Happy Valentine's Day

Most Danes don't celebrate Valentine's Day, but Andrew and I had a delicious dinner at home tonight. Hope everyone has as wonderful a valentine as I do, although that's nearly impossible, as Andrew is quite perfect.

A Relæ nice weekend in Copenhagen

Andrew and I got out of Aalborg this weekend for a visit to the big city. Only about a 40 minute flight, it's so easy to get to Copenhagen and there is so much to do! We arrived Friday night in time for a pizza dinner, which I've been craving for months. It wasn't Chicago-style, but it was delicious anyway.

We woke up reasonably early on Saturday and walked around before getting some breakfast (cream puffs at a local bakery) and heading to a few museums. We went to three different art museums on Saturday: Davids Samling (an impressive collection of Islamic art), the Hirschsprungske Samling (a collection of art from the Danish Golden Age + a special exhibit on P. S. Krøyer), and then finished the afternoon at the Statens Museum (the National Gallery). We had a pretty typical Danish smørrebrød for lunch where Andrew was able to get his fix of pickled herring - yuck! The weather was VERY cold this weekend (we even got some snow), but we bundled up and had a great time anyway.

Saturday night we went to Relæ for dinner, a small but amazing restaurant that has been getting some very good press (it is run by a few alumni of Noma, the Copenhagen restaurant that's been named the best restaurant in the world two years in a row now). The style of the restaurant is Nordic cuisine with an emphasis on locally-produced ingredients and there were just two meal options: meat or vegetarian (Andrew ordered the former and I got the latter), both consisting of five set courses. The courses were all interesting, but not all to my liking. Andrew, for example, had a course of veal tongue, which I could barely stomach one bite of, but I had a really delicious beet, apple, & seaweed salad which was amazing, and my main course was even better: kale, walnuts, and salted pears. Dessert was a bit of a letdown, though, as I'm always craving chocolate or cake of some kind - instead, we were basically served a deconstructed ice cream: mandarin orange slices, frozen buttermilk (almost like dippin' dots), and a raw egg yolk on top. We were both very happy with the meal overall, and we're certainly glad we got to eat there while we're living here.

On Sunday we did a little more wandering, but spent several hours at two more museums: the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek and then the Danish Design Museum. The latter wasn't that great, but the Carlsberg museum was probably the best place we went all weekend - I suppose being a beer baron gives one the luxury of buying a lot of very nice art! They house a fantastic collection of French Impressionists and one of the few complete collections of Degas' bronzes, a personal favorite.

We didn't leave until this morning, catching a 7:30am flight back to Aalborg before Andrew had to go in to work. Luckily, I don't work at all on Mondays, so I just get to nap and unpack today! If you want to see more pictures of our weekend, they're on our flickr page, and all of our stops are tagged on the map below.

View Weekend in Copenhagen: Feb, 2012 in a larger map

Feliz Navidad!

Yes, we're living in Denmark this year, but we spent the holidays in the Canary Islands! We arrived on Christmas morning and spent the whole week relaxing in the sun. On Monday, we luxuriated at the spa for several hours, and then lounged at the pool for a few more hours before going into the nearby town/fishing village, Puerto de las Nieves, for a wonderful dinner. We ate there several more times during the week, each meal seemingly better than the one before.

On Tuesday we went horseback riding through several nearby banana farms, and Wednesday was spent hiking. Andrew found a trail online that was supposed to be easy, but it turned out that the last third of it was basically scaling down a cliff (which we didn't do). Thursday we spent the afternoon at the pool and on Friday we went back to the spa. Saturday came way too early and we were a bit sad to leave all the warmth and sunlight.

More pictures of our wonderful vacation are on my flickr page here.

Juletid in Aalborg

Christmas has taken over Aalborg since October - as neither Halloween nor Thanksgiving really exist here, the Danes start decorating very early. The streets are all decked out with Christmas trees and lights, and one of the biggest Christmas traditions is the town's outdoor Christmas market. Almost every town (it seems) has their own market that is set up through the holiday season (Advent through Christmas). There are plenty of stalls full of people selling food and Christmas presents, and there are even rides for the kids. 

 

In addition to the town market, there is also an indoor Christmas market in Nordkraft, the cultural building about two minutes from our apartment (it houses an indie movie theater, restaurants, a climbing wall, and the tourist center, among other things - be warned, though, the Indian restaurant there is terrible!). The indoor market is infinitely better than the outdoor one - we got some delicious apple cider and bacon there a few weeks ago, but have yet to buy anything from the outdoor one. One of the best parts of the indoor market has got to be the man riding around on an absurd bicycle, though:

Lastly, one of Aalborg's best Christmas festivities is the train (actually a bus that is decorated to look like a train) that runs around the city during the season. I've never seen anyone but children riding, but it looks like a good way to get around the city...

Happy Holidays!

Since we're living out of the country this year, Andrew and I won't be mailing any Christmas/holiday cards. This will have to do instead:

(The background is from a photo I took in Luxembourg.)

An American Thanksgiving in Luxembourg

Andrew is in Copenhagen for a few days this week, giving me some alone-time to finally post about our best trip yet: an American Thanksgiving in Luxembourg with family (Andrew's cousin Sara lives there with her husband, Paul, and daughter, Julia; and his Aunt Janet and Uncle Dick were visiting from Buffalo, NY)! We arrived in Luxembourg on the night before Thanksgiving, and I can't begin to explain how nice it was to get there and have family waiting for us. Thanksgiving day was spent cooking and eating (and eating and more eating) some very delicious food! Hats off in particular to Uncle Dick's stuffing:

On Friday, we went into Luxembourg City where we visited their Christmas market and tried some traditional Glühwein (warm, mulled wine). We also went to an art museum and found some dinner at an American restaurant (who knew that Chi Chi's had locations abroad?!). We hit another Christmas market on Saturday, this time heading across the border to Trier, Germany.

On Sunday we got a tour of Paul's office and lab, and spent a little more time in Luxembourg City before flying back to Aalborg that night. It was a bit hard to leave, as we had such a wonderful time with everyone. We really hope to get back to Luxembourg at some point before we leave Denmark. More photos of our trip are on our flickr page.

Our next big trip is in just a few weeks: the Canary Islands for Christmas! We can't wait to get some sun and warm weather!

Into the Woods...

This morning, Andrew and I hopped the train to Skørping, where we spent a few hours wandering through Denmark's largest forest (Rebild). We're having a beautiful autumn here and it was great to get out of the city and spend some time in NATURE today. Here's some footage of the fall foliage we saw on the train ride:

We hiked through the forest for a few hours, and, thanks to Andrew's GPS, we got off the [beaten] paths and explored a very beautiful part of Denmark. 

An interesting fact about Rebild is that the land was purchased by some American expatriates and donated back to Denmark with the stipulation that it be open to the public and available for the celebration of American holidays. There is a huge Fourth of July party held here every year, but today it was quiet and we didn't come across many people, let alone any Americans. It was a lovely way to spend an autumn afternoon and you can see the rest of our pictures from the day on our flickr page.