Denmark Lake District Hiking - Day 1
After helping Becca move into her apartment, Kate and I headed about 30 miles west into Denmark’s Lake District for 5 days of inn to inn hiking. The start of our journey was the small town of Ry. Perhaps a quarter mile outside of the village, we turned onto a gravel path and entered the woods. The landscape in the photograph above was typical of the first half of the day’s hike. The greens of the moss and ferns on the forest floor were strikingly intense.
In about a quarter of a mile, we reached the southern edge of Lake Birksø. At the lake, a couple of Mute Swans and a large flock of Graylag Geese were there to greet us.
Our path loosely followed the edge of the lake, sometimes right near it and sometimes in the forest. After another mile, we headed more into the forest. We came across an electric fence with a sign in Danish. Using Google Translate, we were able to read that wild boar were being introduced into the fenced area with the purpose of creating more ecological diversity as a result of their presence. The impact of their digging on the ecology was particularly emphasized. After about half a mile walking along the fence, we saw a family of wild boars in the distance. While not a great shot, here is one of the wild piglets eating before it darted off into cover as we approached.
Our path brought us to, then followed along, the shore of Lake Julsø before heading inward and upward to one of the highest points in Denmark. Here is a photo as we approached the tower on the peak of Himmelbjerget ("The Sky Mountain" or "The Mountain of Heaven"). Himmelbjerget reaches the grand height of 147m above sea level and was thought to be the highest point in Denmark until 1847. The 121m rise from Lake Julsø makes this the largest “mountain” in Denmark as the hills with the highest elevations have much smaller rises from their surrounding areas. The tower was erected in 1875 to honor King Frederick VII for his role in giving Denmark its constitution in 1849 and ending absolute monarchy.
The top of Himmelbjerget provides a wonderful view north towards Lake Julsø, one of the many lakes in the Lake District. The town of Ry where we started would be off to the right of this panorama.
The path heading down Himmelbjerget away from the lake was decorated with many carvings made from tree trunks.
As we made our way away from the lake and towards our inn for the night, we passed a number of small houses with traditional thatched roofs such as the one above.
We reached our inn for the night, the Lyng Dal Hotel in Gammel Rye, in the mid-afternoon after about 7 miles of hiking. Neither of us had slept well the previous night, so we both napped a bit before dinner. Kate and I have had a long-standing rule against cell phone use at the dinner table, so we both chose to leave our phones charging in our room at dinner time. Had one of us brought ours, we would have photographed the amazing gourmet dinner we enjoyed. The food and the presentation were both spectacular. If any of you are ever in this region, do yourselves the favor of dining here!