The Traveling Nurses

As I said in a previous post Scandinavia is one of my favourite places in the world. I have wanted to go there since my son decided Lego was his favourite toy and of course thanks to an interesting Finnish man (see the ‘Scandimania before it was cool’ post).

So after watching Oprah Winfrey in Copenhagen and then a TV show called Scandimania which featured 3 shows where the host visited Sweden, Norway and of course Denmark, Dawn and I decided that it was time for us to visit.

We decided that we wanted to go in winter and see the city in all it’s Christmas finery so the trip was booked for the end of November. However, even though there were elements of Christmas around the city it was not until a week or so later that the Christmas festivities commenced fully.

There aren’t many direct flights to Copenhagen from the UK so we had no choice but to travel in the evening. We arrived in Copenhagen late evening, we decided that due to excellent reviews regarding the ease of using the train, we decided that we would travel into the city in that fashion. The reviews were not wrong it was very easy.

Our main focus when booking was to visit Tívoli Gardens so we booked a hotel nearby to this attraction. We stayed at the First Hotel Mayfair which was near to both the train station and Tívoli.

It was an excellent hotel in a great area, an area which turned out to be the red light district. I must admit, though, this fact was not obvious when walking around.

As we had arrived so late we decided to just get a drink and a bite to eat and venture out in the morning.

There was a nice bar in the hotel but we decided to venture across the road to a very Scandinavian looking bar.

This bar was very nice. Lots of wood and of course the obligatory candles burning everywhere. (Not sure health and safety in the UK would approve 🤔). We ordered our drink fully expecting to be handed a glass of wine each and where surprised when the bartender came out to our table and insisted we test the wine before buying.

We rose early on the Saturday and discovered that on a Saturday many food places do not open until 9am but we managed to find a nice little cafe serving coffee and pastries to tied us over for a few hours.

Dawn had booked a canal trip which took us around the harbour. The start of the boat tour was in the beautiful area of the city called Nyhavn. This area is very picturesque with its colourful buildings and cobbled streets.

In order to get to Nyhavn we had to walk through the city. As expected there are bikes everywhere. Although we decided not to partake in any bike riding we felt that the city was easily manageable for a walker too.

The boat trip lasted around an hour and included a commentary. It was a clear sunny day when we left Nyhavn however as the trip continued it proceeded to get more and more misty.

From the boat we were able to see many of the harbour side attractions including the (tiny) Little Mermaid statue and Christiana, the country within the city.

I would definitely recommend the boat tour as it also includes the experience of traveling under some of the lowest bridges in the city

After the boat trip we decided to venture along to Tívoli. Entry into Tívoli was included as part of the boat trip deal. It was now starting to get dark and Tívoli showed us its glory.

Tivoli, was the inspiration for Disneyland in California and deserves a post all to itself.

The following morning we found a restaurant that had a traditional breakfast buffet with Danish bacon, Danish blue cheese and of course Danish pasties.

We didn’t need to get our flight home until late in the afternoon so we decided to see the city from an elevated position from the top of the Rundetaarn or the Round Tower.

Unlike some other towers I have had to climb it wasn’t stairs but a ramp that curved round the tower until the last few feet. At the top was a full 360 degree view of the city and included an observatory and rather unusually an art gallery.

Although we had only a very short time in Copenhagen we have definitely enjoyed it enough to visit again in the future.