We spent our last day in Copenhagen exploring Tivoli and I’m very glad we did! It was so quaint and pretty, a surprise oasis in the middle of the city. It was fairly empty, so we walked around casually and took dozens of photos of many beautiful flowers. The park features various floral gardens, music venues, restaurants, as well as the requisite amusement park rides. My favorite was the Dæmonen roller coaster, whose warning signs were enough to send us running in the opposite direction!
The afternoon was soon upon us and lunch became the order of the day. We explored some of the restaurants inside Tivoli, but most were either overpriced, too fancy, or far too meaty. We found one that looked promising and were even seated, but I had a very rare uppity vegetarian moment. Chicken salad was 9 EUR, but the one vegetarian entree (a Quorn cutlet with some sides) was 25 EUR—unacceptable! I realize that vegetarianism is a choice, but I refuse to be financially punished for that choice. We left the park in search of something simpler, cheaper, and quicker, since the day was quickly advancing. Fortunately, I had noticed while leaving the hotel that the sushi buffet we had been to our first night doubled as a deli during the day. We stopped in and found the sandwiches to be appealing and cheap, and the lady even made me a meat-free one. It wasn't terribly substantial, but tasty and would keep us going.
By this time, it was about 1400, so we collected our bags at the hotel and hopped on the 26 bus to the cruise ships. The driver was gesticulating wildly about something regarding the ships, but his English was fairly weak and we just kind of nodded, smiled and sat down. As we traversed city traffic that reminded me of mid-day DC, the sky grew very dark and we got clobbered with a thunderstorm. The rain came down in sheets and it was fairly active electrically as well. The traffic broke free and we headed into a suburban area within sight of the boat terminals.
While on the bus, we passed by everything we saw the day before, plus quick peeks at Amelienborg and the Marble Church, which did look lovely and I was kind of sad we’d missed. We saw more expensive boutiques and more fancy art galleries, thus confirming my view that CPH = NYC, and definitely not my favorite place. I also felt a little ridiculous that we'd walked all over town the day before when the buses obviously could have helped us get around more efficiently (and probably with fewer tears on my part). I'd like to think that if we'd spent less time plodding around the city and more time going to specific destinations, we would have had a better time of it. We got to watch a massive thunderstorm from the safety of the bus, which had luckily abated when the bus driver dropped us off at the corner of nowhere and nowhere, assuring us that the bus stop for the boat terminal was very close.
Here's where it gets interesting. The driver stopped at a station on a side street and, in his broken English (Danglish?), explained that he didn't go all the way to the boats and we would have to catch the NEXT 26 bus to get there, but we would have to walk around the corner to catch it. The next bus wasn't due for another 20 minutes and the sky was threatening again, so we decided we'd continue walking at least to the next bus station, and hopefully find some shelter along the way.
The rain started and my raincoat was packed in my suitcase, but Liz had an umbrella in her bag. We finally reached the next station, which had a slight overhang from the adjacent building for shelter, and stopped to rest for a moment. I had gotten a little mad because, as I looked down, I saw something fly past me and thought Liz had been annoyed and kicking rocks at me, but I didn't say anything (Note: I would never kick rocks at Scott). The bus came and we hauled our now-soaked bags on board, suddenly realizing that we would go one stop to the terminal—about 200 yards. As we got off the bus, I saw something else go flying past my view and came to the sudden and terrifying realization that Liz had not been kicking rocks at me at all: it was pea-sized hail! We sprinted for the door, as fast as one can sprint with forty-pound suitcases in tow.
We’re fairly certain that the second bus driver thought we were insane and/or retarded, but we didn’t care. We were ridiculously early, so we had to just sit around at the terminal for a while, but Scott enjoyed watching the rain and hail on the water outside. The ship for our second voyage, the Crown of Scandinavia, wasn’t as nice as our first one, but by no means shabby. I think its greatest fault was simply being laid out less nicely as the first ship. Our cabin was similar, although in the Crown, we were almost as far at the back of the ship as humanly possible, and have the pictures of the insanely long hallway to prove it. The rain let up and the afternoon got really beautiful for our departure, and we got some great views of the city from the upper deck as we pulled away. A bit further out, we were able to see the Øresund bridge in the distance, and get some blurry shots of it with the camera zoomed to the max!
We had to make “reservations” for the buffet dinner, which left us with time to kill before our seating, so we looked around the ship a bit more and found some comfy chairs to enjoy a few tasty (albeit overpriced) local Danish beers while watching the world go by. The buffet was overpriced and underwhelming, but we lucked into seats right by the window on the port side of the ship, and enjoyed fantastic views of Kronborg Castle in Helsingør (setting of Shakespeare's Hamlet...something is indeed rotten in the state of Denmark!). Scott and I agreed that the chief attraction on this cruise was the view sailing up Oslofjord in the morning, so we opted to go to bed early.
I wish I could say that I loved Copenhagen, but it was just so underwhelming. Maybe I had built it up too much in my mind, but it was crowded, overflowing with Americans, and chaotic. It felt more like an American city than a European one, and there was so much dirt on the buildings and construction everywhere that it was really hard not to feel let down. I’m glad Copenhagen was part of our trip, and there were some really unforgettable and beautiful sights, but on the whole it was less than magical. Here's hoping Oslo gets us back to feeling smitten by Scandinavia!
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