After arriving in Copenhagen and making our way to Nyhavn, or "new harbor" - not really all that new as it was constructed in 1673 - from the airport via the metro, this anchor statue was one of the first things that greeted us. Taking a 180 degree turn gave us this view of the canal:
On the left in this picture you can see part of a party/drinking/restaurant boat that you can enjoy the canal on. Nyhavn offers a couple of different canal tours, so we got tickets for the quick one hour tour and got to see some of the major sights of the city from a canal boat. I had trouble staying awake for the duration of the tour as I had the bright idea to stay up all night in order to watch the Vikings
After the tour, we hit up Amalienborg palace, the winter home to the Danish royal family. One of the first things I noticed about Copenhagen relative to the rest of Scandinavia is that you can really see that loads and loads of money flowed through here throughout its existence. They knew how to pillage and they knew how to turn their loot into cool things. For example, Amalienborg palace:
Just lookin' around with my pops
Changing of the guard. A pack of guards like this would march around to each post and one of them would march right up to the guard he would be relieving and get right up in his face for a few seconds before switching places. I yelled, "Kiss him!" during one such swap but the guards either did not hear me or they did not appreciate my humor. Must not have heard me.
Here's a picture of the Copenhagen opera house from Amalienborg.
And of course my mom had to harass some poor, innocent bystander into taking our picture.
The next morning we headed to Norreport, a really cool indoor market and food hub, to meet up for a food tour that my parents had booked. I didn't really know what to expect, but I wasn't really surprised to find myself being the youngest member of the party by about 20 years. I was pleasantly surprised, though, that the tour took us to some really cool places and that the food we ate was pretty good. Some highlights:
After leaving Norreport, we took a stroll through the University of Copenhagen Botanical Garden on our way to a local brewery in Copenhagen's meatpacking district.
Inside the aforementioned brewery. We got to taste a handful of beers including an ale brewed with jalapenos (much better than it sounds).
Other parts of the tour not pictured include eating smørrebrød, Danish open-faced sandwiches, eating organic (!) hot dogs from a street vendor, and checking out a 100+ year old candy shop. After the tour finished, we went to check out Rosenborg castle, pictured below.
Had to take my picture with King Christiaan IV. He pretty much built everything in Copenhagen which is impressive. Not quite as impressive, however, is the fact that by the time his rule ended, Copenhagen was pretty much bankrupt. At least they got some nice things out of the deal.
Because I'm 12 years old, the following pictures were my favorite part of Rosenborg:
Yep. Here's a boat that was constructed by Danish prisoners while imprisoned in England built entirely from the bones that they saved from their meals. You can't really tell how insanely intricate and detailed the boat is by the picture, but it's one of the coolest things I saw in a castle filled with cool things.
Here's another boat from the castle, but this one was made of ivory. It's a really cool and intricate boat but was it worth murdering whatever amount of elephants/rhinos/ivory producing animals that it took to build it? Maybe? Not pictured, but in this room there was a tiny elephant figurine made out of ivory. Humanity!
The throne room. You can't have a throne room without statues of lions all over the place.
Eventually we made our way towards the Church of Our Savior. It features an impressive spire that, for those willing to take the 398 step ascent, can be climbed. Here's the view from a few blocks away:
And the view from the first landing, which is the circular platform that the spire sits on:
And 398 steps later:
An assortment of pictures from the weekend, starting with the central train station:
Some canal swans:
A statue built as a part of the competition/movement put on by the Association for the Beautification of the Capital. It is called the Dragespringvandet, or dragon fountain.
And this is one of my favorite pictures that I took over the weekend. Just a couple of dudes killing time and some beers watching the canal go by from the comfort of this street couch. If I had to, I'd guess that there weren't twenty teeth between the two, but I think they've got it all figured out.
Some other highlights not pictured:
- Getting a beer at Mikkeller bar, which had over 40 beers on tap including many local beers. I later found out that the owner of this establishment was the math teacher of my Danish friend who lives in my dorm.
- Eating at Fiskebaren and trying raw oysters for the first time (they were good!)
- I appreciated/was amused by in Copenhagen was that it's perfectly acceptable to drink in public. Most restaurants and stores had signs out in front advertising the "take away" beer price. Sometimes you just gotta grab a road beer and drink it in the streets.
I really liked Copenhagen and could picture myself living there some day, despite the seemingly endless throng of tourists. Of the Scandinavian cities I've seen, Copenhagen rates the highest for me, but I also think that I would grow tired of Copenhagen sooner than a city like Oslo.
Really neat pictures! Glad you are having a good time
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