by Candace Rardon
It’s harder than I expect to talk while cycling down the cobbled streets of Odense’s old town, the wheels of my bicycle clattering against well-worn stones. My guides for the day, Claus, the city’s director of tourism, and Lone, who also works for the tourist bureau, take me along back streets lined with 18th-century pastel rowhouses and through Hans Christian Andersen Haven, a large park that follows along the winding Odense River.
A conference in Copenhagen has brought me to Denmark for the weekend, but I’ve taken the day to get outside the city. Weekend breaks to big cities across Europe are certainly not uncommon, but I often spend little time getting out and seeing the life that exists beyond a capital’s walls. Odense couldn’t be easier to reach, a mere hour and a half train ride from the heart of Copenhagen. It’s located on Funen, the country’s second-largest island known as the “Garden of Denmark.”
I’ve spent the weekend dodging bicycles on Copenhagen’s sidewalks, where morning rush hour finds rows of cyclists lined up for battle next to motor traffic, but I hadn’t expected to find such a strong cycling culture outside the capital as well. Indeed, the first thing we do in Odense is to pick up bicycles from one of the city’s many rental schemes.
“We bike everywhere,” Lone says as we put our bags in the front basket of our bikes and head away from the train station. “And we love to park as close as possible to where we’re going.”
Who can blame them? It’s rumoured that Odense has as many bicycles as it does residents, nearly 190,000. Electronic counters have been posted in various places around the city that track the number of bicycles that ride by in a single day. By noon on Sunday, a meter we pass is already at 1,876.
Odense is home to famed children’s author Hans Christian Andersen and our ride around the city takes us to his childhood home and the museum built in his honour. I love this look into Odense’s past, but can sense its future as well. Many of our conversations throughout the day turn to plans for improvements around the city, whether it’s converting streets to pedestrian malls or closing the highway through downtown off to cars to bridge the new and old town sections. In Odense, it seems, bikes come first.
After a picnic lunch by the river, we head back to the station through the park. Maybe it’s the bright sunlight streaming through the crisp autumn air or maybe the brittle leaves crunching beneath our wheels, but I’ve never been happier to be on a bike.
Candace is originally from Virginia but lives in London where she studies travel writing at Kingston University. She recently returned from a year-long working holiday in New Zealand and is glad to back be in Europe where flights aren't quite so expensive. You can follow her on Twitter (@candacerardon) as well as read more of her stories on her blog, Rare Travels.
