of Honshu (the main island), but also the strange UNESCO site of Gunkanjima  in the South, well-known as a James Bond inspiration. And the Dinosaur Museum near Fukui (where you can actually dig for dinosaurs!) is in a region beyond the mountain ranges where most tourists never venture. Also, on a more general and practical note, we wrote a piece on how to use Japanese toilets – it's more difficult than you think!

South Korea

Between the ancient kingdoms of Korea and the modern urbanity of Seoul, one place that impressed us in a rather different way was the United Nations Cemetery in Busan – built for the many thousand Allied war dead and their veterans of the Korean War (1950-53). The topic seems current enough these days…

Our personal Top Five in Copenhagen

At the end of May, we spent a few days in Copenhagen. As it was our second visit to the Danish capital we had already seen some of the must-sees and were eager to explore a bit more of the city this time. Luckily the weather was fine and we could stroll through the parks and city quarters.

Once we were back in Berlin we both made a list with our five highlights and gave points according to rank. The best experience got 5 points, the second 4 points and so on. Interestingly enough, we chose the same sights and experiences albeit in a different order. And we had two second ranks with 7 points each! It was fun to rank our Copenhagen experiences and we might do more posts like this in the future.

And these are the things that made it into our personal top five!

# 1: The Viking Ship Museum in Roskilde

On our travels we always try to visit UNESCO sites, and from Copenhagen there are several sites you can reach in a day trip. This time we visited Kronborg Castle and Roskilde Cathedral. While both of these places were interesting enough, none of them made it into this list. As we had a whole day in Roskilde and the cathedral only required around two hours, we also visited the fantastic Viking Ship Museum. In a sound near Roskilde five almost 1000 year old Viking ships were discovered, retrieved and restored by the archaeologists.

# 2 and 3: Kayaking in Copenhagen’s channels and a Gin Tonic at „The Bird and the Church Key“

Over the last two years we have developed a certain interest in Gin & Tonic and wherever we go we research the G&T bars. On our last day in Copenhagen we made it to „The Bird and the Church Key,“ a relaxed cellar venue, where Isa had a fantastic Northern Gin & Tonic, with Finnish Kuro Gin, rosemary and fresh cranberries.

Copenhagen is a city at the water and beckons to be explored by boat. There are several ferries (including one public ferry officially classified as a “bus”) and bigger and smaller excursion boats. And then, there is also the possibility to go kayaking in the middle of the city! We did a two-hour sightseeing tour with „Kayak Republic“ and while the weather was not perfect on our booked day we enjoyed it so much that it made it on rank 2 of this list.

# 4: Papirøen Streetfood market

Food markets are always a great possibility to sample different food and some nice beer in a relaxed atmosphere. Copenhagen’s popular street food market is situated on Paper Island in the harbour area of the city. The old industrial halls on Paper Island served as a paper storage for the Procurement Association of the Danish Press for many decades but are now used by art projects and other creative start-up companies. The street food market is a large hall filled with all kinds of food trucks. There is some seating inside, but as it was a beautiful sunny day we sat at the tables outside.

Unfortunately, as we have heard, the contract for use of the industrial hall terminates at the end of 2017 and so the food market is going to close down.

# 5: The Design Museum

It´s all about Danish design and they have a stylish café on site. Particularly interesting to us was the special exhibition about the Japanese influence on Danish design and handicrafts. But we were also fascinated by the amazing exhibition of Danish chairs and we got a lot of new ideas for architectural sightseeing in and around Copenhagen.

Have you been to Copenhagen? What were your highlights? What did we miss? – Looking forward to your comments!

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The last three months in life and on the blog – April to June 2017

We are already half into 2017 and it is time for another 3 month wrap-up on the blog: Actually we spent the better part of the last three months in Japan working. In April we were both busy with tour-guiding work. Cherry blossom season was a bit late in most parts of Japan but we could experience it with every group and we also managed to get a good view of Mt Fuji with every group. Natascha also went to Japan for a 10-day tour in May and since mid-June we are both back in Japan for researching the new edition of the Loose Japan guidebook (in German) due next year. This time we split up for the research work, and while Isa is covering the Hokuriku and Chubu region, Natascha is researching Tohoku. So far everything is going fine – except for spells of bad weather – after all it is rainy season. But we have also planned some hiking and sightseeing together.

When not tour-guiding in Japan we had writing work to do in Berlin, especially the new edition of the Baedeker Japan guidebook. All this left only time for two short trips in between, to Munich to visit family and friends, and to Copenhagen to celebrate Isa’s birthday.

We had visited the Danish capital in winter before and in spite of the freezing cold had really liked the atmosphere. It was a nice change, though, to experience this wonderful city in warmer weather, to go kayaking in the city and to have a lot of too expensive, but tasty food and drinks. By staying at a cheap campsite (Belahoy campsite), the trip became overall affordable.

For the next months we have planned more Japan and a trip to South Korea, as well as some hiking in the Balkans and from September the tour-guding work will start again. So busy months are ahead of us – stay tuned, we will have posts about largely unknown UNESCO sites in Japan, about Korea and hopefully the “Peaks of the Balkan” Trail.

 

And here is a list of our blog posts of the last three months (just in case you missed one or the other):

Japan

We still had to catch up with our series of posts about the wonderful islands of Okinawa, which we visited in February/ March this year. If you are short on time and want some nice beaches, blue water, a good English infrastructure and easy access from Mainland Okinawa, then do not look further than the Kerama Islands.

But you will find the most beautiful beaches and less tourists on Miyakojima Island. And also a German castle...

And finally a blog post about all nine UNESCO World Heritage sites on Mainland Okinawa. Which one should you definitely visit and which one could you give a miss?

We don’t do hotel reports very often, but really enjoyed our one night stay at the retro Spice Motel in Okinawa. Get inspired by some pics.

Also, there is a post about Nagoya – a highly underrated city in Japan that can make an ideal base for budget travellers who want to explore the surroundings. And believe us, there is a lot to see in the area!

Uzbekistan

In May the 2^nd edition of our Uzbekistan guidebook published by MairDumont was out in the book stores and this blog post shows you five off-the-beaten-track highlights that we have newly included in the book.

Denmark

Always interested in visiting and learning about UNESCO World Heritage sites, we used the opportunity too see two (of the three) UNESCO sites near Copenhagen:

Mighty kings and heroes – Kronborg castle in Helsingor

Roskilde – A UNESCO listed cathedral and the Vikings

Spain

And one more post about our trip to Barcelona earlier this year. Of course we could not miss to visit some of Gaudí’s fantastic architecture.

Did you visit any of these destinations or have a trip planned?

Roskilde: A UNESCO-listed cathedral and the Vikings!

The elderly woman is slowly moving up the slope from the bay towards the Old Town and the Roskilde Cathedral. It’s Sunday, and she has only a few minutes left to reach the church service in Denmark’s oldest brick church in time. In fact, the Roskilde Cathedral is the prototype of a Gothic brick cathedral, which set the tone for any number of churches around the Baltic Sea.

The building of the Roskilde Cathedral started as early as 1170 and took around 100 years. At this time master architects in France were just experimenting with new vertical building styles and the architect of the Roskilde church had seen these new Gothic churches and was keen to try something similar in his home country. Contrary to France, where they used sandstone as a building material, the traditional material in Denmark was brick, since there are not enough mountains and rocks that could be used. Some details had to be adjusted to accommodate for the different material, but overall it turned out that building such a huge and tall cathedral with bricks was indeed possible and sturdy.

For the Danish people the cathedral is tremendously important because dozens of Danish kings are buried here. When the space inside the church was all taken up by tombs, they added new chapels on all sides, and even built some new burial chapels outside next to the church. Some of them are huge, and lavishly decorated, such as the Chapel of the Three Magi or the Chapel of Frederick V.

Visiting and reading about all the chapels and tombs takes a while, but the huge main nave alone with the enormous brick pillars and the decorated king’s balcony is at least equally impressive. How daring it must have been in the 12th century to build almost 76 m high in brick, when even the Gothic architects using stone were still uncertain about the static of such colossal constructions. Therefore it is not for the fancy royal chapels but for this daring avant-garde spirit that the Roskilde Cathedral was included in the UNESCO World Heritage list in 1995. Other churches e.g. in Rostock, Neubrandenburg, and Magdeburg were later modelled on the Roskilde experiment.

As we were on a day trip from Copenhagen, we also had enough time to visit Roskilde’s second tourist attraction: The Viking Ship Museum (Vikingeskibsmuseet).

In the bay below Roskilde, five Viking ship wrecks were discovered in the 1950s. They had been sunk around 1050 to block one of the few channels leading through shallow waters to Roskilde, which was then an important city with its population of 5000. Apparently the rulers feared an invasion and wanted to force all vessels to approach slowly through a more winding water channel, so as to have time to prepare their defence if necessary.

Archaeologists rejoiced when the sunken ships were found: They are the best-preserved Viking ships ever found, and could be re-assembled, preserved, studied and even re-built with new materials and the old techniques. The five original ships are displayed in a purpose-built hall at the shore, and next to it modern boat-builders have for years been building Viking-style ships that are very close to the originals and allow experimental archaeologists to try voyages such as those the Vikings are known to have undertaken. After all they went to Greenland and even Newfoundland, they could navigate around Europe to the Mediterranean and up streams into the Baltic states and Russia. The Nordic Seafarers must have been far more organised and disciplined than their wild image implies, it turned out. To navigate the fast, shallow boats, they needed a huge crew, and depending on the wind they all had to move constantly around the boat as a counterweight. Sleeping arrangements during the voyage, rowing shifts and food storage must also have been tricky.

We joined one of the guided tours in English in the museum (included in the ticket price) and had a look in the shipbuilders’ yard next to the Viking Ship Hall, where visitors can inspect the traditional tools and watch the builders at work. There are some ships that are accessible to tourists and it is also possible to join a Viking Ship boat trip from the harbour – rowing and rigging included.

Is Roskilde Cathedral worth a visit?

Unless you have visited some of the big cathedrals in France – and perhaps other brick cathedrals in Northern Germany – and have a little bit of background knowledge about architectural styles you may probably have difficulties to realise the architectural value of the church. But nevertheless the Roskilde Cathedral is quite impressive by  size and splendour. In combination with a trip to the Viking Ship Museum you are definitely in for a great day out of the city of Copenhagen.

How to get to Roskilde by public transport

The train from Copenhagen takes around one hour. Both the cathedral and the Viking Ship Museum are in walking distance from the station.

Mighty kings and heroes: Kronborg Castle in Helsingor

Upon leaving the station of Helsingør we can already make out a massive, square fortress in the grey sky, looming above the Oresund sound: Kronborg Castle, home of Hamlet! Shakespeare made the splendid castle of "Elsinor" the home of his fictional Danish prince, thus ensuring its worldwide fame.

There used to be a castle on the cliffs as early as the mid 15^th century. But it was the Danish king Frederick II who fortified the walls, added bastions for the cannons and built a modern three-storied castle at the end of the 16^th century. It turned out to be a worthwhile investment: Every time a ship passed through the narrow sound below the castle – in those times the other shore also belonged to Denmark – they had to pay a heavy toll, and moreover the king also had the preemptive right on the cargo – if a trader undervalued his goods in order to reduce the tax, the king would snap them up at a bargain price! This system made the Danish kings quite rich and so Helsingør Castle came to be one of the biggest and finest Renaissance Castles in Europe.

We make our way along the shoreline towards the walls and spires of the mighty fortification (together with several busloads of chattering Chinese tourists). To get into the castle walls themselves you have to cross a system of several ditches and ramparts, because after a siege from the shore side in the 17^th century, the Danish king Christian V (all Danish kings are either named Christian or Frederick) added a system of vaguely crown-shaped fortifications.

The king's and queen's living quarters right above the entrance are beautifully restored; although it is only partially done with original furniture, the rooms nevertheless give a fantastic impression of royal life back then. We liked the pin-board above the king's writing desk.

Crossing the chancellery, the king's and queen's rooms and several galleries, we reach the impressive ballroom: At 62 m in length, the ballroom of Helsingør Castle was once the largest in Northern Europe. Guests at the frequent banquets had to eat a minimum of 24 dishes and after the sumptuous meals dancing was expected. Indeed, when we enter the large hall there's a middle-aged tourist couple trying out some dance steps.

A highlight at least for tapestry lovers are the King's tapestries. When his archrival, the Swedish king Eric, commissioned a series of valuable tapestries, King Frederick II felt the need to counter him by ordering 43 tapestries showing 101 Danish kings and their stories. The king exerted a lot of pressure on the craftsmen, and the tapestries were completed in just four years. To protect the old textiles, the light is dimmed in this part of the castle, lessening the appeal of the tapestries somewhat as they appear a little murky.

The castle chapel was not only used for prayers and services but also to disseminate important news to the court and the servants, and it was also extravagantly decorated.

Under the castle there exists a network of tunnels and rooms, the casemates. In later years Kronborg Castle was mainly used by the military, and the casemates were bunkers in case of an attack. Today they are poorly lit and empty, without any information boards – but kids seem to have fun in the damp, dark tunnels. There is a statue of Holger Danske, a Danish legendary character who lent his name to a resistance group during the German occupation during WWII.

The castle with its fortifications became a UNESCO World Heritage site in 2000 because it is an outstanding example of Renaissance castles, and one which played a highly significant role in the history of this region of northern Europe.

Is Kronborg Castle worth a visit?

Kronborg Castle is a mighty Renaissance castle and you can spend several hours exploring it. We had bought a small booklet with interesting snippets about the life of the kings that helped us to immerse ourselves into the times when Christians and Fredericks ruled Denmark from here. The castle is impressive for its sheer size, but to really appreciate the tapestries and the rooms it helps to have some background knowledge. Have you been to Kronborg Castle? We are curious about your impression.

How to get there by public transport

Helsingør and Kronborg castle make a nice day trip from Copenhagen. You can get there by train in one hour.

A walk through Orestad, Copenhagen's new architecture laboratory

On a cold winter morning, Southern Copenhagen is almost deserted. A tiny, toy-like train is zipping past a bright blue cubic building – it is the Copenhagen metro, running overground in Orestad, the youngest city development area in Kopfenhagen. Two students rush to their bikes.

Not far from the metro station we have a look into the courtyard of the circular Tietgen student hall, with colourful letterboxes and washing machines prominently visible on the ground floor and a huge round inner courtyard. The circular building is influenced by a type of traditional Chinese architecture: The Hakka people built round walled villages, which could be defended easily, and where several extended families lived together. Continuing southwards along a cycling road lined by different, but uniformly Scandinavian, family homes, we finally reach the Bella Sky Hotel.

Standing beside the nondescript halls of the trade fair, the Bella Sky Hotel's two 76 m high towers seem to be swinging forward and backward: Both towers are markedly leaning in different directions, right angles having all but disappeared. From the equally odd connecting corridor on the 23 floor of the towers, we get an overview of the Orestad development area: The Mountain House, the Field's Mall, and in the distance the big 8-shaped building, all strung up along the metro line.

Placing the mall and an also quite interesting high school (without traditional classrooms, only open learning spaces) in the centre of the new town quarter was clearly a clever move, as it creates some movement between the modern office buildings. However, especially at its southern end, the area appears a bit lifeless, not least because much of the new architecture is self-contained and inward-looking: The offices all have fancy-looking cafeterias, the apartment buildings are arranged around courtyards as social spaces.

For visitors to Orestadt, it is both fascinating to gape at these glass-and-steel explosions with oddly-shaped windows and balconies, and lonely because you don't meet the inhabitants much. But then, after all, we visited in winter, when it was bitterly cold. No wonder that people try to stay inside if they can.

If you like modern architecture a visit to Orestad is a must-do in Copenhagen. The Danish Architecture Centre offers free Podwalks on Orestad architecture: http://www.dac.dk/en/dac-life/podwalks/podwalks/oerestad/