From Preetz we headed for the German Danish boarder near Flensburg. Just before the boarder we stopped for fuel, as fuel is more expensive in Denmark. There was a large supermarket outlet called Scandanavian Park. So we also decided to stock up on supplies as the prices will only keep going up from here on. (click read more below for the lesson learnt here…)
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| Our home in Aabenraa Denmark |
Rather than stay on the motorway we detoured to the Danish East coast and stopped at a place called Aabenraa. We parked for the night on the waters edge between the beach and marina.
A long evening stroll 9-10pm past the port area and up into the main street window shopping.
We decided we would revisit here in the morning and check out the old church.
Scandanavian Park on the German Danish boarder. People were leaving the supermarket with trolleys loaded with cartons of beer and soft drinks. Hmmm interesting. We found at the rear of the supermarket a warehouse area where the Beer was incredibly cheap as low as E$5.80 A little over $8.00 a carton!! Carlsburg etc was dearer at A$15.00. Anyway we filled the trolley with shopping and several cartons of beer and soft drink.
We loaded one of the two open checkout belts full and ‘Helgi’ (name changed but picture a stocky blond Helgi) asked in Danish/German for our form? When shown the form it was some sort of customs declaration. No problem, so filled out the form, a bit slow as there was no English (the queue behind us is getting longer) Helgi then needed to see a passport, OK so off to the van to dig out the passports and return, Trish keeps Helgi company, and smiles to the ever increasing queue of patient German and Danish travellers.
Some time later after extracting the passports from there secure hiding place in the bowels of the Hypermobile I return to the checkout and Helgi’s welcoming glare, having just risked being turned to stone I chose not to push my luck and look at the people in the queue. I presented my passport where Helgi informed me in an interesting turn of phrase that I must have a Danish or German Passport. GH as we now call her (GH = Grumpy Helgi) unloaded the cartons of beer and soft drink from the belt to the floor and proceeded to efficiently check out the remaining supermarket goods faster than it was possible to control them coming out at the other end. So we just threw it all into the shopping trolley anxious to get out of there.
Glad that this part of the ordeal was over I presented my credit card. GH shook her head not so sweetly and made it known ‘NO CARDS’ . Kroner or Euro’s only. We had read and been warned that it is not unusual for supermarkets here not to accept cards. This was going to be close! We had no Kroner so we started gathering all the Euros we had left. By this time the queue had resigned themselves to their fate and were just enjoying the free entertainment.
On the bright side we got our supermarket supplies, no soft drinks but two 6 packs of beer and the wine went through OK, we had just enough cash to pay for it and German and Danish people in a queue can be unexpectedly patient. Don’t mess with Grumpy Helgi’s on the checkout though!
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| Late evening in Aabenraa Denmark |