Annette at YVR Vancouver Airport in Canada excited to get on the plane and go....that girl absolutely loves flying! :)
Once again The Pedersens take a holiday to the "Land of Where The Pedersens Are Made" that being Denmark. Ed and Annette flew to Copenhagen in early May to enjoy a three week holiday in Denmark with a cruise through the Norway fjords tucked into the last week. Along the way we met some other Pedersens, that being my brother Ken and his wife Linda whom flew over a week later, and we met many new-to-us relatives in Denmark.
TIP - Click on any picture to see the pictures full size.....they look way better that way! :)
The story takes a lot of telling so I have broken down the trip into several packages;today's package is "Day 1 - Copenhagen"
Later packages will be more condensed for your reading pleasure....otherwise it would take you three weeks to read this! :)
Annette and I flew into Copenhagen late in the morning on Day 1, and as we knew would be dead tired, decided to take it easy and just do a bit of site seeing within walking distance of our hotel. As we had been here recently (was it four years ago already? Seems like just a few months ago) we knew our way around this part of town so we decided to amble over to one of the main tourist areas a 10 minute walk away and grab a bite to eat.
Across the busy street from the main gate of the Tivoli Gardens Amusement Park, one of the oldest amusement parks in Europe, stands the statue of Hans Christian Andersen. You may recognize some of his children classics such as "The Little Mermaid", "The Princess And The Pea", "The Emperor's New Suit", and 165 other titles.
The statue of H.C. Andersen is on the corner of the City Hall Plaza....across the plaza is the start of the Stroget....five long blocks just perfect for strolling and window shopping, and of course, some for-real buying
The Stroget is the pedestrian walkway in Copenhagen and one of the longest walkways in Europe. Many streets in a row have been blocked to vehicle traffic creating close to a mile long shopping bonanza of boutiques, bars, cafes, and tourist shops. This is the main street of Copenhagen dating back as far as 1728, and today it is still the main street, only now for the people. On our last trip we discovered the Lagkagehuset, a combination bakery and cafe that became our fave place for breakfast.
Every couple of blocks or so the Stroget opens into a plaza which is like breathing in a big gulp of air after walking along the narrow streets between 3 and 4 story buildings. Most of the plazas host a number of cafes and grills with patio chairs and tables just waiting for you to stop, rest, and watch the world go past.
We were too early in the day to take full advantage of the chairs but I can easily see us sitting there sipping a coffee or a cool drink enjoying life.
Ummm...yeah....I have several really good stories made up as to why I took this picture but my stories sound kind of weak in the telling....so...ummmm.... yeah.....oh look, another picture further down the page!
(BTW - you do remember that you can click on the picture to see the full size version - right?)
We walked about half way down the Stroget, then hooked a right with the intention of circling back to our hotel to see if our room was ready; we were so looking forward to sleeping! Getting to Europe from Vancouver is usually an 18 hour adventure....by the time you wake up on the morning to leave, you tend to have had only 4-5 hours of sleep, and by the time your head hits the bed in Copenhagen, you've been awake for close to 24 hours.The excitement of the trip keeps you going but sure leaves you dragging your arse the next day. So, being world class travelers and knowing everything now, we were smart enough to realize that we needed sleep.
Like most cities in Europe the major roadways for goods were the rivers, and when the river did not go far enough, canals extended the boat mans reach. Copenhagen is no different, and on our last visit we took a canal ride around the city through the various canals and interlocking river stretches; I highly recommend this type of site seeing.....we make it a point to have a canal/river ride in every town where possible as you see so much more of the original heart of the city.
One of the largest plazas in the city is just outside the doors of the Bertel Thorvaldens Museum which houses the great works of the Danish sculptor of the same name. This plaza was a surprise in its size, and by the view of the old buildings it provided across a canal.One of the buildings had a date stamp of 1748.
The old part of the city is jam packed with history, this sign only tells part of the story regarding what is in the area. The sign lists four museums, a Royal Library, and a palace all in the same area; that's pretty impressive!
So....passing a window in one of the museums I spot these bottles......as I don't read Danish I'm hoping that this is some kind of booze.....another part of me is thinking that the museum is offering Danish-Viking blood as some kind of fund raiser and that there are dozens of ferocious Vikings down in the basement letting their blood run into pails for collection!
Anyways, end of Day 1 story telling....next episode will highlight a week long car tour of Denmark with stops in the far north of Denmark, and then running way down south to the small Island of Aero to meet distant cousins.
These pictures and many others from today can be found on my Flickr web site here. PSSST...right click and choose "Open In A New Window"
If you enjoyed the story leave me a note in the comments section below - it's always nice to get feed back on what you liked and what more you would like to see. You can access the comments section by clicking on the field titled "No Comments" (You'll be the first) or "1 comments" or "2 comments" depending on how many comments are there already
3 comments:
Fabulous! Eddie. You’re the happiest guy in the world. Thank you for sharing.
Looks like you had an absolutely amazing trip!
Can’t wait to see it in person one day..
Nice photo’s.
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