Time is Møney

I have wanted to go to Møns Klint for a while, but never mustered the courage to do it. Møns Klint (Møn’s Cliffs) … “are a 6 km stretch of chalk cliffs along the eastern coast of the Danish island of Møn in the Baltic Sea. Some of the cliffs fall a sheer 120 m to the sea below^[1]”. While I had made very loose plans with my friend to go, we never set on a time and I knew if I wanted to do it I would need to leave early. The “VisitCopenhagen” site says the drive to the cliffs is a estimated a 1.5 hours, but by transit is 2 hours and 45 minutes.

I have this idealistic idea that I get to the cliffs, and spend the day on shore reading and journaling. The white cliffs hugging my surroundings, and the smell of the Baltic sea surrounding me.  I’ll buy post cards and write to all my friends about my wonderful solo trip. I’ll meditate. I’ll feel absolutely at bliss. Most importantly though, I will have done it all on my own. My sanctuary of thoughts. My trip.

I was ready for my first adventure of solo travel. Being as unsaavy as I am with directions, I was a little scared. In almost every endeavor or trip I have been on in my life, I have been supported by others in some way. Even in moving to Prince George alone, my dad and grandma joined me on the journey up and made sure I was safe, and my roommates made me feel at home instantly. In every trip I have travelled with or met with someone at the airport, and from there on the trip became a collective effort. But this, was a solo trip. I thought I was being smart staying in Denmark for my solo trip. All I can say is I was very very wrong. I will now tell the story of how I ended up in the car of a German family on a farm road in Stege, Denmark.

BEEP BEEP BEEP. My alarm clock goes off at 7:30, then 8:00, then 8:30, and 9:00, then 9:30. I was already supposed to be at the book store. I had told myself the loose plan was to pick up my Logistic Clusters text book at 9:00 AM when the bookstore opened, then bike to the station and head to Mons Klint. Why am I like this? Why am I absolutely unable to wake up on time? I roll out of bed and quickly get dressed and pack a bag. No time for breakfast, I think to myself. I’ll buy something, I’m already behind schedule.

I trek out to the door by 9:40 and spend what feels like eternity finding my bike. Every exchange student has the same blue bike from the same bike rental company, finding mine is like a real life Where’s Waldo. I bike as quickly as I can to the book store, but Danish pastries are taking a toll on my body and I’m passed by at least three elderly people and one small child.

I walk into the bookstore, only to find the information desk is not open. That desk is what I relied to help me last time I needed a book and everything in the store is in Danish. I wander around until I stumble upon “logistik”. Definitely logistics. Definitely what I need. With book in hand, my next stop is Føtex, the Danish equivalent to Save On: not absurdly priced, but enough to make a student die inside. I grab a protein yogurt for breakfast, a ready to go sandwich for lunch, 2 bananas and a pack of granola bars – necessary fuel for my solo adventure.

Time to head to the train station. Here’s the thing, many people bike with one headphone in their ear to give them directions. For me, that’s a death sentence. With only half the hearing of a normal human, putting directions in my one functioning ear would be asking for a bike accident. So, I try to memorize how to get there. Update: I failed. Miserably. I got lost and ended up just parking my bike at one point. I arrive at the station at 10:45 and just miss the train, waiting until 11:09 for the next one to come.

I start my journey to Møn at 11:09 AM on Monday. The Visit Copenhagen Website says it’s a train to Voldenborg, then a bus to Stege, then an additional bus that takes you closer to the cliffs. My phone is on its last legs, and I really should have replaced it before moving half way around the world. But alas, I am a low key hippie who likes to use everything to the last drop because screw planned obsolescence and consumerism am I right! The battery is dying at an alarming rate. Thank god, there is an outlet in the train. I plug it, start my reading, and then continue to procrastinate my reading by going on Instagram. I use the phone off and on throughout the train, and not until the last 5 minutes of the ride do I notice that it has not been charging the entire time. It is at 30% battery. Nice.

Right outside the bus stop is the bus I need, and it arrives in 4 minutes. Things are going smoothly. Today will be my day! Mira solo travels will be smooth sailing and I’ll get my idyllic beach day. When I arrived at the stop in Stege, the bus pulled up at a cobble stone street. I was very confused. This is not a bus stop is it? Apparently it wasn’t, it was actually a bus hub for many busses in Stege. That gives you an idea of how small Stege is. While I thought staying in Denmark for my first solo travel experience was smart, I did not consider that in rural Denmark, English was widely less spoken than in Copenhagen. Then checking my Visit Copnehagen instructions, I realize that the bus they instruct me to take from this stop is Stege does not actually exist. However, there is a different numbered bus with the same end destination city: Klintholm. However, what the Visit Copenhagen directions also did not offer is what stop to get off. I assume that I ride the bus until it’s end. I was wrong. Once we get to the end of the trip I worriedly approach the bus driver. Our conversation goes like this:

“Hi, I’m trying to get to Mons Klint, is this where I get off”

~Bus driver is visibly does not speak English and is confused~

“Mons Klint. Sit.”

I sit. I’m not quite sure if the stop was even on her route but the nice lady drives me to a sign that says “Mons Klint – 6” and lets me off. 6 what? 6 Kilometres? 6 Miles? 6 hours? 6 as in Toronto, Drakes home town? I begin to walk down the road. This place is literally in the middle of nowhere. With my phone on 7%, I sacrificed battery to take this picture to show my readers just how in the middle of nowhere I was:

20 minutes into my walk I run into human civilization, who kindly tells me to continue walking and then turn left. She mentioned how many kilometres I had left, but the number was in Danish so I really had no clue but smiled back, thankful that I had seen another human. Another 15 minutes into my walk, I’m starting to wonder if I should just turn back. I’m in a tiny town. What if the busses stop running at an early time and I get stranded? There’s no café’s, no hotels, I am literally in the middle of nowhere. Just as I’m about to head back and consider the day a sunk cost, I see another student walking in the opposite direction of me. She tells me I’m an hour from the cliffs, but that she hitchhiked there.

Let me get something straight, I do not condone hitchhiking. Nor is it legal in Canada. Also, as a solo travelling female it was not my best idea. I was however, desperate. When I saw a BMW come up behind me I stuck my finger out and hoped. They pulled over, and it was a family: two parents and their son in the backseat. I asked if they were heading to Mons Klint. They chatted in a foreign language quickly and decided to let me in. At this point I figured I am either safe, or the culprit of a serial killer couple who has another culprit sitting beside me. I sit there smiling way too widely, like Will Ferrel when he gets hired at Gimbels. Their son breaks the silence and weird smiling by asking “Where are you from?”. “Canada!” I reply cheerily. The dad turns around, “Where from in Canada?”. “Vancouver, on the West Coast.” I reply.

The dad continues to tell me a story of how the family was once living in Seattle and visited Vancouver during winter holidays. However, on their way back into the states the border patrol would not let them back in and they got stranded in Vancouver on New Years Eve. Once they finally find a moderately priced hotel, they head into the bar trying to lighten the mood and kick off the new year on a good foot. The bar was packed, there was no way this man was getting his wife a cocktail. The Canadian manager see’s the unhappy family and asks what happened. Upon hearing the story of their day, the manager opens the restaurant and gives the family a nice private candle lit dinner for dinner and drinks. Turns out this family loves Vancouver and Canadians for this reason! Despite totally not going to Møns Klint, but probably heading home into the country farms, they drive me all the way to Møns Klint.

I pretty well run to the stairs that take you down to the cliffs, yes all 992 of them. I get there, and my breath is taken away by kilometres of chalk cliffs. I go to pull out my phone to take a picture, after all 4 hours of travel, this photo would be my prime bragging right that the pain of the commute was worth it. Just as I pull the phone out, I realize, that my phone is dead. Panicking, I grab my MacBook, which is at 3% battery and open photo booth turn my laptop to the cliffs and take this one photo:

I then plug my phone cord in and pray to the iPhone gods that it gives me enough battery for one legitimately nice photo. The iPhone gods must’ve listened, because when it turned on, it gave me 5% battery, I took one photo, and it died directly after. But I was content. I had one photo. That is all I needed.

I finished my descend down the last ten steps, and was blown away by so much joy. Tears of happiness dwelled in my eyes. I had made it. After the longest four hours of my life, in which I constantly wondered if I should just turn back, I made it. Each time something went wrong I thought I should just call the day a sunk cost and head back to Copenhagen, but I couldn’t. Turning back meant that I couldn’t solo travel. Turning back meant that I was too dependent on those around me when I travel. Denmark is one of the safest countries in the world, and to turn back would feel like a failure.

It was in that moment that I realized, I didn’t make it there on my own. If it hadn’t been for the kindness of so many people that day: the bus driver who dropped me off directly at the stop, the Danish lady who assured me the busses run until midnight and that I was on the right track, the Malaysian student who told me how far along the path I was and how she got to Møns Klint, the German family who despite not being on their way to Møns Klint decided to be warm and friendly and drop me off there, and the lady who watched my phone as I did the trails (that part to come), all made it possible for me to have the experience I did. They made me not turn back. It was in that moment that I realized what comes from small acts of kindness, and how monumental they can be to someone else. Had that German family not picked me up, I would have likely been to scared about the sun setting and just headed back.

I walked the beach for about one kilometre, then trekked back up the stairs, and searched the tourist Geo-Center (rock museum, restaurant, etc.) for somewhere to charge my phone. No outlets even in the washroom, apparently that is a very North American thing. I then grabbed three post cards, and asked the cashier if there was anywhere to charge my phone. She offered to let me use the charging port behind the counter, and she could watch the phone for me while I did the hikes around the cliffs. So kind.

While I have no photos of the events to follow, they were truly breathtaking. I walked along the upper part of the cliffs to two different viewpoints. This means you get to look down and see cliffs to both your sides, and look down on the cliffs and the beach below. The people on the shore are miniscule, and the rock on shore turn black from the water, contrasting sharply against the white cliffs. On some of the cliffs, shrubbery and trees have begun to grow and all of these were burnt orange and burgundy and glistening in the early fall evening sun. The sight was something that I will never forget. I kept thinking about Curtis, and what a nerd he is about fossils and rocks, and how much he would have loved it.

I got back and headed on my way out with a 33% battery life on my phone. Of course, I couldn’t leave without a selfie for proof that I had actually made it.

Here’s the thing. When I was driving with the awesome German family, I was so distracted listening to the dad’s story and talking to them, that I was not watching how we got to the cliffs. Oops. This made the walk back incredibly stressful, nothing looked familiar but I just followed my instinct and vague memory. During this time, I also texted my family to let them know I was in the middle of nowhere and my phone may die and there was no civilization around me except for one lady from 20 minutes earlier who had passed me on a horse. Yes, she was on a horse. That’s how in the middle of nowhere I was. If you’re a parent, you know how the “I probably won’t die but might get stranded alone with no phone in the middle of nowhere with limited civilization” would sit with you. Not good.

After an hour of walking by unfamiliar landscape with no cars having passed me, I see cars driving on a road adjacent to me about 10 km through farmland. I could have turned onto that road 45 minutes earlier, but I didn’t. Luckily, just as I was second guessing my choices, there was an old farm couple out picking pears off their tree. While they didn’t speak English she did say “Klintholm” and pointed in the direction I was walking. Good sign. Finally, an hour into my trek I started to recognize where I was. I also realized how much driving that German family must’ve done for me. There, an hour and 25 minutes after I left the cliffs, I saw it. A bus stop.

My way home was characterized by a lot of close calls and almost missed busses and trains. The key word is almost because I did just barely make them all. While this didn’t help my anxiety, I finally got back to my dorm at 9:30 PM. Remember, that I left it at nearly 9:30 AM.

While I didn’t get my idyllic beach day full of meditation and journaling and channeling my inner hippie, I did get something better. A day full of tough lessons. Which I will now summarize

• Never be afraid to ask for help, the worst someone can say is no
• Your own success is often made possible by the combination of grit and the support of others
• Always bring a portable phone charger with you when travelling alone. Always.