Culture and Environment: Those Cycling Danes

Those Cycling Danes

W

eekdays on my morning run, and later trotting down the same street to Charlottenlund Station, north of Copenhagen, I pass three show windows full of shiny new bicycles. The bearded and besmocked proprietor, I used to think, had the shortest memory of anybody I’d ever said Goddaw du! (Good day, you!) to. One morning he would wave and return my greeting with a sunny smile. Next day he’d look at me as if he’d never seen me before, knit his brows and nod.

This went on until one day, jogging past the bike store, I did a double-take and came near to

heading for the closest eye doctor. There were two of him lining up bicycles on the sidewalk! Same short skinny frame in a faded green smock. Same skew-nosed face with rusty-brown beard and mustache. Only one difference in behavior saved my sanity: one of him waved

and said Goddaw du! while the other just looked and nodded.

The Teglgaard brothers must be the only identical twins in Denmark who run a bicycle shop. Viewed head-on, 41-year-old[i] Bonde and Christian look as if they stepped off a box of Smith Brothers cough drops. Originally from south Jutland, where their father was a bicycle dealer, they live next door to each other in Allerød, each with his wife and three children. They sell several world makes and accessories to customers from all around.

The Teglgaard twins run a bicycle shop in Charlottenlun.

Enormous Comeback

Three-quarters of this nation’s 5.1 million[ii] population own at least one bicycle. The last decade has seen an enormous comeback of the noiseless, fumeless, fuel-free and parkable two-wheeler, according to Lars Skovenboe, office manager of the 33,000-member Danish Bicyclist Federation.

“For the Danes, the bicycle is much more than a . . . Sunday pastime for nature lovers,” writes the Copenhagen-based American Ed Thomasson in Danish Quality Living. “It is basic to a life-style that gives that touch of quality visitors so admire about Denmark. It is everyday transportation.”

A nationwide sampling of the full-time working population in 1982 revealed that 38% — many more than before the last oil crisis — ride their bikes to work. That compared with a dwindling 35% driving cars and carrying another 8% as passengers, 29% taking public transportation and 13% walking to work. It was especially 18- to 28-year-old men living in Aarhus, Odense and Aalborg who were swelling the brigade of workaday pedal-pushers.

The total exceeds 100% because some commuters use more than one form of transportation. Look at the bicycles stabled outside every station in the country and, in Copenhagen, at the big circular bike-stand on the east side of Town Hall Square. People park the stationcykler they pedal from station to office and back, leaving them — locked, if they want to see them again — in the racks. Many have another bike at home for running errands and pleasure touring.

Niels Johansen is a man with one bike and one mission. Denmark’s 76-year-old “steel grandfather” intends to make a childhood dream come true: pumping “my good old bike and a trailer” all over the country. Camping out most nights, Johansen expects to mow down 4,000 kilometers of asphalt in four months.

Now It’s Going To Be!

He will visit places he knew as a boy, towns where relatives lived. ‘’I’m not out to set a record,‚ insists the bereted and bespectacled pensioner. ’’This is something I’ve wanted to do my whole life, but work and children prevented it. Now I’m a widower and now it’s going to be!’’

For thousands of pedaling vacationers, half the fun is taking the family. Aase Elers, an English

teacher at Vallerød School north of Copenhagen, tells me she and her husband and two sons have spent their last six or seven summer holidays biking. Not only in Denmark, but in Sweden and Ireland. ‘’You set the daily tempo yourself,’’ says my fellow-fiddler in The Hamlet Strings. “You really see the landscape from a bike, smell all the aromas, get to meet amazingly helpful people you never meet otherwise. The same goes for your own family: you’re together day round, you help one another, you’re on the same level — of you, parents and children.”

Elers calls Denmark a “very child-friendly” country for bikers. Cycle paths separate two-wheelers from motor traffic over most of the nation. “And there is not so much distance between towns and campsites or hostels, where there are always play activities for children and your kids meet other kids. So it’s very easy to take even little children along.”

Did you know you can take your bicycle as one of two pieces of checked baggage aboard your flight to Denmark or elsewhere, without extra charge?[iii] Maximum length is 135 centimeters with pedals and wheels removed and handlebars turned sideways.

Sell at Half-Price   

You can rent a bike at places like Københavns Cyklebørs and roll with the Copenhageners. Bureaus such as DVL Rejser (Tel. 01-13 27 27) offer bike, tent and map for eight- and nine-day tours from 745 kroner.[iv] A few shops, such as the Teglgaard twins in Charlottenlund (Tel. 01-64 20 46), will sell you a touring bike and then buy it back at half price after a week or two.

A good tip for used-bike seekers: Look under Cykler in the weekly national classified-ad tabloid called Den Blå Avis (The Blue Newspaper).[v] That’s where I found my like-new, three-gear Danish Mustang for about $100 and where milady found a well kept roundabout bike for about $36.

“If you’re in Denmark for more than a couple of days,” says Lars Skovenboe, “come to our office at Kjeld Langesgade 14, beside the lakes, and we can help you. DCF offers a free booklet, Bicycle Holidays in Denmark.

SCANORAMA July-August 1985 

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[i] In June 2014 the now gray-bearded twins turned 70.

[ii] Today (2014) Denmark’s population is around 5.65 million.

[iii] This was in 1985. Doubt if it’s true today.

[iv] Same with this price.

[v] The print edition was shut down; the “Blue Newspaper” continues online at www.dba.dk