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Hygge from CPH to the Red SeaHygge from CPH to the Red Sea
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A 18-day adventure by Brico Adventures Read more
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  • Brico AdventuresHygge from CPH to the Red Sea
    1
    Day 1

    LAX - CPH

    June 30, 2017 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 75 °F

    Hygge is a Danish word indicating a state of well-being.  It's a way of life in Scandinavian countries, which is why you'll frequently see them topping out among the world's happiest.  We'll be embracing this relaxed lifestyle over the next 17 days, gladly leaving our work emails unread.  Our trip starts in Copenhagen, then several days visiting family in Germany, followed by a week of diving in the Red Sea.

    The Uber ride to the airport was in typical LA style, with the driver cutting into the airport line and being at the receiving end of some angry honks multiple times. But WTH - we made it.

    Let the travelling begin!    Read more

  • Brico AdventuresHygge from CPH to the Red Sea
    1
    Day 2

    København

    July 1, 2017 in Denmark ⋅ ⛅ 59 °F

    No brico adventure would be complete without the obligatory 1km+ trek to our hotel towing the luggage. Despite some concern about losing a wobbly suitcase wheel, we still proceeded to pull our luggage across the city's cobblestone sidewalks and streets from the train stop to First Hotel 27.

    After freshening up at the hotel, we stopped at a small cafe for espresso and a chocolate croissant. We continued our stroll down a pedestrian street full of food stalls and shops. From one of the squares, we ventured up to the top floor of a shopping center that offered lofty views of Copenhagen.

    Even with less than ideal weather, packed outdoor cafes line the streets, outfitted with blankets and heat lamps to keep patrons warm. These outdoor cafes create a laid back vibe all over town that we wish was more prevalent in the US. We stopped at a waterfront cafe/brewery that had several local beers on tap. We enjoyed watching small boats with picnic tables and passengers enjoying alcoholic beverages of their choice motor by.

    From there, we continued our walk to the Nyhavn canal. What was once an area full of bars and drunken sailors, Nyhavn is now one of the most popular places to visit in the city. Colorful houses and decades old sailboats line the canal, making it very picturesque and charming. It was also very touristy. So we found a restaurant at least 10 mins walk away from the crowds. Afterwards, we called it an early night even at 9 though the clouds had cleared and there was still plenty of daylight to be had.    Read more

  • Brico AdventuresHygge from CPH to the Red Sea
    Day 3

    18 Hours of Daylight

    July 2, 2017 in Denmark ⋅ ⛅ 61 °F

    During our first night we were woken by fireworks at midnight. We felt a little out of sorts since it was a few days early and several thousand miles away from where we expected them. We couldn't see them and they didn't last long so we were able to easily fall back asleep. And since Copenhagen is located above 55° north in latitude and we visited just after the summer solstice, there was plenty of time to explore the city even after sleeping in til 9.

    One of the great things about being back in Europe is the quality of breakfast that can be found anywhere you go. Rather than the typical continental breakfast garbage seen in US hotels, we got a spread with fresh bread, homemade jam, an assortment of eggs, fruits, and pastries.

    Copenhagen features several free walking tours which are usually a good introduction to a new city. We were surprised by the amount of Spanish visitors. This confused a fellow tour member who, after overhearing the guide, asked "Is 'hola' hello in Danish?" to which the guide replied "no, that's Spanish." Overheard in CPH... The tour itself was good but not spectacular. We got some history about the rise and fall of the Danish Kingdom, the frequent fires in the city that have destroyed many historic buildings (sometimes more than once), and the queen's chain-smoking habits.

    We stopped for lunch at Street Food Copenhagen, a collection of street food vendors in an old warehouse. We opted for an order of fish 'n chips and a pasta dish. The atmosphere was cozy with communal tables. We found a table on the makeshift second floor, overlooking all of the stalls and crowds below.

    Next up, we headed to the freetown Christiania aka Nemoland. It was formed by a group of hippies in the 1970s, and so far has maintained its autonomy from the rest of the country. They have few rules: have fun... The dirt paths are lined with old shacks and tents, most buildings are covered with counterculture graffiti, and the smell of weed abounds. We grabbed a beer in their "downtown," listened to some music, walked along the waterfront paths, and checked out an art gallery in an abandoned building. Overall a pretty cool vibe quite different from the rest of the city, and well worth the visit.

    Just outside of Nemoland, we climbed to the top of the external spiral staircase at the Church of our Saviour which, at 92 meters, offered pretty cool views of the area, including the Baltic Sea and Sweden in the distance. We didn't spend much time at the top since there was only room for one person and a lengthy queue below.

    No stop to Copenhagen would be complete without a visit to Tivoli Gardens - a 19th century amusement park in the middle of the city. Our tour guide from earlier in the day mentioned that Walt Disney was inspired by Tivoli when creating Disney World. We took a ride on the Demon roller coaster and walked around the park.

    After watching Germany on the way to a Confed Cup win, we were excited to try the New Nordic Cuisine at Restaurant Bror. There are a number of restaurants across the city showcasing sustainable, healthy and fresh food which have made Copenhagen a destination for foodies. We weren't disappointed with our 4 course meal which highlighted local produce and fish. And incredible bread. We finished dinner just before 11, and the sun had just set.    Read more

  • Brico AdventuresHygge from CPH to the Red Sea
    1
    Day 4

    København - Final Day and Final Thoughts

    July 3, 2017 in Denmark ⋅ ⛅ 61 °F

    The forecast for our last day in Copenhagen called for rain showers. It ended up being the sunniest day we got with the rain only making a quick, albeit heavy, appearance around noon. We had a light breakfast of smørrebrød, a Danish open-faced sandwich on rye bread with a variety of toppings. We chose one with fried fish and 2 with hard boiled eggs and shrimp.

    Afterwards we walked to a nearby waterfront area called Kalvebod Bølge (wave). It's a pedestrian bridge going into the harbor with a modern design and a kayak slide. The dark skies began to roll in so we started walking towards our lunch spot.

    The rain began as we neared our lunch destination. The restaurant was inside Det Kongelig Bibliotek (The Royal Library) which is an impressive glass building with a modern design. The restaurant, Søren K, served small plates focused on the flavor of the fresh Nordic cuisine. Our favorites were fried scallops bathed in lobster bisque and fried brill with an onion puree. It was an excellent way to end our time in Copenhagen.

    The last quick adventure was getting to the airport. We arrived at our hotel to pick up the stored luggage just under 2 hours prior to departure. Although we were initially thinking about catching a taxi, the hotel clerk ensured us that we had plenty of time to catch the train. After a 10 min walk, we were at the train station in line to get a ticket. But for some reason, unlike everywhere else we'd been, the ticket machines did not accept US credit cards or Danish bills (only coins). So it was a 20 minute struggle to try different machines and cards, all whilst having other travelers breathing down our necks. We finally found out that our US debit card worked. The train ride, fortunately, only took 15 mins. After a short disagreement with the automated baggage machine regarding what constitutes overweight luggage (turns out heavy is just a note for handlers), we were back in the hectic terminal of Scandinavia's biggest airport.

    While we enjoyed Copenhagen and think it's worth a stop, you don't need a lot of time to visit all the popular sights. The food was definitely the highlight and it was a refreshing change of pace from LA, with the majority of Danes biking rather than driving, and the city continuing to invest in bike-friendly infrastructure. Copenhagen was modern, accessible, and clean. Interestingly, though, we felt it was a bit chaotic in many of the public spaces (airport, squares, etc.), most likely due to the fair weather and the long daylight hours drawing big crowds. Outside the freetown Christiania, there wasn't much of an "edgy" feel to it in terms of cultural diversity. Though there is definitely something to be said for being the world's happiest country.    Read more

  • Brico AdventuresHygge from CPH to the Red Sea
    1
    Day 5

    Food & Family in Germany

    July 4, 2017 in Germany ⋅ ☀️ 79 °F

    We try to make it to Germany at least every other year to visit Nico's family. Fortunately the weather was quite good in Germany - we had temperatures upwards of 30 C which made for great pool weather. We also enjoyed a walk in the hills around Aidlingen. And of course couldn't get enough of the quality bread and hefeweizen.

    It's always exciting to see extended family too, especially over dinner at one of our favorite Italian restaurants, Da Vittorio. We were joined by the Wieland family (now qty 6 with Phil's gf Johanna), Opa and Robin.

    Nico started with an appetizer portion of the Tortellini in Brodo (broth) and Brittany had red beet carpaccio with goat cheese and arugula. For the main course, Nico ordered Orata al Sale (Dorado baked in a salt crust) and Brittany got the popular Taglioni ai Tartufo Nero (homemade pasta lightly tossed with cheese in a parmesan wheel, topped with black truffles). A+, 10/10, 100% for every course! We long for a restaurant of this caliber in the US.

    We spent close to 4 hours enjoying the food and company. Brittany needs to work on her German, but luckily, Nico's cousins were happily speaking English.    Read more

  • Brico AdventuresHygge from CPH to the Red Sea
    1
    12
    Day 6

    Schloß Lichtenstein & Reutlingen

    July 5, 2017 in Germany ⋅ ☀️ 75 °F

    The following day, we made our way towards Nico's grandma's house in Ruetlingen. We chose to combine this visit with a stop at a nearby castle, Schloß Lichtenstein. This castle sits 250 meters above the valley and has incredible views of the Swabian Alp mountains. We paid 8€ each to take a guided tour of the 1st and 2nd levels.

    The tour was mostly in German with brief highlights in English. An original medieval castle was built in the 1300s and replaced with a hunting castle in the early 1800s, and then replaced again with the current castle in 1840. The final castle was built at the direction of Duke Wilhelm of Württemberg who got inspiration from a fairy tale written at the time.

    The castle, which is considered to be a relatively new castle, was built more as a vacation home. The Duke had a collection of armor (including some for himself), a chapel with a 550 year old original painting, and even a drinking room. It was definitely worth a visit.

    The rest of the day was spent visiting with O, Nico's grandma. She made some vegetarian maltauschen with potato salad for lunch - a Swabian specialty. It was a delicious. Brittany will work a little harder at learning German so she can converse with more of Nico's family.    Read more

  • Brico AdventuresHygge from CPH to the Red Sea
    1
    21121
    Day 8

    Quad Ride in the Eastern Arabian Desert

    July 7, 2017 in Egypt ⋅ ☀️ 91 °F

    After a 4 hour flight from Frankfurt, we landed in Hurghada, Egypt, on the Western coast of the Red Sea. There were some cool sights below, including the Adriatic coast, the Greek island Crete, and the Nile river delta. It's pretty amazing to see the landscape change from desolate to lush greens, and shows just why the river was so important to the earliest civilizations.

    The airport is quite large and new, but we were the only plane in sight at arrival. Even with plenty of jet bridges available, we deplaned far from any of them and took a bus to the terminal. Inside was equally quiet. The first stop was to get visas which cost $25 each - when we walked up to the stand, the collector shouted "cash! money!" once we handed him our passports. The remaining part of the airport that we walked through was the same, eerily quiet, but employees were still eager to get everyone out of the building.

    We had booked a desert quad tour to fill the time until we would get picked up for our liveaboard, but even for the quad tour, we were looking at an hour wait. Not having eaten since breakfast, we started to get hungry. We didn't see any options in the arrival terminal, so Nico decided to try our luck for food in the departures terminal. However, he was declined entry because he didn't have a boarding pass for a departing flight (security is pretty tight). Luckily, we had a small portion of a pretzel left to hold us over.

    We finally got on our way for the quad tour after our guide, Ahmed, showed us to our bus. Admittedly, there was a bit of trepidation on whether this was a legit tour because the only branding we saw was on the shirt that he was wearing. Adding to the anxiety, we were told at the airport exit that a police officer would have to ride along with us for safety purposes. However, Ahmed spoke to them and eventually returned to tell us that it wasn't necessary since we wouldn't be going far.

    We were still hungry, so we asked Ahmed if we could stop somewhere to get something quick to eat. He offered to pick up some beans and falafel, a typical quick Egyptian lunch. We stopped at a small shop off a busy street and were brought 4 small pitas: filled with beans in 2, falafel and veggies in 1, and another with potato chips and veggies. The beans pita was chased with pickled veggies which was pretty good. We didn't care much for the potato one, but the falafel pita had a lot of great flavor.

    After quick (unnecessary) instruction on how to ride a quad and picking up (very much necessary) bandanas to cover our faces, we were off riding through the Eastern Arabian desert. Unlike the Sahara, there are more rocks than fine grain sand. We started seeing the Sinai mountain range appearing in the distance which was unexpected but pretty cool given the jagged features and nice backdrop behind the sandy air. It felt serene to cruise through this landscape with no life, just sand, for miles in any direction.

    After 22 km of riding through the desert, and some odd photo poses for the guide (see photos), we arrived at a Bedoin village. Bedoins live a rudimentary lifestyle in the desert. We skipped the camel riding and sheesha smoking since we were limited on time and not particularly interested, but opted for some tea and a quick scramble up one of the nearby hills.

    We cruised back and got dropped off at the airport for our shuttle to take us 200 km South to Port Ghalib, the departure point for our liveaboard. While writing this just after the sun set, on a remote stretch of road, the van just came to a screeching halt due to a pack of camels crossing.

    Note to our eager readers that the next post may be several days out since we don't expect to have WiFi on the boat.    Read more

  • Brico AdventuresHygge from CPH to the Red Sea
    12
    Day 8

    Emperor Elite

    July 7, 2017 in Egypt ⋅ 🌙 86 °F

    We arrived in Port Ghalib a little after sundown. The area was quite different than the traditional Muslim villages that we had just driven through. It was obviously geared towards tourists with fancy hotels, restaurants, shops, bars and a number of large ships, many of them dive boats. The Emperor Elite, our home for the next week, looked quite stunning all lit up in the harbor.

    It's the biggest liveaboard we have been on, and welcomes 25 divers plus a crew of around 12. It has 3 floors, each with ample room for sunbathing or relaxing, a large living room and dining room and a huge dive deck. Our dive instructor / tour leader Sonia is Swiss but grew up in Colombia and has now lived in Egypt for 20 years. She can speak English, German, Spanish, Arabic, and who knows what else, fluently.

    We sat down to dinner with 6 others who were first to arrive that evening. A Canadian, Egyptian (who now lives in Bahrain), 2 Germans, a South African and Guatamalen (who both now live in the UAE). It was already shaping up to be a very international bunch.

    After dinner, Sonia showed us to our room and joked that we would need walkie talkies to speak to each other due to the size. We were somehow upgraded to the 'Executive Suite' and it rivals the size of our apartment back in LA. It has its own shower room, which is usually shared with the toilet, a full wardrobe, mood lighting and a TV (not sure anyone would watch TV?). Needless to say, Ming approved of his crib.

    We headed into Port Ghalib to grab a beer. While the waterfront area was nice, it was about as authentic as Playa del Carmen. By the time we returned, the rest of the divers showed up, and 11 different nationalities were represented overall.    Read more

  • Brico AdventuresHygge from CPH to the Red Sea
    1
    11
    Day 9

    Diving 1

    July 8, 2017, Red Sea ⋅ ☀️ 90 °F

    The modus operandi over the next week was eat, sleep, dive, and repeat. A bell on the main deck indicates that it's time for the dive briefing or that food is ready. To figure out which one it is, just keep it mind that it alternates. So if you last dove and hear the bell, it's time to eat. There are a number of potential origins for the name of the Red Sea: 1) the abundance of red athias, 2) the red-glowing sunsets, or 3) the infrequent red-colored algae that can be found on the surface.

    On the first day, we cruised north along the shore for some easy checkout dives. These dives were relatively shallow at 50ft with nice coral. We saw two smaller turtles that were very cute and swam close, a bluespotted stingray hiding in the sand, a crocodile fish also hiding in the sand, nudibranch, various fish and a fat eel.

    We watched a very pretty sunset over land. Shortly after sunset we had our final dive briefing for the day - a night dive. With 3 night dives under our belt, it still causes Brittany some anxiety but has gotten noticeably better with each dive. There was some additional anxiety about the battery life of the torches we brought from home so we borrowed one as a secondary. Luckily we did because both of our torches went out and we only used the borrowed light. Surprisingly, even with one light, Brittany felt much calmer and didn't start to get spooked until we left the group to return to the boat. It was a successful, although short, dive because we saw a little cuttlefish and a Spanish dancer.

    We ate again, then went to bed shortly after, to do it all over again the next day.    Read more

  • Brico AdventuresHygge from CPH to the Red Sea
    Day 10

    Diving 2

    July 9, 2017 in Egypt ⋅ ⛅ 84 °F

    Day 2 was the start of the real diving. We cruised north 7 hours to the Brothers Islands in the middle of the Red Sea. First up was the smaller of the two, Little Brother. The current was quite strong and required a negative entry, in which one enters the water with a fully deflated BCD and descends rapidly in order to not miss the dive site due to the current. At around 30 ft, the reef provided enough protection from the current. The reef was in great shape but we didn't see any big pelagics on this first dive.

    Brittany skipped dive #2, so Nico buddied up with a 5-pack of dudes. He was thrilled to get the first glimpse of a hammerhead shark, one of the larger species (~12 ft long) with the distinctive face, which congregate in the blue near off-shore reefs. The shark was at least 10 meters away, but circled just below the divers for a little while. Seeing hammerheads was one of the goals of this dive trip.

    The third dive started on a wreck at around 100 ft, a transport vessel called the Aida which sank in the 1940s. The stern sits at 180 ft, outside of recreational dive limits, so we could only check out the middle half. From there, we swam along a beautiful coral wall. A juvenile Napoleon wrasse followed us the entire way, opportunistically looking for prey loosened by the bubbles. The wall was unbelievably colorful and abundant with marine life. There was also a scrawled filefish down below, and numerous cornetfish along the way.

    After the third dive, tuneage was bumping on the top deck and the bar was open for cocktail hour. It's great comradery to enjoy some cold beverages while watching the sunset after an accomplished day of diving. The Thai delegation was leading the party train, and had stocked up on hard stuff at the airport duty free, so we enjoyed chatting with them all night long. Probably a little too long since we didn't get the best sleep that night...    Read more

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