Aalborg 🇩🇰

I caught a couple of trains to visit Aalborg which is a large regional city an hour away.  The trains are reliable, clean and modern and well used.

Aalborg is a city on the Limfjord river with Viking heritage and earliest settlements from 700AD.  The pretty white castle dates back to 1550.  There is a large old town with cobbled winding streets with colourful or half timbered houses that were wealthy merchant’s residences. 

With a huge river running through it, it has a lot of industry including being a global supplier of wind turbines, cement and grain.

The Utzon Centre is a striking museum of architecture on the banks of the river, and the final structure designed and built by Jorn Utzon who won the world wide competition to design the Sydney Opera House - one of his most famous works.  He was raised in Aalborg and his father a ship builder which influenced the sails design of the Opera House.  

I spent a few hours looking at the visiting  exhibits by award winning Danish designers and architects and then participated in a school holiday program (I asked if big kids could have a go and he said of course 😊), the Lego design centre with virtual reality headsets and guidance was outstanding.  A group of vacation care students, probably 10-12 years were building complex and creative structures from Lego! 

And then the Opera House exhibition where you can see his 15 iterations of design that he submitted, wooden models, virtual reality headset and a documentary of footage of the building process.  Interesting to see our progress on building site safety!  I chatted with an Aussie lady who heard my accent when I purchased my ticket.  We chatted for ages.

I then walked around the castle and church and found some of the 50 street art murals..  It's a bustling city and visually interesting with a mix of old and new architecture.  A very enjoyable day out.