Smukfest and the rest of Denmark

I didn't have any idea what to expect, and it worked in my favour. Monday night we packed up all our camping gear and loaded it in Jesper's van. Helene and I hopped on the midnight train and headed out to Skanderborg where we met one of her friends, Pi. Walking away from the city centre the crowds of people grew larger and larger. I didn't know what to think, because as far as I knew the camping didn't open until 5pm the following day... Somehow in the madness of the crowd we found Jesper and Morten who had a pile of tents and chairs with them. I was instructed to pick up whatever I could carry and to get ready to run. No sooner than I had picked up a couple of chairs a whistle blew, the yelling grew more intense and we were off running. I followed Morten's red coat as we scrambled from spot to spot trying to find dry land (it had been raining previously) in the forrest to pitch our tents. Eventually we settled in a semi-marsh, which had enough room for our 5 tents (there were about 10 of us in total). We set-up camp in the pitch black night, had a few celebratory beers, then went back to the van to get the rest of the gear. It was one of the most random nights I have had, but that was just the start of things to come at the Smukfest Music Festival.

I don't have the time or patience to write it all out here, but I will try to sum up the week:
- Arrived Monday at midnight and set-up camp
- Played beer bowling all day Tuesday because the festival didn't actually start until Wed/Thurs
- More beer bowling and went to see a few Danish bands in the middle of the week
- By this point I opted to be a beer bowling spectator, but it didn't seem to decrease my consumption levels
- Saw the Kaiser Cheifs, Franz Ferdinand, Lenny Kravitz, Infernal, Eric Clapton, The Århus Symphony, Ace of Base and probably a dozen more bands.
- Ate at China Box multiple times and had enough fries to last the rest of my trip.
- Festival ended on Sunday night with fireworks, but we stayed the night chatting with randoms and trying to finish off a bit more of our beer.
- Packed up on Monday afternoon and headed back to Århus

I have spent the last few days staying with Helene and her boyfriend Morten, seeing the sights around this area (Old Town, Museum, 3rd highest point in Denmark [147m], fireworks/music festival). I have even been treated to a few home-cooked meals with Helene's family. It's been amazing to be welcomed into the daily life of other people, and has been one of the best experiences I have had on my trip so far. When I left Canada 2 years ago I never imagined I would meet so many amazing people. It is becoming more apparent to me as I continue my trip that it really is the people in your life that make all the difference. I consider myself to be extremely fortunate to have the friends and family in my life that I do.

I have got all my pictures from the festival posted on my FaceBook - you can find them here:
http://www.new.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2205982&l=55c69&id=21002902
http://www.new.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2205984&l=5e3db&id=21002902

Dudley (my Mountie Moose) made quite a few appearances along this stretch of the trip so far - everybody seems to want a picture taken with him.

I am about halfway finished this trip through Scandinavia/Eastern Europe - here is how the rest of my trip is looking right now:

Aug

16 - Århus

17 - Copenhagen

18 - Copenhagen

19 - Copenhagen

20 - Hamburg

21 - Bremen

22 - Bremen

23 - Dresden

24 - Wroclaw

25 - Wroclaw

26 - Krakow

27 - Krakow

28 - Krakow

29 - Budapest

30 - Budapest

31 - Budapest

Sept

1 - Budapest

2 - Belgrade

3 - Belgrade

4 - Belgrade

5 - Sarajevo

6 - Sarajevo

7 - Sarajevo

8 - Dubrovnik / Split

9 - Dubrovnik / Split

10 - Dubrovnik / Split

11 - Ljubljana

12 - Ljubljana

13 - Ljubljana

14 - Graz ?

15 - (Extra Day)

16 - Bratislava - Meet with Colin

17 - Bratislava

18 - Bratislava

19 - Brno

20 - Brno

21 - Brno

22 - Cesky Krumlov

23 - Cesky Krumlov

24 - Prauge

25 - Prague

26 - Prague

27 - Plzen

28 - Stuttgart

29 - Stuttgart

30 - Fussen

31 - Fussen

Oct

1 - Munich - Meet with Dani and Sam

2 - Munich

3 - Munich

4 - Athens - Meet with Jodie

5 - Athens

6 - Athens

7 - Greece

8 - Greece

9 - Greece

10 - Greece

11 - Greece

12 - Greece

13 - Italy

14 - Italy

15 - Italy

16 - Italy

17 - Italy

18 - Italy

19 - Italy

20 - Italy

21 - Italy

22 - Italy

23 - Italy

24 - London

25 - Vancouver

I am back to travelling alone for the next while, but will meet with friends starting next month.
If anyone has any suggestions of other places to check out in the vacinity of where I am travelling I would love to hear about them. This is just a rough guide - I looked at a rail map and picked out a few places that sounded familiar.

I also updated my travel map, so if you are interested you can see where I have been up to this point in my trip.

I think this has been a sufficiently long post, so I will leave it at that.
All the best,
Trev