Random travel bits

I'm never going to write up a full travelogue -- I spend enough time working on the pictures for Flickr -- but here are some random thoughts about my trip.

1. Denmark is expensive. We thought we were prepared for it -- we've been to Europe before, and based on the hotel rates we thought we had a feel for how expensive it would be. We were wrong. The food was insanely expensive, as was getting around by bus or train. (In Copenhagen we walked everywhere, but in Esbjerg we had to takes buses and trains to Ribe and Legoland.)
   
   
2. Denmark is cold. Esbjerg is especially cold and damp, and the nicest it gets there is approximately the worst it gets in Santa Barbara.
   
   
3. Danish food, with the fish and the mayo and the herring and the pork, is so not our thing. I did have some tasty fishcakes at one point, but we ended up eating lots of shwarma and falafel. You know you're in trouble when you're looking forward to London for the better prices, weather, and food.
   
   
4. Legoland was awesome, though.
   
   
5. We went to the British Museum, and wandered into their Africa galleries. We were sorely disappointed by the curation of it, though -- organized by type of object (masks, ceramics, textiles), with little to no discussion of culture or history. Boo.
   
   
6. I sampled the eeee!'s beer in Denmark, and didn't particularly like any of it -- lagers are just not my thing. But I love English ales, and at a random pub he had a pint of Sharp's Doombar, which was the best beer I have ever tasted. Maybe it's just because I haven't really had any beer for the past five months, but it was amazing.
   

All in all, it was a great trip, and seeing my brother was wonderful. But I do not see myself going back to Scandinavia any time soon.