<p>In the museum near the excavated fort is a casual pile of replica iron Viking helmets, heavy chain mail, axes, and huge spears for visitors to try on and snap the inevitable "You talkin' to me, Beowulf?" photos. DO NOT SWING THE WEAPONS, the sign says. America's ranks of the safety-obsessed would be horrified.</p>

<p>The bridge from Zealand to Fyn is enormous, the second-longest suspension span in the world. With its connecting causeways, it totals just over 11 miles. The toll each way is nearly $40, which must be hell on commuters. Safely and expensively on Fyn, we pick up the daisy route just outside Nyborg, and immediately the countryside turns into a Martha Stewart soundstage&#151;thatched roofs, pastel houses, barbered shrubbery, flower beds everywhere, a tiny road winding through narrow corridors of catalpa trees, pheasants taking wing as we trundle past. Many of the daisy-route roads are so narrow that we involuntarily take the Porsche SUV minimally off-roading&#151;two tires in the ditch&#151;to pass the occasional traffic that comes our way.</p>

<p>Everything is in bloom&#151;lilacs, tulips, pansies, catalpas&#151;but nothing more spectacularly than the vivid yellow fields of mustard, grown everywhere to make rapeseed oil (more famously known as Lorenzo's oil).</p>

<p>The route takes us to Egeskov Castle, an odd but somehow admirable combination of commercialism and historic beauty. The fortified sixteenth-century manor is splendid, sitting in the middle of a small lake, replete with firing slits for bowmen and scalding holes out of which to pour boiling Lorenzo's oil on any poor sods who might make it across the water.</p>

<p>Inside, however, is a strange amassment of items, from 1930s African hunting trophies won by the owners to modern replica armor and a 15-foot-long, compulsively detailed model of the nuclear carrier U.S.S. <i>Roosevelt</i>. Around the castle, in a combination medieval theme park/Danish Smithsonian, are hundreds of vintage cars and motorcycles, a large collection of agricultural tools, dozens of horse-drawn carriages, and a bunch of old bicycles. Oh, and a big Saab Draken jet fighter parked on the crushed-gravel drive. "An interesting exercise in enterprise," my driving partner notes.</p>

<p><b>Day Two: Odense to Aalborg, 244 miles</b><br>
Teenagers will snort breakfast out their nose when they see it: The short daisy-route crossing from Fyn to Jutland is replete with signs to Middelfart. In Danish, <i>fart</i> means speed, or time, as in <i>fartgr&#156;nse</i> (speed limit) or <i>fartplan</i> (timetable). Okay, Junior, settle down. It's not that funny.</p>

<p>Kids will also presumably love Legoland, in central Jutland. A plastic amusement park built from snap-together Lego blocks, it is Denmark's second most popular tourist attraction, trailing only Copenhagen. Having lost interest in toys long ago, we instead move on to Jelling, perhaps the most stark and remarkable historic sight in all of Denmark.</p>