A Danish Hill Tour to Vordingborg [Part 5]

The bike tour had actually shared one common theme on all days: lots of variety. The landscapes I rode through were mostly flat and a bit monotonous in terms of biome, but I passed through many different towns and a range of route sections, so the day before I had ridden everything from country roads to bike paths. That variety was about to change on this fifth day, when I rode from Copenhagen to Vordingborg.

Out of Copenhagen

When I got up at 9:30 a.m. in my hostel, everyone else in my room had already left except for one person. With my power banks recharged and my clothes (somewhat dried) packed up again, I loaded my panniers and carried them one by one to my bike, where I mounted them while trying not to let the bike tip over: because of the uneven load after attaching the first pannier, the bike simply fell over - so I placed the panniers next to the bike while I fetched the next one, hoping no one would be interested in a pannier filled with clothes and my drone. Once I had the rest of my luggage together, I could load up the bike and set off, out of Copenhagen.

After the first few kilometers, with strong wind, the urban jungle slowly faded away and I reached country road number 151, which would accompany me for the next 90 kilometers all the way to Vordingborg. What I had expected: Denmark is hilly. Not mountainous, but many dozens of hills with elevations of 30-90 meters lay ahead of me.

As soon as I was out in the countryside, I got the idea to look for food - unfortunately I was far too late with that thought, because out there I couldn't find another larger town before Vordingborg where a restaurant or supermarket was open (I didn't want to build more than a 30-minute detour into my route for food). Then, just about halfway along the route near the village of Rode, it started to rain too, so I sat down for 30 minutes in a recreated American village called "Bournonvilles Wild West".

Setting off in Copenhagen: at the moment with a strong headwind, hopefully that changes soon 🌬August 10, 2021

Coastal weather, you just have to love it 🌧 pic.twitter.com/eTUYVUQ2n4August 10, 2021

After I sat down in the main building of the small village (whose buildings were also realistically done in American construction style, since it was still dripping nicely even through the ceiling), it once again started pouring properly.

At least I had excellent 5G reception out in the middle of nowhere, so I could at least go through the latest messages during that time. During the shower, the owner of the place stopped by, and I was able to chat with him. A nice man, as American as a Dane could possibly be - he drove a big 4x4 pickup truck and wore a cowboy hat, even in pouring rain. When it looked like the rain was about to stop again, I got back on the bike once more. I was only able to keep riding through the drizzle for less than two minutes - then the next rain shower came, which this time drove me into a strip of trees off the side of the road. I had actually wanted to shelter there, but unfortunately the trees were already wet from the last shower and offered hardly any protection. So once again on this tour, I got completely soaked.

At least this rain shower only lasted a few minutes, so I was able to continue fairly soon, onward in the direction of the German border.

A bit frustrated by all the rain, I set off to ride the next 40 kilometers to my destination for the day.

This stretch dragged on quite a bit too, since the many hills continued to make the ride harder. On top of that, the constantly monotonous landscape wasn't particularly exciting to ride through, and the country road with the small "bike lane" next to it (really just the shoulder of the road with a maximum width of 35 cm and no physical separation from the road) truly made this one of the toughest stages of the tour, especially mentally - physically, everything was still well within the green zone.

Very happy, I reached my campsite in Vordingborg at around 5:15 p.m. One more time - and for the time being the last time - I pitched my tent, took the bike bags off, and went looking for dinner. I had actually planned to ride another roughly 30 km each way to a restaurant farther south (= 60 kilometers total), but I abandoned that plan after the first few minutes because I wanted to save enough energy for the next few days and the ride had pretty much drained me.

So I visited a black Netto in Vordingborg, where I bought myself a small dinner. But with the minimum purchase quantity of six bread rolls, small was no longer an option, so I also bought toppings for the upcoming breakfast and lunch and headed back to the campsite.

Once there, I ate dinner first, then headed out on foot along the coast for a little while with the drone.