Funen Travel Guide
Funen, the second-largest Danish island, separates Zealand from the mainland peninsula, Jutland. Known as Fyn in Danish, it offers unique attractions, from a Viking ship to runic stones.
Hans Christian Andersen was born in Funen in the town of Odense. A visit to the storyteller's native island is a journey into a land of roadside hop gardens and orchards, busy harbors, market towns, castles, and stately manor houses.
Funen has some 1,125km (700 miles) of coastline, with wide sandy beaches in some parts, and woods and grass that grow all the way to the water's edge in others. Steep cliffs provide sweeping views of the Baltic or the Kattegat.
Although ferryboats have plied the waters between the islands and peninsulas of Denmark since ancient times, the government's leaders have always regretted the lack of a network of bridges. In 1934 the first plans were developed for a bridge over the 13km (8 miles) span of water known as the Storebaelt (Great Belt), the 19km (12 miles) silt-bottomed channel that separates Zealand (and Copenhagen) from Funen and the rest of continental Europe. After many delays caused by war, technical embarrassment, and lack of funding, and after the submission of 144 designs by engineers from around the world, construction began in 1988 on an intricately calibrated network of bridges and tunnels.
On June 14, 1998, her majesty, Queen Margrethe II, cut the ribbon shortly before driving across the Great Belt Bridge. The project incorporated both railway and road traffic divided between a very long underwater tunnel and both low and high bridges. (The rail link has operated since 1997.) Only some aspects of the Channel Tunnel between England and France surpass the staggering scale of this project.
Visitors can view exhibitions about the bridge at the Great Belt Exhibition Center (tel. 58-35-01-00), located at the entrance to the bridge and hard to miss. It's open May to September, daily 10am to 8pm; and October to April, daily 10am to 5pm. Admission is 25DKK ($3.30) adults, 10DKK ($1.30) children.
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