Lego Masters Academy

 Woo Hoo!  We did it!  We became Lego Masters.  Ok, maybe not, but we did get to participate in a workshop.  

This was a fun activity to do, but was very hard to enroll in.  Lego's main page doesn't exactly tell you not to book this and the VIP tour of Lego house at the same time. We had originally booked to do this on the same day, but managed to get it changed to Sunday.  Hence the pirate hotel stay. 

I was super excited of course, and we stripped our beds and headed to breakfast.  Another cock-up. Paid for, but not registered.  Receipts didn't matter and since we don't eat breakfast anyway, we just left.  Did I tell you not to stay at the Billund Pirates "motel"?  If not, don't!

We arrived in time to find a 2 hour free parking area near the Lego house, and from there we went to join the show.  

The front entry was cool and of course we had to take a few photos. 

The inside entrance was just like in the show.  Dark lights, strobes and spinning lights.  And lots of children who were more excited than I was.  

When we got inside, there were bricks everywhere, and 2 brick bins in the front.  We were talked through a build of a figure of ourselves.  George tried, but since he's not really into lego, it was harder for him to keep up.  One guy came over and helped him a bit and George of course switched into talking about 3D printers with him.  

We built our likeness and were able to bring it and the extra pieces on the table home with us.  We of course gave our extra bits to the kids in the room.

All in all, it was a fun day that I would do again.  If we ever go back, I'll do a more advanced workshop I think.  I highly recommend this experience.  Money well spent.  And I got George to goin in so how much better can it get?

On the way to Billund

 Since we were doing this trip and connecting it with DCD, we decided to make the trip to Billund as well.  After leaving Philip's house, we headed over here. I wanted to travel to Aarhus because it is a city on the Eurorails map that we haven't visited, but in the end we decided the one hour detour was too much. We've been on the road too long, and when the notification popped up telling us we could get our room early, we didn't hesitate.  

Our first night we stayed at the Legoland Village Pirate Inn.  This place is a hoot.  First, it is self checkin, so I did.  But then what do I do?  Where is my room?  I asked the girl behind the counter and was given a map and sent on my way.  Ok. Easy enough.  We parked the car and took our stuff to the room.  George lay down to watch Wall-e.  Can you believe he has never seen that!  And I went off for a wander.

The room is pirate themed.  Not too over the top and I love the pirates chest in the room.  The spider in the bath I could do without though.

Durning my wanders, I roamed around the campgrounds.  Took a few photos and decided to go to Lego House.  We are doing the Lego Masters build session on Sunday Morning so I wanted to know where to park and how to find it.  

While there, I took a few photos, but then when I looked at the time, I decided to go check out the Lego store and buy Krissy's set before I forgot (as if that would happen!) Inside they had the Minifigure factory so I made one for George and I and this time they had a beard for him.  It was so popular that it took just over an hour to get the torsos back.  I wandered around some more and was the passport stamps so I got those, and got my GOLD Lego passport cover! I am so happy.

Around 5 I returned to our room at the hotel-wait, it is a MOTEL.  Big difference here.  Let me explain.  Here we have to put our bedding on the beds ourselves, then return the sheets etc to the reception when we leave.  Now I booked this because we had to do laundry.  Turns out Philip was very nice and let us use his machine.  We didn't need this stop, but we are now stuck because it's non refundable.  The difference in cost? €10 for the night.  For that price, I would much rather have had a real hotel room at Legoland.  

Funny thing. When I asked about the bed sheets, the lady at the counter told me "everyone knows this". Logical fallacy.  If everyone knew I wouldn't have asked.  When I told her that, it went over her head.  I couldn't help myself. I just had to.   

When I returned to the cabin, I had to use the loo and it didn't flush. As I wanted to get the passport stamps, I went back, told them of the problem, and then had a lovely discussion that went as follows:  

"it worked this morning" 

"well, it doesn't work now" 

"But it worked this morning" 

"And it still doesn't work now". They gave us a new room.  Downstairs this time. "Oh, here is the new bedding.  Please bring us the dirty ones and don't forget to drop these off in the morning when you leave".  🤣. One can't make this stuff up.  

Oh well.  On to dinner.  We opted for the Pirates Inn Restaurant tonight.  It was a buffet (which we normally never do) but surprisingly good.  George had salmon, and I had some pork. The scalloped potatoes were so good, I had a second helping. 

We returned to the room after dinner.  I typed a bit on this blog and George worked on a puzzle.  Tomorrow we have a 9:00 alarm for that Lego Masters fun.  But sleep did not come for quite a long time. The room above us had very active children in it and a very thin ceiling.  When we finally did fall asleep, the window suddenly blew open as did the door!  An airplane flew overhead and I guess that set it off.  

Around 1 am I woke to go to the bathroom.  It is raining heavily outside.  It sounds wonderful, but they shut the heat off in here.  It is freezing!  What kind of place is this?  It's 8 degrees outside and not much warmer inside.  I'm laughing as I write this.  Honest I am.  But I'm also making a solemn vow to never stay here again. 

Tomorrow will be a better day!  I just know it can't get any worse.  But I have to admit, I laughed a lot today.  Life is such a wonderful adventure. 

P.S. They turned the heat back on at 6:00!  What a racket.  Do they do this in all motels in Denmark? Or did we just make a bigger mistake than we thought?