Dyrehaven & Bakken (Timeline: Late 1940s, early 1950s)

Another early horse memory was the occassional treasured trips to "Bakken", which is an amusement park located near Klampenborg, about 8 or 10 miles north of where we lived in København (Copenhagen). Bakken was located in a corner of the Royal Forest "Dyrehaven" (The Deer Park); which was a HUGE area, open to all, but which did not allow any motorized vehicles. Most of it was woods, but there were several open areas, a couple of smallish lakes, and even a golf course and a castle of sorts, called "Eremitagen". And lots of deer and smaller wildlife. You could walk or ride your bicycles around, or hire a horse and carriage. Or ride horses, if you were lucky enough to know any or knew where to rent one. At Bakken, where my parents often took my brother and myself when we were little, there was a pony ride, and I would always pick the biggest pony to ride, an Icelandic named Basse. I used to have a picture of my brother and myself riding the ponies, me, at three or four, on Basse and my 2 year older brother on Buster, another somewhat smaller Icelandic. Dunno what happened to the pic :-( I haven't seen it in YEARS!

One would get to Bakken and Dyrehaven from my home either on bicycles or on the S-Train to Klampenborg and then walk. When we were little, we would ride on child-seats either in front or in back of my parents' bicycles, but my 2 year older brother Bjørn and I both got our own full size bikes for our 6th birthday, and we soon learned to ride them! No training wheels for us! We had blocks on the pedals to begin with, so we could reach, and my dad put a broomstick behind the seat when we were learning, so he could grab the broomstick to balance us. Most folks, including my family, didn't have cars, so our transportation would be the bicycles, the trams that were plentiful all over København, or the S-train, which covered a wider area but wasn't as handy as the trams. On rare occassions we'd use a taxi, but they were expensive, so we tried to avoid them.

Note: Clicking on the title of this blog entry will take you to a site with several pics from Dyrehaven.