Aarøsund Lystbådehavn

Aarøsund Lystbådehavn sits in the middle of the Little Belt, where the Årø Sound separates the island of Årø from the Jutland mainland and Haderslev Fjord opens to the west. It is a private co-operative harbour with 180 berths along floating pontoons, built in 1988 alongside the old ferry quay. A municipal fishing and ferry harbour occupies the same stretch of shore, so two separate harbours sit side by side: commercial fishing and the Årø ferry at one end, yachts at the other.

The current is what you plan around. Årø Sound is one of the strongest tidal streams in the Little Belt — the sound runs to 25 metres deep precisely because the water scours the bottom clean — and the set is irregular. In hard weather it can reach six knots, and between Årø and Linderum it runs across your track, carrying a boat sideways before the helm necessarily notices. The harbour can be entered day or night. South of it lie fishing gear and cables, and anchoring there is discouraged. The Årø ferry runs roughly hourly and fish are still landed next door, so traffic belongs in the plan.

The berths belong to shareholders, and those who do not keep a boat in the water sublet their space. That is the mechanism that lets the harbour take in some 6,000 visiting crews over a season. Many use it for crew changes in midsummer — its position in the middle of the belt makes it a natural meeting point between Funen, Als and Jutland. The harbour office is called "Perlen" and doubles as a common room.

The ferry crossing here is older than most Danish market towns. The Årøsund–Assens route appears in King Valdemar's Land Register in 1231 and again in 1292, and for centuries it was the main link between the Duchy and eastern Denmark. Funen oxen were driven across the water on their way south, and from 1640 the route formed part of the main postal road between Copenhagen and Hamburg. The first lighthouse was built in 1777 to assist the mail run from Assens; the present one dates from 1905.

The crossing ceased after the loss of Schleswig in 1864. It resumed in 1920, when A/S Lillebelts-Overfarten was founded in Assens, and then ran for 52 years — until the new Little Belt Bridge of 1970 made it redundant and the ferry stopped in 1972. The ferry quay of around 1920 was built as a state harbour and a call for the steamer route to Haderslev, Aabenraa and Sønderborg, and from 1903 to 1938 the Haderslev county railway ran all the way out here.

Aarøsund Badehotel began as a four-winged farmstead that received waiting ferry passengers. Hans Christian Andersen noted in his travel diary that he passed the place on 11 November 1845. The building standing today was raised in German Jugendstil in 1903. Inland lie the remains of the Årøsund Battery, part of the German First World War defensive line Sikringsstilling Nord — five gun positions and barracks linked by tunnels to the ammunition stores. About a fifth of the works survives, known locally as "Æ Unnestan".

The village has just under 300 inhabitants. The ferry to Årø takes seven minutes, and the benches along the quay are set facing the island.