scattershot

Bergen, Norway on an overcast summer day in 2015.

scattershot (adjective): broadly and often randomly inclusive

* * *

We wanted to go to Italy, but the airfares for travel in June for a family of four were outside of our budget. We had to get creative…

…which is how we found ourselves flying into Copenhagen in June 2015. On the way, we had a 12-hour layover in Dublin (more on that in a moment).

What???

Please let me explain.

Ticket prices into Rome and other Italian airports were expensive. I mean, hello, summer travel? However, with two teenagers, we had to work around their school schedules.

Some online research showed us that flying into Copenhagen would be far less expensive, from there it would be easy and relatively cheap to fly to Rome from there and back again at the end of our travels.

The aforementioned layover in Dublin was originally going to be just a few hours. Someone who shall remain nameless thought extending the layover and seeing a tiny bit of Ireland would be fun. Someone else who shall remain nameless thought this idea was risky but decided in the name of adventure to just humor her husband.

Narrator: These turned out to be unwise decisions.

You see, taking a red-eye flight out of Dulles to Europe is already challenging because who actually sleeps on those flights? Certainly, none of us did.

We landed in Dublin around breakfast time, navigated passport control, dropped our bags in a baggage storage place, and took a taxi into the city.¹ We didn’t have a plan; we adults thought it would be fun to just walk around a strange city and see the sights with our teenagers when we were all exhausted. Be ye not so foolish.

Random side note: Ireland and Scotland had played a major football match (soccer to the Americans reading this) the night before and the city was full of fans dressed in their colors who were still partying hard the next day.

By late morning we were ordering lunch at a pub and fighting to stay awake. We quickly realized that we needed sleep more than we needed an adventure, so we took another taxi back to the airport, collected our bags, went through security and passport control again, and found a spot to snooze until we boarded our flight to Copenhagen.

We landed in Copenhagen in the evening and took a taxi to our Airbnb, which I’ve mentioned before was not one of the best accommodations decisions we’ve ever made. Again, at the time, it seemed like it would be an adventure.

We had a terrific few days in Copenhagen, then flew to Italy for a couple of weeks. In other posts, I’ve shared stories about two different driving situations that were stressful in the moment but turned out fine in the end. Overall, Italy was just lovely.

At the end of our Italian adventures, rather than just flying back to Copenhagen and heading home (this time with a layover in not-London England²), we decided to squeeze in more mini-adventures and add more countries to our passports. We flew to Bergen, Norway, and stayed for just one night, then took a train to Oslo³, and spent one more night.

And THEN, we took an overnight ferry from Oslo back to Copenhagen, which was fun, except for the part where one of our teenagers spent the entire journey queasy from seasickness. Luckily, we had a cabin with bunkbeds and everyone was able to sleep.

Okay, so there we were back in Copenhagen just after breakfast, one day before our flights home. Do you think we merely checked into a hotel and explored the city a bit more? Oh heck no. Instead, we took a train to Malmö, Sweden for another 24-hour mini-adventure.

And then, finafreakingly, the next day we took the train back to Copenhagen, where we got on an airplane and flew home.

(Another random side note: I started a new job 12 hours after we got home. I do not even know how I got through that first day without falling asleep. 0/10 do not recommend.)

The results of our scattershotting around Europe and the Nordic countries for 2.5 weeks: 7 countries, if you include the Vatican, which we do, and the layover in England on the way home. Folks, that’s a lot. And I swear it’s not normally how we do things.

Having said that, my husband and I are traveling again next month and in some ways this trip will reflect the 2015 trip: several countries, including two which will essentially be 24-hour layovers. Something tells me I’m going to have quite a few new stories to share.

What about you? Are you a fast- or slow-paced traveler?

1. Carry-on size and minimal packing, natch.

2. At this moment I can’t remember if it was Birmingham or Manchester.

3. I highly recommend this. The views are simply gorgeous.