Filling in some gaps in Spain, a Greenland cruise and I'm getting a tattoo!

[RooFlyer]

Maybe, maybe not.

Interesting! But what I meant by ‘proper stuff’ were the pipes and drums as opposed to a ceremonial guard.

 

[RooFlyer]

One last stop. Another guy I'm researching is an avaricious Scot, Andrew Geils, some-time fill-in Lieut Gov of VDL in the 1810s. His family seat was in Dunbarton, on the Clyde west of Glasgow, so I stopped and found his grave.



There used to also be the grant house, at the unfortunately named Dumbuck, but last year it suffered two fires a couple of weeks apart and has since been demolished and the site to be redeveloped. The locals suspect involvement of developer owners ...

Lastly, to the Dakota Hotel at Ferrymuir, abt 20 mins from Edinburgh Airport. I hadn't heard of the Dakota chain, but this one is pretty good and I'd recommend it.





From Google street view.

 

[RooFlyer]

Next morning

BA1443 dep EDI 11:25 arr LHR 13:00
1D, A320, Alaska miles redemption

The BA louge at EDI leaves a lot to be desired. Crowded, very noisy (school holiday kids) and the food options aren't stellar.





Black pudding is a minor redemption, but no idea what the stuff on the right is



The booze selection was stellar!



After an hour or so I got sick of the lounge and decamped to outside and I contemplated on EDI. Its crowded, old, dirty and in the running for my least favourite airport.



Boarding called and it was a couple of flights down to the tarmac, then up again to the plane, where you couldn't help noticing the airbridge, right there ...



Typical Eurobusiness



I am impressed that BA hand out menus for these short hops



I just had the greek salad, which was mostly lettuce and b-all fetta.

 

[RooFlyer]

Into LHR and about 4 hours to kill.

BA First lounge again and - like last time, but I didn't mention it - it smells of curry, even as you enter.

Gate wasn't announced until abt 30 mins before departure, notwithstanding Flighty app showed the inbound parked about 30 mins earlier.

BA820 dep LHR 16:20 arr CPH 19:15
A319, 5D, Alaska miles redemption

This flight started badly and went downhill. First they said full flight and groups 3 and 4 must gate check their carry-on.

Boarding was silly, no, stupid. They call 'Group 1 for preboarding'. Which means you scan your BP and then wait just there. Crew arrive late.



Then stop/start on boarding, down escalator. Held at the bottom of the escalator. Go again, then held at the plane door.

Held at the bay for abt 10 mins before pushback. Afternoon tea served.



Arrive CPH, easy immigration, then to bag carousel. Nice benches



The the fun began - not. After abt 10-15 mins at the carousel, I got an e-mail from BA saying sorr, some bags may have been left at BA. We'll contact you further if you are affected. This was almost immediately followed by an indistinct PA that mentioned out flight. I asked someone - said ALL bags were left at Heathrow and we have to see Menzies. WTF?

Walk quickly and join the queue at Menzies to put in a report. Couple of people around me very upset that they carry-on, which was forcibly gate-checked were still at Heathrow.

How do you not load ANY bags onto a flight? There has obviously not been any further comms from BA.

Bags got flown in later that night and mine was delivered to my airport hotel about noon the next day.

 

[tgh]

I have an unrequited desire to see some family graves, lowland Scotland, Poland, and of all places Crete
Sadly it will remain on a (fairly small) list of misses.
I would suffer great anxiety being separated from my carry on; what might they say if you argue it contains life saving essential medical stuff ??

 

[RooFlyer]

what might they say if you argue it contains life saving essential medical stuff ??

They would say carry it with you. And really the guy should have.

 

[RooFlyer]

I have three nights at the Clarion Hotel at the airport, one of the Choice group. There is also a Choice Comfort hotel next door, that's down a peg. I wasn't really aware of the Choice brand before. Everything in Copenhagen is expensive, and airport hotels especially so. Think $600+

@Flashback introduced me to Choice and their Privileges program. They had a bonus buy points promo on at the time, so I bought enough to cover three nights (and points redemptions include breakfast!!). From memory, the points cost was between 1/3 and 1/2 the cash cost.

The Privileges program amongst other things gets me a 4 cent/litre off petrol at United stations. They status matched my Accor Platinum to their Platinum.

I booked a deluxe room which is really nice.







Great minibar! But expensive.



Nice view over the airport and to the Øresund Bridge to Sweden.



As mentioned, breakfast is included when you use points. And a very good spread it is too. There is a restaurant, also pretty good, but service achingly slow.

I checked out the terminal the first morning in preparation for our OMG o'clock departure for Greenland in a few days. Thing caught my eye was this LAGs station. Lots of benches to organise lags and bags provided. Many people were using it. I wonder if they are particularly strict here? We'll find out.



Yes, that's a $9.50 for a small airport coffee, right there. Denmark is expensive (along with the other Nordics).

 

[RooFlyer]

Yesterday, a full day here I barely ventured out of my room, working on the manuscript of a book my historical society is publishing. Travel isn't conducive to keeping up with what I promised!

Today, I took the metro then train to Helsingør, abt an hour away and abt A$40 return.

Helsingør is of course the home of Elsinore of Shakespeare's Hamlet, or more strictly, Kronborg Castle

The castle dates back to a stronghold built by King Eric VII in the 1420s. Along with the fortress Kärnan in Helsingborg, on the opposite coast of Øresund (present day Sweden), it controlled the entrance to the Baltic Sea. From 1574 to 1585, King Frederick II had the medieval fortress radically transformed into a magnificent Renaissance castle and bastion, to enforce the extraction of tolls ['sound dues'; sound = body of water] by any vessel passing from the Baltic to the North Sea. Its regarded as one of the best Renaissance era castles in northern Europe and is World Heritage listed.

In 1629, a fire destroyed much of the castle, but King Christian IV subsequently had it rebuilt. The castle has a church within its walls, which was one of the original stronghold's buildings. In 1658, Kronborg was besieged and captured by the Swedes, who took many of its valuable art treasures as war booty.

In 1785 the castle ceased to be a royal residence and was converted into barracks for the Army. The Army left the castle in 1923. After a thorough renovation, the complex was opened to the public.

Helsingør train station. pretty grand itself



The castle/fort is only a few minutes walk away; there are several rings of moat/wall fortifications, which evolved over time as canon and other warfare technology increased.










Inside the castle.





Lots or neat carvings along the walls and window treatments.

 

[RooFlyer]

I took a 45 min 'Hamlet's Castle tour which was well done, but oddly differed a bit in relation to Shakespeare's relationship with the castle from what I had read. My source was the Who Do You Think You Are program on the Shakespearean actor Judi Dench, which traced her ancestors back to the court of Frederick II, who was a big party giver. On that program some castle experts showed that a contemporary Shakespearian actor, William Kemp actually played at Kronborg for the Royals there; there were also Rosencrantz and Guildensterns lurking around. Kemp could have easily taken back stories and descriptions from his Danish visit and relayed them to Shakespeare.

The tour's explanation was more along the lines that the Hamlet-like story was part of the folk law, as told by Viking-era Amleth and written as a saga by Saxo in the middle ages(that's a bit of a paraphrase - see translation below). And this tablet at the castle, in Danish, says as much.






Some more views

The chapel, one of the surviving original stronghold buildings, now incorporated into the castle









The ballroom, where William Kemp would have performed.





Outside; Sweden over the way, but it was Danish at the time the castle was built.

 

[RooFlyer]

And that's me up to date! Up at 4:15 tomorrow to catch the charter to Kangerlussuaq, Greenland where we begin our cruise. Will hopefully bump into @Flashback and @k_sheep and their parties along the way!