Lisbon from Home #10: A day with H. C. AndersenTings LisbonThe best One Star Hotel in Lisbon

H. C. Andersen is perfect for at Lisbon Family Day from home during Covid!

The Bottle Neck follows the story of a wine bottle. It is a tale told by the bottleneck about how it remembers being crafted and filled with quality wine, before being opened during an engagement celebration. It relates how a sailor took the bottle with him on a sea journey and how the ship was wrecked in a storm.

The bottle traveled around the world and returned home, with only the bottle's neck intact. An old lady picks it up and she doesn't realize that she drank wine from this bottle at her engagement party. The old bottle didn't know her either, partly - in fact, chiefly - because it thought only of itself."

The ending of the story, for example, seems to be pertinent for today's world.

Click to read: A modern fairy tale Wang Kaihao, China Daily, 1 April 2020

Today it's Hans Christian Andersen's birthday!

I am very bad at remembering birthdays – but somehow I always remember H. C. Andersen’s: 2 April – multiplied with 2 you get 4 August wich was the day he died.

Imagine how the feeling hid me when I woke up around 2 am to the story about Chinese William Yip’s Hans Christian Andersen Art Project in The China Daily.

Since the end of february Yip has traveled around China inviting people to create art inspired by one of H. C. Andersen’s lesser known stories The Bottleneck and upload their work on his birthday today.

The Bottleneck is of Andersen’s less known works which are still relevant today. Especially during these Covid days… but that’s another story.

H. C. Andersen has been a big inspiration for me

His fairy tales were not only among the first books I read myself, they have also been very useful references to my cultural background while traveling in the part of the world where nobody knows about Denmark. Like in China where Andersen for many years were among the only legal foreign writers and therefor stories all Chinese knew about.

Finally we turned off a narrow street with walls to either side and started going up a steep and difficult path, which led to an ancient and isolated country house on one of the highest points. It was called ‘Pinheiro’, or Pinietraeet in Danish (…)

When I arrived the flowers in the garden were still in bloom. There were lots of roses and fire-coloured geraniums, as well as creepers similar to the ones in our forests and passionflowers hanging like great carpets over the walls and bushes. The white flowers of the elder and the red flowers of the pomegranate trees combined to form the Danish colours (…) How full of charm this country is!

H. C Andersen

About his visit to Quinta do Pinheiro

To move, to breathe, to fly, to float,
To gain all while you give,
To roam the roads of lands remote
To travel is to live.

H. C. Andersen

The Fairytale of My Life

It’s also from Andersen I got my first travel inspiration – he published 5 travel books. Until a few years ago there only existed one Andersen Travel book in my world: Fodreise fra Holmens Canal til Østpynten af Amager – which I read while writing a thesis in school about Amager, the part of Copenhagen where I grew up. This book is about Andersen’s ‘travel’ from Holmen’s Kanal in the city of Copenhagen (where Annette and I are married) to the Eastern part of the Island Amager where I grew up (now a part of Copenhagen).

But Andersen wrote 5 books among them about his visits to Harzen in Germany, Italy and Spain – some of the most beautiful destinations in Europe. It was during the latter he visited the sons of the former Portuguese Consul in Denmark: José and Jorge O’Neill whom Andersen met as a young boy in Copenhagen. Jose and Jorge lived in Quinta do Pinheiro on the outskirts of Lisbon – where The US Embassy is today. It’s possible to visit this place by appointment only.

I am not a Hans Christian Andersen nerd

Ok – let’s me honest.

I usually don’t remember stupid things like this. I only remember it because Andersen wrote about it in his A Visit to Portugal – the appendix of his A Visit to Spain in 1866 – which I wouldn’t have reread if it wasn’t for this horrible Isolation. So thank Covid for this recommendation.

But I am glad to have had the opportunity to reread it. It’s fantastic and surprisingly easy to read. So for all you travelers out there who have been forced to cancel your Easter Holiday in Lisbon it’s a perfect way to visit Lisbon and Sintra that I’m sure most of you have on your To-See-List.

If you read it I am pretty sure that you will add Setúbal & Palmela – to the list. If we didn’t run a hotel and still wanted to live here we would move to Setúbal that in many way is more charming and authentic than Lisbon – definitely worth a visit!

Enjoy your day wherever you are and see you on the other side.

Thomas

Enjoy H. C. Andersen the go...

Jeg kan huske Sintras Dejlighed

Tekst: H. C. Andersen
Speak: Ulle Bjørn Bengtsson
Musik: Benggtsson Sydow

Get the PDF version here: HC Andersen Visit spain and portugal PORTUGAL ONLY

Did H. C. Andersen visit the people behind Cristo rei?

… when you know how adventurous Andersen was it’s hard to imagine that Andersen didn’t also visit Quinta da Arealva? I asked mys self when I blogged about one of our favorite Sunset & Street Art destinations in Lisbon – and a true hidden gem!

If you are curious you can read more here.