Thursday, 5 July 2012
Aboard the Sirena: Harwich, England to Esbjerg, Denmark
Esbjerg, Denmark
Sir Thomas Leaf arose rather early that morning as allergies and sheer exhaustion had consumed his rest last night, a formula that never ceases to turn him into a snoring Viking dragon. He slipped out of the cabin in the early morn, trying to be silent as possible while Sir Robin Wildwood caught some z’s. Taking his provisions with him, he made his way up to the Columbus Lounge to make his breakfast of cream cheese / salmon muffins mini savoury eggs, and Lucazade. The ship steward however, was not happy with Sir Leaf, as apparently “no outside food nor drink” was allowed in the lounge. (Exactly where do they expect their passengers to snack on their own provisions outside of their room on this ship was definitely on Sir Leaf’s mind) Luckily though, before getting caught, Sir Leaf had finished his meal. He cruised over the World Wide Web on the extremely slow wifi connection the ship’s satellite was streaming to investigate his travels ahead and to write about the past trips. 18 hours aboard the Sirena, he was able to get a bit of work completed, slow internet or not. Sir Rob joined him in the lounge after a few hours and before they knew it, as 1 pm clocked around, Sir Leaf rushed down to the cabin for a quick shower, packing his gear up, and the explorers were off on their journey. Disembarking into Esbjerg, Denmark for Sir Thomas Leaf’s first time ever in Denmark. Sir Thomas found this trekk across Denmark to be very flat and boring, minus a few burial mounds in the fields, appearing quite similar to the countryside of farmland Germany or any other atypical European agricultural area. Sir Thomas did notate though, that oddly, most properties did not have fences bordering the property nor much livestock either. He pondered what the hiking / trespass (if any) rules were for this country.
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Sir Thomas Leaf was able to reach Lady Sanne to whom he had the previous pleasure of sailing with aboard the HMB Endeavour last summer and snorkeling in the Great Barrier Reef while Down Under. They arranged a meet up as she worked for a large windmill producer who’se headquarters was along the same stretch of roadway that the adventurers would be passing. A small shipping port town called “Randers”, that reminded Sir Leaf of some of the landscape of Holland. They pulled into the visitor park, awaited Lady Sanne, and had a grand reunion when she got off work. She took the explorers down to the Rander’s Sailing Club Marina café overlooking the boats, and treated the weary travellers to drinks and dinner. Sir Leaf was famished and was treated to a wonderful local fish dish he found quite savory and delicious. After dinner it was time to hit the road, sweet farewells were found, and onwards the delvers drove off in the caravan to Hirtshals where they were to catch the Colorlines Ferry from Hirtshals, Denmark to Sandefjord, Norway.
About 2 hours later, they were piled into a very extremely large parking lot / ferry waiting zone which was the size of a few football fields, for a lengthy wait to drive on to the boat. Kids at play riding their bikes, people socializing and drinking, bird shit coating a protective layer over all the concrete obviously not cleaned for years was the panorama. The Colorlines ferry was massive, so it took some time to load up, then a race upwards from where the car deck the duo set off to find a seat (hopefully with a power socket) and somewhere Sir Rob could stretch out and sleep. Sir Rob found a sleeping couch, Sir Leaf only found a chair and no socket, so he was not very happy for it was hot and noisy, very bothersome to him. Sir Leaf took a walk around the ship and found that the outside deck was abandoned with a nice bench and decided to camp out there for a bit while watching “Past Life” episodes until his laptop died. Some drunks moved to the bench he was sitting on and started getting rowdy and breaking bottles. That was Sir Leaf’s cue to head back into the ship. Sir Rob was passed out, not tired Sir Leaf just sat down and read a book on Tolkien’s theory of “Faerie” which he found to be a excellent read. The explorers arrived into Sandefjord, Norway around 1 am. Sir Leaf’s first impression was that it reminded him alot of Alaska, especially since the skies were lit up and was like daylight even from 1-3 am and the landscape very green and very forested. It felt like home to him.
Prices however in Denmark and Norway were not like home, very very expensive … a burger and chips about 160 kronos (ca. 24 Euro), Coca Cola about 89 kronos, so penniless Sir Leaf was shocked and concerned. He was in for a tough journey for sure. The adventurers arrived at the Motor Hotel where Sir Rob booked himself a room, while Sir Leaf stealthily closed the curtains and slept in the van while Rob headed up to his room. Exhausted, Sir Leaf was finally able to fall asleep ….
(note: this is an actively written blog. If links are broken or come to blank pages,
it means the page hasn’t been written yet. Check back soon.
Meanwhile entertain yourself by going backwards into the blog below)
Remainder of the Story, Photos and videos below the cut:
Rander’s Sail Club Cafe
* Randers, Denmark *
Colorline Ferry: Service from Denmark to Norway
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Photography is copyright 2012 by technogypsie.net as photographed by Leaf McGowan, Thomas Baurley, and other Technogypsie photographers. Photos can be requested and/or purchased, on a individual per photo basis, as well as permission for reproduction can be granted by enquiring at http://www.technogypsie.net/photography.html. All content of this web page is copyright Thomas Baurley / Leaf McGowan / technogypsie.net.
- In its 7th year … The Chronicles of Sir Thomas Leaf are back … The Great Walkabout Down under and Sailing the Seven Seas will be on hold in its completion for the time being due to funding & time it takes to process the photos, write, and design the pages – these tales should resume back in production come August 2012. Meanwhile, we are focusing on current journeys of Sir Thomas Leaf … hopefully (funding dependent) … live … day to day … If you’d like to see this happen, NOW is the time to pledge support or send in your donations as Sir Thomas will be journeying on the tightest shoestring he has yet travelled on … A $5 donation will buy him a chai where he can get online and weave you a tale with photos … otherwise, you’ll have to wait as fate allows publishing … But we digress … Lets begin … the Chronicles of Sir Thomas Rhymer … and a Viking Tale … This is to replace the failed funding project of the Pirates which couldn’t happen like we wanted it to so is being replaced by this adventure, which will ‘eventually’ be turned into a book …