Copenhagen

Copenhagen couldn't be better situated as a stopover point between Amsterdam and Oslo, sitting smack in the middle of a 16 hour drive between the 2 points. We rolled into Copenhagen in the mid evening, but with our northern location it was bright as 3pm outside. It was tricky finding our hotel due to the hotel's sign being on top of a tall building down the street from where it actually is. I got out, ran around the building looking for the entrance... nope. SO, we followed TomTom, which instructed us to turn down a side street and go a few hundred meters. There it is! Not sure why they have their sign on a building that's NOT where they are located, but there you have it. Found a place on the street to put the car after checking in. The room was almost like a ship cabin I was in during a high school trip to the Bahama's! Beds and tables folded up to the wall for maximum space, the bathroom... man, hard to explain that one. Let's just say you could clean it by just spraying it down with a garden hose (you know, how they do it at Hee-Haw Junction). The room was clean, convenient, and comfortable... the important "C's" when it comes to accommodations. You can throw in "cheap" as a 4th "C", but that doesn't really exist in Scandinavia!

With plenty of light left, we jetted out and walked towards what we considered city center. It took a while to get our bearings, but we made it, and in the process figured out the best direct route to take later. Copenhagen is a clean, well-spaced city, pretty much like Oslo. Every European city we have visited maintains it's cleanliness very well, with the exception of Amsterdam!! Figures. But I believe I have come upon the reason. Amsterdam is a very small, densely populated city, where the others are less populated and/or spread over a larger area. Also, people from poorer areas of the world where litter isn't much of a consideration have made Amsterdam their new home. These 2 factors, I believe, make Amsterdam a messier place. But to be fair, since coming back from Norway, Amsterdam does look a little cleaner. Brad and Natalia say that NY City has more litter, and we said "No way!". I was just in Manhattan, and one of the first things I thought was "They are CRAZY if they think Manhattan has more litter on the street then Amsterdam!" Come to find out when I returned to Amsterdam, R told me they had visited Manhattan during their recent trip back to the states and felt the EXACT opposite, that Manhattan IS more littered then Amsterdam! Oh... what do they know?! ANYWAY, back to the trip. We are in the shopping district of Copenhagen, and the prices of clothing at some stores are actually less then what one would pay in Amsterdam. That was a pleasant surprise. We walk, sight see, people watch (people STILL falling for sidewalk shell games!!!), and grab a bite to eat, sitting outdoors at an Italian restaurant on a plaza. It was quite nice, but got a little chilly (it IS May AND Scandinavia). We head back to our hotel a little after 11pm when it is finally dark.

Friday morning comes, and I go down to the front desk to see if any of the limited number of parking spots in the back of the hotel have become vacant overnight, as they instructed me to do the day of check in when none were open. There were a couple, so I quickly went to where we had parked the car on the street because it had to be moved by 8 or it would get ticketed, and parked it in the hotel lot. There it would stay until we left tomorrow. We headed to the city center around 10am, walking along a canal and past a nice park. The sun was out and it was warm, so people were out and in seemingly good spirits. We went to a small art gallery and then visited a cathedral, going up a tower with a spiraling ramp that Peter The Great supposedly rode his horse up early in the last century. We grabbed a bite to eat for lunch and then visited the plaza and vendor stalls looking at what was being sold. Radhika bought herself some fine earrings and then we went down to the waterfront. After we visited another cathedral, walked through another large plaza, past some beautiful fountains to where the famous statue of "The Little Mermaid" could be found along the waterfront. We eventually made our way back to the center via another pretty park, going to the shopping district to eyeball all of the people who were now out on an early Friday evening. We ate a nice dinner outdoors at an Italian restaurant and walked back to the hotel at 11pm.

The next morning we sleep in, then head out a little before 11am. It's Saturday, so the streets are bustling. We catch the changing of the guard at the Royal Palace and then have a nice meal at a street side cafe. We go to the center and waterfront areas checking out people, sidewalk markets and vendors seeing their crafts and wares, and around 3pm stumble upon a pipe and drum band putting on a concert in a plaza. We enjoyed that a lot, but that was the end of our trip as we had to make the 8 hour journey back to Amsterdam. We walked back to the hotel to pick up the car in the lot and headed out of Copenhagen by 4pm, arriving in Amsterdam shortly before midnight. It was good to be home only due to having the long drive behind us, but we were bummed that yet another adventure was behind us. But now we prepare for the next one in a couple of months - - Oktoberfest and southern Italy!!!