LIVE from Scandinavia on the Voyager of the Seas July 31-August 10, 2022 with Dragon of the Seas

[DragonOfTheSeas]

We went to both entertainment/activities tonight. 

First was the Barricade Boys. They met on the set of Les Miserables. I thought they were pretty good. I especially liked the Motown medley.
 

However they explained how hard it was to sing the song  Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen . And I don’t think they actually should’ve tried. The high notes were beyond their range. 

 

 

 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

At 9 o’clock there was a Latin Street festival on the promenade.  
 

 

 

The DJ was on the area above the crowd. There were a number of the staff pumping up the crowd.

 

There was Latin music, line dancing, even a little country thrown in. Everyone seem to be having a great time. All the younger ones were dancing and the older ones were watching. Ha ha

 

After a while I headed back to the cabin to get my things ready for my morning excursion tomorrow.

 

[cntrydncr1]

I've enjoyed your pics from Visby.  Now I'm really looking forward to my upcoming visit!

[DragonOfTheSeas]

We are on our way to Aarhus. The captain said he would have to hurry to get there by the 8am time to pick up the pilot and be along side the port at 9am. He said we would need to go 19 kts. We are currently doing 15 kts.
 

Here are two views of this part of the route for the voyage. 
 

 

 

You can see we had to take a southern route around the islands. 

 

I didn’t get up in time to get the sunrise today. It looks like a nice morning—but, a little chilly right now.

 

It is going to be cloudy and a high of 64. 

 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

Aarhus was one of the stops added when St Petersburg was dropped.  It is the site of a university and has a hipster reputation.  Here is a map of the city.

 

 

The city dates back to the 700s when it began as a trading center with Norway and was prominent during Viking times.  The Cathedral was built in the late 12th century.  

 

Today I am going to explore the history of the city.  I am taking a ship's tour called "Aarhus City Highlights."  It has two main stops and a few drive-by photo ops. [I did not love my ship tour in Helsinki, it was just OK, I hope this one is better] I decided to take the ship's tour because the open-air museum I want to visit is a distance from the ship and too far to walk from where the shuttle would drop us off.

 

Today we have a free shuttle.  So, I could stay in town after my morning tour.  However, I plan to return to the ship and pack one suitcase for tomorrow.  

 

Our two stops are the Aarhus Cathedral and the Dem Gamle By.  The latter is an open-air museum.  They moved buildings from around Denmark to this location and set of three distinct time periods.  We will have a guide and a walking tour. 

 

Here is a drawing of the museum. 

 

The various buildings are open and working as they were during this time. For example, I have been told to stop in the bakery to buy a treat. 

[Stuart Suss]

Agnes,

 

Thank you for all of your information prior to and during the cruise.

 

Final statistics

Started the cruise: 1336

Boarded during the cruise: 27

 

Leading nationalities:

USA: 550

UK: 175

Mexico: 143

Spain: 74

Canada: 45

 

I hope everyone has enjoyable post cruise visits and safe journeys home.

 

Stu

[DragonOfTheSeas]

6 minutes ago, Stuart Suss said:

Agnes,

 

Thank you for all of your information prior to and during the cruise.

 

Final statistics

Started the cruise: 1336

Boarded during the cruise: 27

 

Leading nationalities:

USA: 550

UK: 175

Mexico: 143

Spain: 74

Canada: 45

 

I hope everyone has enjoyable post cruise visits and safe journeys home.

 

Stu

Thank you, same to you. Why did they board late? Flights? 

 

I felt it was a very international mix of passengers. 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

Aarhus is the second largest city in Denmark. Population of 300k. 40k are university students. When you add in the children in the city you have a very young population. 
 

Many students stay after finishing university and the city is growing. A number of years ago the city decided that it couldn’t grow out. So, they had a contest for young architects to design apartments to replace the industrial waterfront. 
 

Each building would be unique in its own way. And the got young architects for cheap. 
 

 

 

 

 

They decided these apartments would be a mix of people. This one has a different color for each type of apartment dwellers. First time renter, seniors, families, etc. 

 

 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

Our guide pointed out the Queen’s boat. The city built her a mansion here. She went to Aarhus University. 
 

 

I took this picture from the bus. Not the best. 😋

[DragonOfTheSeas]

The Aarhus cathedral is only a couple of blocks from the river. It dates to the 1200s. 
 

 

 

 

All of these European cathedrals are beautiful. 
 

 

 

[flamingos]

Aarhus looks beautiful!

 

 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

The cathedral burned down and was replaced in the 1300s. The bishop paid for it. You know in those days bishops came from prominent families. The symbol for his family was three roses. He had it put on the cathedral tower.  The anchor opposite of the roses is for St Clemens—patron saint of sailors. 

 

 

You could climb the tower. 
 

 

On the cathedral grounds was this. 
 

The guide called it the kiwi. It has environmental literature inside. 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

5 minutes ago, flamingos said:

Aarhus looks beautiful!

 

 

I liked it more than I thought I would. I’m glad I had a tour. Things are spread out and I wouldn’t know what I was looking at. 

[flamingos]

1 minute ago, DragonOfTheSeas said:

I liked it more than I thought I would. I’m glad I had a tour. Things are spread out and I wouldn’t know what I was looking at. 

 

We're doing the steam train to a mountaintop, with a view of a fjord.  It goes until about 1:30, and we're in port until 5.

[DragonOfTheSeas]

We visited the university. A builder offered them 1million yellow bricks for the buildings. Then he said an unlimited amount. 
 

 

 

The guide said how pleasing these buildings are. Sorry, I do not see it. But he is a student there. People are always proud of their school.  (Philosophy—he already has two masters)

 

He said to get a dorm room in the park area you have to put your name in for a lottery. You likely will have graduated before you get to the top of the list.

[DragonOfTheSeas]

14 minutes ago, flamingos said:

 

We're doing the steam train to a mountaintop, with a view of a fjord.  It goes until about 1:30, and we're in port until 5.

That sounds like a good excursion too. I’m sure you’ll drive by some of these sites on your way to the train.  Or you can take the shuttle back into the city. The cathedral is easy walking distance from the shuttle stop

[DragonOfTheSeas]

Then we made it to the Dem Gamle By. Which means old town. Let me say I will never look at cobblestones with historical nostalgia again. 

 

 

First we went to the 1800s buildings. 

 

 

Most had exhibits inside. This one had sound effects of the man snoring. 
 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

Many were shops. Notice the symbols over the door. 
 

 

 

I was going to buy some goodies. But I have a wireless AmEx card and a chip Visa. So could only take wireless Visa and Mastercard.

[DragonOfTheSeas]

The 1920s had a lot to do with cars. 
 

 

 

 

and a couple of others

 

 

 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

The last section was 1970s. This was a small area. They had music playing. “I shot the sheriff” and ABBA’s Waterloo. 
 

 

bell bottom pants

 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

We are in Copenhagen. We took a canal boat tour this morning and we were going to go to Tivoli this morning also. But the line is around the block. Our hotel is diagonally across the street so we think we’re gonna wait and just go this afternoon or this evening. When all these people got home.

 

It’s an absolutely beautiful day here in Copenhagen so it’s a great day to go to amusement park with your children. 

 

i’ll post some canal boat pictures in a little while once we have checked into the hotel

[flamingos]

21 hours ago, DragonOfTheSeas said:

So could only take wireless Visa and Mastercard.

I JUST got my new wireless card!

 

I remember our first trip to England when we didn't have a chip card and couldn't pay for dinner one night with friends, which was a bit embarrassing.  Europe is ahead of us on card technology, every time.  🙂

[DragonOfTheSeas]

1 hour ago, flamingos said:

I JUST got my new wireless card!

 

I remember our first trip to England when we didn't have a chip card and couldn't pay for dinner one night with friends, which was a bit embarrassing.  Europe is ahead of us on card technology, every time.  🙂

Yes, but sometimes the technology doesn’t work. This morning we took a taxi to the canal boats. And he said yes he took credit cards. But then when he pulled out his card reader it wasn’t working. And of course I didn’t have any Danish money so he did take American money from me. But I don’t believe I got the best exchange rate. But I was just happy to pay the bill at that point.

[Another_Critic]

1 hour ago, flamingos said:

I JUST got my new wireless card!

 

I remember our first trip to England when we didn't have a chip card and couldn't pay for dinner one night with friends, which was a bit embarrassing.  Europe is ahead of us on card technology, every time.  🙂

It was great having a contactless card on my May trip to France and England.  So much better than chip + signature.

 

I think every credit card I have is now contactless (Chase, Citi, BoA, AMEX, Discover, Barclays).

 

It's still a challenge with some kiosks that require chip + PIN, since very few US issued cards have PIN capability, and of those, very few are PIN priority (most are signature priority).

[DragonOfTheSeas]

3 minutes ago, Another_Critic said:

It was great having a contactless card on my May trip to France and England.  So much better than chip + signature.

 

I think every credit card I have is now contactless (Chase, Citi, BoA, AMEX, Discover, Barclays).

 

It's still a challenge with some kiosks that require chip + PIN, since very few US issued cards have PIN capability, and of those, very few are PIN priority (most are signature priority).

My American Express card is contactless. My Visa card has a pin. I wrote to Visa and got a pin before we came to Europe. But that didn’t do many good with the taxi driver since his machine wasn’t working.

 

 

to a certain extent money is always going to be a little bit of an issue. The only way around that is to get currency from where you’re going. On this cruise with multiple locations and different currencies that just wasn’t practical.

 

and I can say we were in Sweden for 4 1/2 days and I use my credit cards for every single purchase even when I bought a bottle of water in the convenient store. I expected them to tell me that there was a minimum purchase and I was trying to decide what else I was gonna buy when they didn’t bad an eyelash and buying a €1.5 bottle of water