I forgot to mention a couple of very funny wedding traditions, and since I'm up after midnight after getting only three hours of sleep last night, I thought it was a good time to share. :)
There is a Danish tradition that the men lift the groom on their shoulders, and remove his shoes and cut off the tips of his socks, which they did. Lotta, whom I met and sat next to at the dinner, said there's also a tradition where the women do that to the veil. I'm unsure Heather would have approved of that one though! There is a Swedish tradition that when the bride leaves to go to the bathroom, all of the women in the room rush to kiss the groom! And vice versa.. it was really hilarious and people got quite into it! ha!
Another sleepless night (this is becoming a trend!) but decided to make the best of it this morning and got up and walked. And walked. And walked. As expected, almost all of the museums are closed on Mondays, which is unfortunate as there were three I wanted to see. So I decided to head to the botanical garden and stopped in Baresso coffee for a triple latte before making my way. This city is really small and very easy to get around.
The garden was very nice and has an indoor greenhouse, a large pond with lillypods and many gardens and green areas to sit, flocked by some statues. It was very relaxing and peaceful in the middle of the city.
I then wandered around past the Round Tower and down towards Tivoli again. There is a synagogue and if I found it, it was also closed as the gate was shut. I went towards Tivoli, took a picture of the Hans Christian Anderson statue and went to the Dansk Design Center which was supposed to be open, but not according to the sign on the door. Drat! I walked past a protest of sorts where there were a number of small boxes lining the area with names and messages to 'stop the massacre' and 'Free Gaza.'
I wandered back up the Straedet, to the Stroget, shopping streets buzzing with lots of people and slowly meandered.
This city is very much a biking city, and there's a bike path along the streets. It's actually a slightly lower curb than the street level, so there's the sidewalk, bike path, and street is a little lower than the bike path. Unlike many larger cities, it's the bikes you really have to be careful of more than the cars! The walk like is a green person and goes immediately red with no warning blinks as I've seen in other cities, and one it goes red you must go immediately across or be used for target practice.
This city feels a lot like Amsterdam, and actually more like what I expected Amsterdam to look like with similar construction but more colored buildings. I found Amsterdam to be more muted and of course much more sex, nudity and girls in the window all over the city.
I walked to the Nyhaven area and got a canal boat tour with Netto, which was really interesting.
Nyhaven canal was dug around 1670s and is one of the oldest harbors in the city. It used to be a "dirty" area of ill repute, with lots of prostitutes and clubs. Now it has mostly been cleaned up and is a nice area to walk around and get a bite. You can also get the most expensive beer there in the city.
Hans Christian Andersen lived at house #67 there.
We passed the opera house, which is the most expensive building in Denmark at a cost of $500 million, and I believe he said it's not open yet. We went into a main canal and saw the back of the Little Mermaid statue. On the boat I met a nice family from Lima, Peru and we talked a bit as I had been to Peru a number of years ago. They were touring Scandanavia (Norway, Sweden, Denmark) and were heading home tomorrow.
We passed a partially completed retractible pedestrian bridge being built over the canal. The company building it went broke and half of the bridge was built too high so it was being repaired by another company to open by the end of the year.
We passed Noma, voted one of the best restaurants in the world offering a six-month wait for diners. I had looked it up before arriving and think it cost several hundred dollars for a meal. I did not make a reservation. :)
I decided to catch a short nap before heading out for a late lunch/early dinner. I walked down to Amalienborg then to the Marble Church to check out the inside, as the gal from peru told me it's worth seeing. Apparently there are tours of the dome with a wonderful view, but only at certain times. Of course! The church was gorgeous anyways. I then walked to Nyhaven, the picturesque area on the canal and got a glass of wine and people watched for a while.
I decided to dine again at Restaurant Zeleste, as I enjoyed it so much the night I got in and I wasn't disappointed. I had a kir royale (yum!), got the lamb, which I thought to have the last time there but wanted seafood.. got a glass of the ribera del duero from Spain (again) and tried the chocolate cake, or what I could of it. yum. Double yum. I will write it up in tripadvisor it's so good and the service was wonderful. I again sat in the patio in back and they closed the ceiling with a fabric piece as it was getting colder and lit a fire. Very beautiful.
Copenhagen has been really wonderful and I've enjoyed my stay here. Off to Berlin in the morning.. ahhh!!!
S
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