Landskrona and Ven

We've been going somewhere every week and this week, Keaw suggested that we go to the home of Tycho Brahe - the famed astronomer who gathered the data that led to the prove the sun centered solar system. Tycho (yes we are on a first name basis) lived on an island called Ven. The king at the time gave him the island to perform his calculations and he was also in charge of the peasants there who now had to work for him.

To get to Ven, we traveled by train to Landskrona (about 20 minutes away) and then took a ferry to the island. It is such an awesome feeling stepping off the boat and taking in the island. The first thing you see is this tall skinny tree on the hill and you feel small again. We walked up the hill to the tourist information center and rented bikes. I've always wanted to try a tandem bicycle and luckily Keaw was up for the challenge. It was a lot different than what I thought. Keaw complained that she couldn't see anything and it felt more like having a kid seat on the back instead of another person. Pedaling was sometimes a task too because both sets of pedals revolve at the same rate so if she braked, I couldn't pedal.

We visited Tycho's castle first and learned about the theories of astronomical yore which were deep set in religion. I had never heard of the popular theory of the day which involved the planets going through a crystal media. Afterwards we biked to the other port on the island and got some ice cream. We biked further around the island seeing some great views from high sites. After we visited the church, Houda wanted to try the Tandem and ended up getting her pants stuck in the gear shaft. It was hilarious at the time and still hilarious now. Then we biked back to the port because we had to catch the ferry but Keaw and I wanted to see the observatory before we left. We biked as hard and as fast as we could and had 10 minutes to return the bike and catch the ferry if we wanted to go back with the others. When we got there it was a relief because he had actually made it to the observatory. We then realized that it was closed and we couldn't go inside. So we took a picture of our disappointed faces and rode back as fast as we could. We bareeeeeely made the ferry. It was awesome.