the moving movie

©expat copenhagen - the moving movie

after a long long long week jen, tetsuya and I have our first weekend here in københavn. although we are tied to the bed (aka the couch) because I caught a cold, jen is suffering from allergy and tetsuya hurt his leg while running toooooooo hard and enthusiastically on the grass close to the opera.

It's been a hard time the last two weeks packing, moving and unpacking but I somehow got sick of telling the whole story over and over again. For that reason I made a little movie with all our pictures and hope some of you can experience how it was (to move about 1.5 tons of our stuff).

I also want to shoot a special thanks to our friends who helped out even when we lost our last reserves. Also to our family who supported us not only financially but also with love and helpful reminders! And last but not least a special thanks to our new and first danish friends Sune & Kristina who not only rent us their lovely apartment but also help out with any question and also with their muscles for our most precious goods.

this movie is hosted by youtube but you can also watch it in a better quality on my web gallery.

enjoy!!

train or car? ferry or brigde?

when you travel with a little doggy you never consider flying. at least we don't! I know it sounds like a pain in the a**, but you learn to get along with it, and there are seldom possibilities to have holidays without the doggy. It's good also for your carbon footprint! (for those who care about it!) so there're only trains or cars to choose!

©expat copenhagen - night train somewhere between münchen & kobenhagen

wien <> kobenhavn 1.400 km by train
from vienna there are two possibilities to get by train to kopenhagen. both are going through night. the one line goes overnight to hamburg with a german train and continues to kobenhavn. the second one is a fast train to nürnburg (ICE) and continues with the overnight train coming from münchen going to kobenhaven!
we joined that night train for our first visit with a second class double cabin. well, I wouldn't say it's spacious, as you see, but if you take some sleeping pills and ear plugs you'll sleep well! You wake up with a little breakfast and you're fitter than you are when you ride a car!

costs vary, but you have to think of 600€ both ways in a double cabin!

Storebælt-Brücke - picture from flickr

wien<>kobenhavn 1390km by car over the bridges
when you take the car it's exhausting! you should sleep over night somewhere inbetween. (which is always a possibility to see nice little villages/towns or cities, as we did in Germany: Würzburg and Hamburg. For this, the Etap Hotels are great! cheap & clean & easy!) It takes you about 13-15h pure driving time. we use to listen to audiobooks a lot, because it keeps your mind working and keeps you focused.
the storebælt-bridge connects Fyn with Sjælland and is very spectacular! the toll is 30 € each way and can only be reduced if you've got a little electronic box for frequent drivers!

Storebælt-Brücke - picture from flickr

wien<>kobenhavn 1250km by car & ship
almost the same way, only that you pass Berlin and drive to the little town of Puttgarden from where you take the ferry to Sjælland, Rødby. It saves you 150 km but also takes 45 min with the ferry. costs for the ferry are 64€ (from 00:15-04:15 only 50€) and it takes 45 min.

in terms of carbon footprint the train wins over the car! in terms of budget it's vice versa!
(train 600€ - car 300€) still it's far better then traveling by plane, but we're still unsure if we should drive over the bridge again or take the ferry for the first time!?

any suggestions?

cycling as a religion

©expat copenhagen - sortedams sø

©expat copenhagen - østerbro bycycle path

when moving to another town, commuting is always an issue! will you take the car, the tram, go by foot, take the metro or the bus or, like 36% of all copenhageners, use the bike to go to work. here in vienna it's rare that you find people who really commute with the bike. here it's dangerous, and it is hard to keep a bike since thieves steal everything from the sattle to the wheels.

so what makes copenhagen so different? first of all they have a high tax on cars! well, we austrians are used to high taxes because we have the luxury tax and this and that, but in denmark, cars have a registration tax of 180%! (no kidding! I didn't believe it till I've read it on the ministery home page! (very good explanation of this problem ...)

secondly, copenhagen is flat and has perfect street conditions for cyclers! there are blue colored pathes over large crossings, 3-4m wide bike lanes, stops and facilities to park your bike. if you like to see some of that the best web tip is copenhagen cycle chic. this is a web blog with beautiful pictures of people cycling in copenhagen.

during our first visit over new years eve we didn't rent cycles because we liked to walk a lot and had our little doggy with us. that was a big mistake, we realized in early february when we visited copenhagen the second time and rented bikes for the whole week! it was fantastic, you reach every part of the city within at least 15 min cycling and you feel the freedom of going where ever you want to! of course we had muscles burning after the first and second day! but you start realizing why people look so fit and healthy there!

since that visit we started thinking of buying bikes when we move to copenhagen. well we will take our lovely car with us but since we never took it to work here in vienna we wouldn't in copenhagen. it's just good to have one to make weekend trips to skane (sweden) or to the beaches,... jen's favorit bikes are the velorbis, very beautifully old fashion bikes with high quality. since I'll have to carry our lovely whippet (doggy), a bike with a large basket will be my choice! There are a lot of these typs of bikes on the market, like the christiania bikes, the nihola bikes or more fashionable, the trio.