Copenhagen

Whew! What a whirlwind tour of Copenhagen and the area. We found a great apartment in the Vesterbro neighborhood of Copenhagen, across the street from the Meatpacking District. It's a trendy area with lots of restaurants and bars. But since we bought the 4-day Copenhagen card, we weren't much for nightlife. It allowed us free entry to almost all museums and castles in the area, along with free transportation. That meant we didn't need to rent a bike, which looked fun, but why pay double for transportation options? The card was an amazing deal and we were true Culture Vultures.

We saw 3 castles, many interesting museums, and climbed the top of Our Savior Church for majestic views of the city. One of my favorites was the photography exhibit in Hamlet's castle (known by 3 names: Elsinor, Helsingborg, and Kronberg). The costumes used in the photo shoots were pretty amazing. The photogropher used models to recreate famous Danish royalty. Some of the castle exhibits were musty, and some were fascinating. Another favorite was the Viking Ship Museum in nearby Roskilde, where we got to row and sail in a re-creation of a Viking boat.

We started off the first full day with a Canal boat tour and then hit the ground running. But on our arrival day, we made a late afternoon visit to the social experiment of Christiania, where hippies took over an abandoned military installation in the early 70's and never left. It's been about 50 years on now and it's still a thriving subculture.

Bikes are everywhere. Even more so than anywhere else in Scandinavia, I think. The transportation system is good, but there are no trams and fewer buses than most places. There is a good metro system and regional trains, but since so many people use bikes, I think there is less of a network than similar sized cities like Helsinki. People can bring their bikes on trains and buses. There are whole sections of them for bikes. And since the area is flat, it's just a great way to get around.

We thought we'd get an overnight train from Hamburg to Zurich, but it's sold out for the next month or so. And so we're adjusting by taking a day train from Copenhagen to Hamburg to Cologne in one day. In the morning we'll move on down to Bern, Switzerland . The Eurail pass makes plan B and C pretty easy. We really want to explore Hamburg, but we want to get to Switzerland while it's warm. We'll head back up to Germany later.

Fun fact: St. Pauli Girl, an innocent looking German Fraulein is named after the St. Pauli district in Hamburg. That's the former red light district. So think about that the next time you see the beer label.

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