Day four of storm, and I have become so used to it that I barely brace for the gusts anymore. They blow around and through me in my ancestral lands.
Three days ago, I embarked on the so-called mini-Camino up the Danish west coast (Vestkyst Caminoen), trekking through dunes, nature reserves, fishing villages and holiday home districts. The “mini-Camino” name was probably a marketing ploy to pull in more potential trekkers with its famous point of reference, but having walked the classic Camino in northern Spain, I don’t see too much sense in comparing them. No, this walk has its own character, with challenges (and churches) aplenty… and there is even a luggage transport service for those who do not fancy carrying more than a day pack.
On the first day, the storm was internal, with my brain on euphoric, meaning-making overdrive. It was the first time in many years that I had been away on a solo adventure, and the first time in just as long that I was not working part-time while on my travels. Being a psychotherapist and teacher these days means that I have many who call on my time and it takes some serious boundaries to not make myself available to handle just one little client emergency or answer questions for one more anxious student.
My neural networks took some time to realise that I did not have to pay exquisite attention to everything around me to see metaphors or make teachable meaning out of it – “Oh! A shipwreck! Good metaphor for my Couples Therapy students as a marriage running aground and breaking up!” or “Wow, it’s really important to find the right place to walk on the beach to make good headway without burning all one’s energy sliding around in soft sand, and right next to the water’s edge is best – just like living on the edge of life gives most traction for ideas, but also comes with greater chances of getting wet!” This stream of metaphor and analogy went on for hours, while I observed the outer landscape with wonder — and my inner landscape with a patient chuckle. I trusted that the stream of instant associations and lateral thinking would quieten down at some point.
The St George Museum in Thorsminde, where I began my trek, is one of the best museum experiences I have ever had — no wonder it has won lots of prizes, including Best Museum in Denmark. It tells the story of some of the famous shipwrecks off the coast, with an unfathomable amount of lives lost. Among the interactive and immersive exhibits, there are salvaged wooden name plaques from some of those ships, and the names of many hundreds of sailors who drowned in one single shipwreck – and a dozen who survived – inscribed like a great wave across the walls. Artefacts from hundreds of years ago evoke the hands that touched them, feet that wore them, or voices that spoke their common names, before they found their watery grave.
A huge interactive screen allows visitors to explore the bottom of the sea floor along the coast and discover the vast amount of sail boat and steam ship wrecks, some of which can be explored by scuba divers, and others which are all but gone. The reason for the wrecks, and the disparity between their preservation on the sea floor, is the intensity of ocean currents and shifting sand banks along this coastline. The whole coast has been eroding for millennia, and when a storm rolls in from the West, ships end up blowing onto the underwater sandbanks and reefs off the coast and cannot free themselves as the ships get pounded by waves and break up. A lucky few might make the swim to land or be rescued by the local coastguard that was organised in the early 1800’s to give those souls a chance. They would shoot out chair-like lifebelts with cannons and attempt to hook them over the mast so sailors could attach themselves and be pulled ashore, but imagine doing that in the middle of a storm, standing on dunes that (as I found out later) whip the face and hands brutally with sand as the gusts come in so one can barely retain footing let alone look out to sea…
The name of this little town, Thorsminde, translates directly as “the memory of Thor”, the Norse god of thunder and war – apt for a place of astounding natural drama, endless wreckage and high waves of emotion. No doubt it sounded like Thor’s hammer beating as the thunder cracked and waves crashed over the North Sea, and sailors’ lives hung by a watery thread…
I started the first day’s 18km walk along the dunes, expecting a well-marked path like on the Camino in Spain to follow, and quickly realised the impossibility of this among a landscape of shifting sands! It took me 15 obstinate minutes to also learn that picking one’s way through dunes with the sharp grasses that grow there is a very bad idea, as my calves were getting sliced and my boots filled with sand. So I headed to the water’s edge on that summer’s day, with gentle (for the North Sea) waves lapping at my feet, and felt my inner storm make landfall.
The further I got from other people, the more space my euphoria and incessant metaphors began to take. I was reminded of the days after sitting medical school exams and trying to relax on a Turkish beach with Ozge – random names of medicines and genetic conditions kept popping into my head after months of intense studying. It seems that expansive feelings along with connections between everything, object and concept, is what my day job as a psychotherapist now primes in me, and it runs on auto-pilot in the background of my consciousness!
Many hours later, after a well-earned picnic on a big white fossil of a log on the beach with barely anyone in sight, I turned inland and ambled through some farmlands with busy tractors, toward the hostel in Fjaltring. Something in me had been blown loose by the inner storm — I saw an old farmer sitting on a bench outside his house, and the thought came to me to ask to share his bench for a moment as my legs were tired. I played through what I would say in my mind, and as the pleasure of this imagined exchange took place, I ended up wandering past and just sending him a friendly smile. I knew from experience that if I stopped then, it would be hard to get going again as my legs would stiffen and my back would feel the weight of my rucksack. And maybe I did not want to break the old farmer’s rest and silence, like I did not want anyone walking with me on this adventure either.
The hostel turned out to be a very pleasant and well-equipped place, with a friendly welcome, warm showers, comfortable beds, private terrace, sunset views, and a solid breakfast buffet. All set in a building with exposed brick, high wood-lined ceilings and modern lighting, which made my Scandinavian design aesthetic feel oh-so-at-home. As I washed off the kilometres of sand and sore muscles, my inner storm ebbed and peace fell within.
The second day offered a string of village churches to visit, dramatically set along the cliffs these days, but a thousand years ago when most of them were built, local history holds that they were in the middle of their respective parishes. The sea and shifting sands have eaten up farms, fields and fishermen’s shacks that stood between church and coast. Church ships hang from the high ceilings and intrigue this wanderer who started sailing before he could walk… it took me till the end of the trek, and standing at the priest’s pulpit in Thyborøn, before I had a clearer idea: it allows the priest to include those at sea in the sermons and blessings, with the prow of the model ships always facing forward toward the altar. My helpful mother also found some information on the church ships’ votive nature, meaning that they are offered as gifts to the church by someone who had a close encounter with death — not a rare occurrence on this coast over the centuries. A gift back to God in return for another gift of life. It also gave the local people something to spend time and love on creating that could be offered to decorate their church, without it costing a fortune, while the well-heeled local gentry could afford to offer gold-gilded inscription plaques and other precious craftwork.
As I pass Bovbjerg Fyr, a red lighthouse that acts as a beacon along vast stretches of this coast, there are throngs of tourists in campervans, hailing from Germany, The Netherlands, Austria, Luxembourg, and further afield. I walk straight on without pause, as I feel the overwhelm of voices and my movements being constricted by them all. How I survived 18 years of living in London before making my escape to a more rural location is a wonder of habituation and numbing of the senses!
This storm of humanity, bustling to experience the lighthouse and snap photos of the dramatic paragliders swooping up and down over the cliff edge, parallels another storm brewing within me. This one is chemical, and is slowly beginning its chain reaction as I continue heading North with the sun directly behind me, for hour upon hour of walking with my lower legs exposed to the Danish summer warmth. The gentle wind is masking the heat of the day along the cliff, but I feel the temperature much more intensely as I head inland of the next series of dunes alongside a long lake. Small birds sit atop thorny bushes and make an impressive din in the shelter of the dunes.
“The Lost Words Blessing” by Spell Songs begins to surface from my memories. I try to order the verses correctly in my mind as I feel a pang of longing to know the name of these birds that are making such a glorious racket. One of the lines in the song goes: “Look to the wild with care, my love, and speak the things you see; let new names take and root and thrive and grow…” I wish to honour this coast, these dunes, and all that lives within them, by knowing something of their uniqueness.
As the lake comes to an end and a district with a hive of holiday homes comes into view, the path bifurcates ahead of me. I know the rough direction I need to head in to reach Harboøre, but some of the paths are quite unkempt and hard to distinguish from the edges of wheat fields where seeds for crops did not grow. I try my luck with the path that seems least likely to turn into a paved road (hard on the feet and dusty with cars passing). And then, as what I thought was a blade of grass grazing the back of my right calf turns into a distinct biting sensation, the chemical storm intensifies in my body. A grey-brown horsefly reluctantly departs as I push it off repeatedly. It has had quite a feast on the back of my leg. A few kilometres later, I sit on the bank of a road, tired from over 20km of walking that day already, trying to brush sand off my feet and legs. My skin is exquisitely painful from the combination of sunburn and insect bite, and lactic acid is building up in my muscles. Strong emotions join the chemical storm and I open myself to feeling it all — the only way through, from what I have learnt. I do not even try to put words to what is flooding through as flotsam from months, years, of sailing the high seas of my life, through relationship, parenthood, creation of training courses, relentless care for my therapy clients…
I get back up, and I wince, I walk and I breathe.
When I finally make it to the old bathing hotel in Harboøre, I have just enough left in me to drag myself gingerly up the old stairwell, feet and legs throbbing, and remain horizontal on the bed into the evening.
A chance encounter with the female proprietor distracted me pleasantly, as she told me how bottles for the Danish drink called Faxe Kondi (a bit like Sprite with a dash of Fanta) were in increasingly short supply as I asked to buy one for rehydration, and she had noticed less goods being available in shops generally because of the Covid pandemic. We mused about how it would be nice to give hand-made Christmas presents that might be significantly more surprising and meaningful for friends and family, if all the shops were empty and no presents could be bought there. In fact, she did exactly that last Christmas as the bathing hotel lay empty and she had nothing but time on her hands, and it was a highlight of the season as she hosted family in her own hotel and treated them to her creations. She served up a good breakfast buffet the next morning, and wished me a good walk up to Thyborøn in the rain that was starting to fall.
Well, that third day brought a full-on storm, a potent reminder of why hundreds of ships lay wrecked off the coast. Beds of reed billowed like waves crashing and the wind snatched the cap off my head several times, leading to mad dashes to recover it, while I stumbled my way through a nature reserve for wading birds where around 300 cows keep the grass at a good height for the birds to negotiate making nests and tending to their young. The cap was not so much to offer warmth or shade but to keep the wind from constantly drilling out my left eardrum! The wind was so strong that even the cows were leaning into it to balance, which made me feel slightly better about being quite literally blown off the path repeatedly. I could hear the thundering waves just on the other side of the dunes, and curiosity compelled me to climb up to take a look, after the sea had been my near-constant companion for two days. Hearing it without sight of it felt somehow disloyal, even under these weather conditions. Unfortunately my higher vantage point was like an encounter with sand paper everywhere my skin was exposed, as the wind played havoc on the dunes, and after catching a quick glimpse of the huge waves rolling in, I quickly descended to take cover again – disloyal or not!
There was hardy any windbreak along the long and straight path through the nature reserve, but small informative signs gave me at least a chance of distraction, and I learnt that whole families would eke out a living on the coast by salvaging wrecks. They lived in very humble houses that could be taken apart for transport when needed, but inside one might find fine porcelains, exotic pieces of wooden furniture and brass ornaments from beyond the horizon. Salvaging wrecks was hard and dangerous work, so the crews received handsome payment for their labours, and then auctions were held for the rest, including the sawn-up timbers of the ships, attracting people from the whole coast. The enormous ship bell from St George even became a local school’s bell and rang out again over the countryside to summon children to their school benches, after it was last heard ringing in the death of so many sailors as the ship sank below the waves. The sailors’ disaster was a boon for the locals. I walked with that notion for a bit, feeling the tragedy and balance of it at the same time. The natural world is also full of scavengers who do the same, vultures hopping along next to dying animals in sandy deserts, waiting for their demise so the vultures can feast… at least these locals also did try to save the lives of sailors whenever possible, and gave the dead who washed ashore a burial in the local churches. Gravestones I came across in Fjaltring from the whole crew of the Norwegian steamship Avona from Bergen and an unknown Canadian fighter pilot from WW2 bear witness to these acts of spiritual care.
Another sign further along the path confirmed something I had wondered about, knowing a little something about human nature: once upon a time in the early 1600’s, according to local legend, a young man was the sole survivor of a shipwreck and he washed ashore with a chest of golden coins. The beach ranger came across him, and instead of offering help, he killed the forlorn young man to steal his money. The ranger buried the treasure in the dunes to hide his crime and enjoy the proceeds later. However, the next day, the ranger was struck down through illness or accident (I don’t quite recall how karma acted this out!) and since then a ghost, whom they call the Knopper Man after the name of the family and homestead that was once here, has been wandering through the dunes trying to find the treasure. Whether it is the spectre of the ranger or the unfortunate young man is not quite clear, but the act that should have led to salvation and resulted instead in bloody murder does not rest easy in these dunes. As the dunes were eaten away by wind and sea, a hoard of golden coins was found hundreds of years later, one of which was inscribed with the year 1598. Shudder.
There is a certain exaltation that comes with the wind. The storm was all outer on that third day, and it offered me relief from my inner workings. Something had blown through, and the intensity had ebbed. The horsefly bite was still impressive in size and itchiness, but I associated it somewhat with the burn on my foot from spending a day with a master swordsmith in Japan many years ago: a bit of damage from adventurous times on my travels.
After emerging from the nature reserve, I explored Thyborøn, with its sea shell house and overturned fishing trawler restaurant, and before my feet gave out completely, I visited the Sea War Museum, which houses a sizeable collection of weapons and parts of airships, planes and navy ships that went down during World War I, in particular from the Battle of Jutland, the largest navy battle in history. Some of the salvaged weaponry looked like steampunk creations, such as the machine gun from a Messerschmitt fighter plane, with the internal workings visible but the patina of time evident on the metal parts.
The atmosphere was oppressive with dark lighting and a pervasive smell of damp fabric, and I took in just enough to get a sense of the role this coast played for Denmark as a neutral country in WW1 before heading out into the light again. I treated myself to an excellent lobster dinner at the local hotel, which was the most upmarket of the journey with a very spacious room, well-designed bathroom fittings, dune views, and an ultra comfortable bed. I slept deeply as wind and rain drummed against the window panes.
The fourth day was a bit of a race. There was a ferry to catch across to Agger Odde and a minibus departing back towards Thorsminde at 2.15pm. I did not like the time pressure one bit after my expansive wanderings outside of schedules — I had experienced real difficulty in believing my calendar telling me “the rest of the day is clear” over the first few days of walking! I made a note to myself that my calendar needs to show that message more regularly, and it is an absolute requirement for next time I go walking too…
The storm continued, albeit with less intensity, and the sun hid behind low clouds. This combination made it rather cold after the sunburn-inducing conditions earlier in my walk. I found a bicycle shed in which to take shelter while waiting for the hourly ferry at the port in Thyborøn. This little ferry service connects places that once had a natural land bridge, but where the salty North Sea can now blend freely with the freshwater fjords of central Jutland. Onboard the ferry, I overhear an older local gentleman confessing to another, with a nostalgic smile, that the first outing he ever took his girlfriend on was a trip on this little ferry, which obviously plays a larger role for the local community than just connecting geographical points. These parts do not exactly have a buzzing night life, and decades ago, the possibilities of outings for young lovers was probably quite restricted. The choice may have been between sitting atop some hay bales or dunes to watch the sunset or taking a ferry ride!
A few minutes later, we arrive on the tip of Agger Odde, a long isthmus which is a nature reserve that has a thriving seal colony and a plethora of birds. I took shelter again, and this time in a small squat concrete building called Svaneholm Info Centre, which had panoramic window openings onto the landscape and lots of details about the birds and land in Thy nature reserve. I lingered as the wind and cold outside would need some bracing to step into, but then the thought of missing the darn minibus pushed me onward. There is no public transport to speak of around these parts, and catching rides on school buses can be the only option except for very expensive taxi services. That was plenty of inspiration to get me going! I spent the next few hours zigzagging between several paths that lead North toward Agger: one that stretches discretely through the nature reserve with its rosehip berry bushes, heather, dune grasses and placid cows, one that meanders through the dunes with tractor tyre tracks, and the other along the edge of the water on the beach.
Unlike the very long beach at Thorsminde, this stretch of beach had plenty of flotsam, mainly wood and plastic, showing how many nations send ships through these waters: bottles from Germany and China, food wrappers from Russia and Poland, and many other bits and bobs brought far up onto the shore by stormy waves. The memory of the people who used to salvage wrecks came to mind, and how it was possible to find treasure from other lands along the shore. I decided to look for a bit of treasure myself, to spur me on through the sandy and rocky terrain at the top of the beach… and almost instantly, I came across a little blue plastic turtle, of the type that children use to mould sand into shapes! I knew my young daughter would love it, along with a story of how it must have “jumped” off a ship to go on an adventure and had patiently been waiting on the beach for someone to find it and give it a new home.
A little further along, I found two enormous concrete bunkers sitting on the seashore, and I tried to reconcile the idea that they must have been dug into the dunes decades ago, but the shifting sands had now totally exposed them to the point where they looked like they had washed in from the sea. Enterprising wanderers or locals had attached pieces of rope (evidently gathered from the beach) onto the sides of these behemoths so one could try to escalate them. Between my sore legs, the chilly temperature and my fear of missing the minibus, I gave it a miss, and convinced myself they were probably not very exciting inside anyway and the view would only be the same as from the top of the dunes behind me. But it would still have been fun to climb them!
With gratitude in my heart for the treasures I found, I covered the rest of the distance to Agger, where there was no fanfare on my arrival at the holiday centre — just an empty mini golf course and the ubiquitous German and Dutch camper vans. In Santiago de Compostela, pilgrims sit outside the cathedral in awe, with a sense of completion after their struggles along the long walk, and one can even get a completion certificate from the tourist information office when one shows the pilgrim’s passport with stamps from along the route, but I did know from the beginning that this was not that kind of Camino. I celebrated with a hot dog from a local grill bar instead, and then went to find the minibus, which turned out to be driven by the same chap who was in the reception at the Fjaltring hostel, and who also happened to be a school teacher for the dozen of children at the local school. Local people keep themselves busy around here.
While on the drive back to Thorsminde, he asked me why I was walking alone, because he was thinking of doing that too. I told him it is because I need the silence and space as a break from my day job as a therapist, to which he replied: “Ooh, so this is your therapy!” Indeed.
I finished the stormy walk on a Thursday, which is quite literally Thor’s Day. I felt his hammer thundering within and without as I covered the many kilometres along the coast, and I returned refreshed and thoroughly windswept from these savage shores that my own ancestors walked, having made landfall within myself again.
Here is the company that arranged my 4-day walk: https://vesterhavscaminoen.dk/vestkystruten/
