Western Denmark Study Tour - Day 2

We had to get up early in the morning for breakfast at the hostel at 7:15 am. It was hard for us but even harder for the kids as they totally did not get enough sleep. But we dragged ourselves to the restaurant, in the cold rain, and had our early breakfast.

We first stopped at Birk Sculpture Park and Geometric Garden in Herning, located in the central part of Jutland (one of three lands of Denmark). The park consists of geometric shaped tall bushes, and if you saw it from above, you will see circles and triangles and squares, etc. As you can see in the photos, they are quite tall, and it was pretty fun to walk through it.

The Geometric Garden.

Geometric Garden from the outside.

But it was raining lightly, and also windy and cold, so we quickly walked through the park, and went into our next stop, which is the Herning Museum of Contemporary Art, or the HEART museum. The museum was completed in 2009 and its collection consist of international conceptual and experimental arts. The building's design was inspired by Herning's long history with textile manufacturing, and the "textile" theme is supposedly carried throughout the building - hard to identify it from the inside... But the kids were pretty tired and bored at this point, we spent most of our time in the cafe, which was also a very nice space. 

Inside the museum. 

Hanging out in the cafe.

One tired kid.

After a group lunch at the museum cafe, we were on the road again, to Aarhus. Aarhus is the second largest city in Denmark after Copenhagen, and is located on the east of the peninsula of Jutland. The students had a walking tour and presentations to do, but the kids were too tired to be part of them, so we broke off from the group, and checked into our hotel (yes, a hotel this time), and took a short rest. 

We met up with the group again at the ARos Museum, which is the largest art museum in Northern Europe.  There is a panoramic walkway on the roof titled "Your Rainbow Panorama" by Danish-Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson, and it was pretty amazing. The view from the walkway is spectacular, but to view the city through these rainbow colored tinted glasses was a pretty sensational experience. 

We also saw some very interesting art. This is a five meter tall sculpture titled "Boy", created by Ron Mueck. I had never seen anything like this! It is pretty creepy (if you are alone in the museum with him!), but really amazing at the same time. His flesh tone, eyes, nails, hair, all look so real, but just gigantic! He used to be THE landmark of the museum, but once the "Rainbow Panorama" was completed, it took over his place. But I think, it is still worth visiting the museum just to meet this Boy.

After the museum, we walked through downtown Arhus. This Aarhus Creek is one of the popular attractions of the city. It used to be underground, but was uncovered just a few years ago. Since then, so many bars and restaurants have popped up along the creek, creating a really vibrant environment. We sat on the steps and had some ice cream.

For dinner, Rasmus (Jonathan's co-teacher) took us to a nice restaurant called Komfur in the Latin quarter. The dinner was very nice, but the kids were really exhausted by then, it was a pretty stressful two hours trying to keep them quietly seated. We rushed back to the hotel as soon as our meal was finished.

Overall, we had a great day. I wish I had more time to explore Aarhus.