After finishing up our time in Stockholm, we opted to take the scenic route—literally—to get to Copenhagen.
We travelled over 500 km by train! It was a long journey (~7 hours, so comparable to getting to Edinburgh).
I’ll admit this particular train wasn’t the nicest we’ve been on. It was older and a bit run down. At one point, I ended up assigned seats next to—how shall I put this—an interesting group of young people. They were noisy, had questionable personal hygiene (think picking at food in their teeth and chewing hangnails and then spitting them out) and I spent a chunk of the train ride trying to make myself as small as possible so I could shrink into my own little zone of personal space and read my Kobo. Indy, Belle, and John ended up beside one quiet stranger. I have NO idea why the seat assignments worked this way (instead of keeping our whole family together), but I had no say in seat selection and it never made sense to ask to switch things up.
We made the most of it and survived…
This is Indy in the first leg of the trip where we had lots of empty seats!
We got into Malmö (still in Sweden!) and managed to get an earlier connection into the heart of Copenhagen. My brother met us at the central station and then we were a quick subway ride away from his apartment.
By Copenhagen standards, my brother and sister-in-law have a large flat. It is lovely. High ceilings with gorgeous plaster work, and giant windows. That said, there is one room with a door (their bedroom) and one bathroom.
John and I slept on a (very comfortable) pull-out couch in their living room, Indy slept on a mattress on the floor beside us, and Belle slept on an air mattress in their dining room. It worked, but it was a tight fit. Originally, they had planned for us to stay at my sister-in-law’s mother’s place (she lives outside the city during the summer), but that fell through at the last minute.
In hindsight, we probably should have recalibrated and looked into renting an AirBnb or hotel room, but we made it work and it saved $1,000s.
After we had gotten unpacked and had a late lunch (we had each made one sandwich at the breakfast buffet that morning for the train), we headed off to a nearby park to stretch our legs.
Indy wasted no time in exploring and particularly enjoyed these swings.
While he’s usually dreaming up unique places to do tree poses, I think he outdid himself this time: mid-air as part of a dismount. This kid is full of great ideas.
We spent about an hour wandering around Fælledparken. It’s a gorgeous green space.
Back at the apartment, it was time for supper. My brother’s an excellent cook and we were treated to his culinary expertise every night which was wonderful.
Dessert was a special highlight (it ended up being Belle’s favourite food item from Denmark). Before this trip, I had never even heard of koldskål, which translates to “cold bowl”. It’s a thickened flavoured buttermilk and you crush up kammerjunkere (dry, crispy cookies) and sprinkle them on top. It sounds a bit like soggy cereal, but it’s delicious, especially topped with fresh fruit. We had this for dessert multiple evenings and I was a HUGE fan.
The next morning dawned sunny and clear. We had considered going to my brother’s church to attend the Sunday service, but since it’s in the early afternoon, it would have impacted the timing of our whole day so we ended up playing hooky and heading off for a day in central Copenhagen.
We started the day by hopping on the Harbour Bus, a public transit line that runs from one end of Copenhagen to the other via the water. It’s a great way to see the city. Like in Stockholm, it’s a very inexpensive workaround to paying for a tour boat.
We could not have asked for nicer weather.
Here’s our little group on the boat; you can spot the Copenhagen Opera House in the background.
It’s a visually striking building and hosts Red Bull diving competitions off the roof. That’s… a long way down.
We got to see the Royal Yacht Dannebrog.
And motored by the relatively new, but already iconic, Circle Bridge (Cirkelbroen).
Once we made it to the opposite end of Copenhagen, we walked to the closest metro stop so we could make our way back into the heart of the city. Indy spotted a playground en route and I got in on the action. Going down once was enough for me. Slides feel so bumpy in my old age!
I love that the front car of Copenhagen metro’s have a full view of the track. It’s like a virtual reality ride at an amusement park! We were all big fans of getting these seats when they were available.
We spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around Copenhagen. Indy, as always, was on the lookout for errant screws and other sharp objects that could puncture car tires. By the time we got back home at the end of the day, he had a sizeable collection in his pockets!
We love taking pictures of pretty streets. Cobblestones automatically make everything look more charming.
By this point, we were getting hungry. We’d worked together to prep a picnic lunch of sandwiches, fruit, and veggies earlier in the morning and stopped at the The Royal Library Garden (Bibliotekshaven) to eat. It’s a small but beautiful green space tucked between Christiansborg Palace and the old Royal Danish Library.
The rhododendrons were in full bloom and offered a great backdrop for pictures. Other people clearly agreed as we saw TWO wedding parties taking photos in the short time we were there.
We have pictures with toddler Belle taken beside this fountain years ago when we visited Copenhagen the first time.
This time around, we have not-toddler Indy showcasing his tree pose skills.
A statue of a particularly famous Dane: Søren Kierkegaard.
In terms of the most beautiful library atriums I’ve seen in my life, the Black Diamond in Copenhagen definitely ranks near the top. The interior is stunning and I loved all the natural light.
The bridge you can spot through the windows is Circle Bridge.
The Black Diamond is a modern extension that’s directly connected to the much older Royal Danish Library. There were so many incredible details from bygone days. I especially loved this old card catalogue system.
There were some interactive exhibits for kids, including all sorts of costumes. The resulting getups were hilarious.
This hat was giving Statue of Liberty vibes!
I had to snap a picture of this sign outside one of the reading rooms: subdued conversation is permitted. Like the rest of Europe, everyone is so quiet in Denmark. While it was less noticeable than in Finland, Danes still offer a sharp contrast to North American noise levels.
One thing I didn’t have time to explore while we were in Copenhagen (but wish I had!) were some of the design museums. We had to make do with stopping outside one of them for a photo op. Indy spotted these chairs from a distance and made a beeline so he could climb them.
We got to see the Black Diamond from a different perspective (this time looking back at it from the Circle Bridge).
I had read about these elevated benches and we came across one by coincidence. They’re designed to demonstrate projected global sea levels. The benches are about 3 feet higher than standard park benches. Supposedly, if you sit on this bench in the year 2100, your feet will be touching the water, not hanging in the air. The bench had a little plaque that read: Flooding will become part of our everyday life unless we start doing something about our climate.
Next up was a stop at Freetown Christiania.
The area was founded in the 1970s when a group of residents and activists moved into an abandoned military site and created a self-governing community. They had “alternative” ideas about housing, culture, and shared living. Over the years, it became famous for its colourful art and independent spirit (read: open cannabis trade on Pusher Street, which attracted curious visitors and plenty controversy).
Apparently there has been a major crackdown on all drug use in the community (my sister-in-law said they were having increasing issues with hard drugs in this area) and it feels distinctly touristy and safe these days. That said, it’s still very quirky. Everywhere you turn there are unusual-looking handmade homes, lots of art, cafes, and… we could definitely smell plenty of weed).
I thought this railing made out of old skateboards was so cool.
We bought one of our favourite pieces of art from here 14 years ago!
It’s currently on Belle’s built-ins at home.
So much street art.
This troll is named Green George, and he was designed by the Danish “recycle” artist Thomas Dambo entirely from scrap wood sourced from within Christiania. (We saw three different Dambo trolls while in Denmark; this was my least favourite, but it’s the easiest one to access within the city/without access to a car.)
This picture offers a little hint at what was next on our itinerary! We were set to climb to the top of that spiralling tower you can see off in the distance: Church of Our Saviour.
You have to book timed tickets to go up to the top of the spire and my brother and I had done just that the night before. FOR THE RECORD, I entered my credit card information, but he had gotten everything else prepped up to that point.
In other words, I blame him for what happened next.
We very confidently walked up to the ticketing desk, she took one look at our tickets and said: these are for 5:30 pm… tomorrow night.
She was very sweet about the whole thing and said it happens regularly and we weren’t ever the first people that particular day to show up with tickets for the following day. She suggested we wait outside for a few minutes and she’d see what the “traffic” was like (they allow a limited number of people up during each half-hour time slot and there is one narrow set of 400 stairs people have to go up and then back down, so it can get congested).
We waited for the suggested 10 minutes and went back to check in. Hooray—she said it would be fine to go up.
(Ordinarily, we would have just come back the following day, but we already had something else scheduled for that time).
In the end, this timing issue worked out in our favour. Instead of climbing up with a large group of people at 5:30, we had the entire top of the spire to ourselves!
There are 250 steps inside and they are steep and narrow.
Then you get to the final 150 steps which wind around outside. Indy pretty quickly decided the outdoor section was not for him. I don’t blame him: it’s very high and extremely windy. He stayed outside long enough to snap a quick picture and then John took him back downstairs.
The outside stairs offered incredible views of the city. Despite living in Copenhagen for well over a decade, this was my brother’s first time going to the top of the church spire and I think only my sister-in-law’s second time. We were glad to give them an excuse to do something so iconic local thing. (Well, iconic for tourists.)
This kiddo was keen to go to the very tippy top. It was a TIGHT squeeze. I was wearing a backpack and had to stop a few steps away from the top because it narrows down to almost no space at all.
My sister-in-law also squeezed her way up.
After getting back to ground level, we walked towards Nyhavn.
This stretch of colourful stores and houses is basically the quintessential postcard shot of Copenhagen. The lighting was terrible at this time of night, but it’s such a gorgeous, bustling place.
Obviously, a tree pose was in order.
Some family photos!
And then we navigated back to my brother and sister-in-law’s place for a yummy supper.
Your turn.
- Have you ever had (or heard of?) koldskål?
- Tell me you wackiest seat mate stories from public transit!
- How do you feel about heights? Would you have climbed those twisty outside stairs?
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