Sunday February 26
After only twelve hours home in Jyvaskyla, Kayla, Franziska and I were back on a bus to Helsinki. We didn’t have any classes this week, so we decided to take advantage of that by going on a mini tour of Scandinavia. We had about eight days, and originally wanted to visit all the capitals plus Bergen, in Norway. But after doing some planning and research, we realized that was a little bit too much for the time we had, and so we settled on visiting Copenhagen, Oslo and Bergen.
Since we wanted to maximize our time in each city, we decided to fly from Helsinki to Copenhagen on the earliest possible flight, and so we needed to spend the night in Helsinki. The bus ride went fairly smoothly, and we arrived in Helsinki at about 8:30pm. Finding our hostel was not so easy. We had booked a hostel that was close to the airport, but the bus station wasn’t close to the airport at all. After getting lost more than once, we finally made it to the hostel at about 10:30 and fell asleep right away.
Our flight left at 7:00am on Monday morning, and I think it was a really good idea to stay so close to the airport. We were able to get to the terminal by foot in about ten minutes and there was no line at security, so we made it to the gate in no time. The flight was about an hour and forty minutes, but there was a time change, so we arrived in Copenhagen at about 7:40am local time. From the airport, we hopped on a train to the city centre, and found our hostel. Kayla’s boyfriend, Jayme, had flown to Copenhagen from Toronto on Friday and was met up with us at the hostel. After we dropped off our bags, we headed out for the day. We started with breakfast at a food market close by, and then decided on our plan for the day. We had a map of all the sights in the area and decided on taking ourselves on a walking tour of the city.
My first impression of Copenhagen is that it is a city that takes pride in its history but also appreciates new, modern design and architecture. It seemed like one street would be full of old, colourful houses, and the next would have really impressive and modern buildings. My favourite part of the architecture of the city is definitely the bridges. Each bridge is slightly different, and cool in its own way. There are some super old, stone bridges, and others that are weirdly shaped and curve around the canals.
On our morning tour we visited the botanical garden and the round tower, and mostly spent the time getting our bearings and exploring the city. Copenhagen is full of winding streets and canals and I really enjoyed just seeing it all and taking it all in. I liked the round tower a lot, because it gave us a really good view of the whole city. Built in the 1640s by King Christian IV, the round tower had a triple purpose of being a church, a university library and an astronomy observatory all in one. To get to the top of the tower, you have to walk up a winding ramp about 200m long. One really neat thing about the tower is that it has a hollow core, with a glass floor that you can stand on! When you stand in the hollow core, you're also standing at the zero point of Copenhagen, since it was used as the centre point of the first accurate maps of the city that were published in 1841.
We started to crash after lunch time and decided to check into the hostel and relax for a couple of hours before dinner. After a bit more exploring, we got some dinner at a local restaurant (yummy) and then went on a nighttime cruise of the Copenhagen canals. From February to March, Copenhagen was hosting a light festival, with a ton of different light art installations. If you know me, you know I love boat tours, and even though it was super cold and super windy, it was definitely worth it! A lot of buildings and bridges were all lit up with special exhibits from local artists. The idea of the show was to highlight "the themes that you expect from Danish art and design is embedded in the events and art works of the festival: Minimalistic beauty, genuine high quality, design and art that shape light itself to human needs, sustainability, and enchanting interaction with architecture and spaces." I enjoyed the tour a lot, and really liked how it showed off a different side of Copenhagen.
We were all exhausted after the boat tour, so we headed right back to the hostel and went right to bed.
Tuesday February 27
Today we got up fairly late (around 9 or so) and felt so much better after a full night of sleep. We got breakfast in the hostel restaurant, made a plan for the day and then headed out at around 10:00am.
Our first stop was a neighbourhood called Christiania. This area of Copenhagen is really, really interesting because it originally began as a hippie commune in the early 1970s. This area was . Today, a lot of people still live in Christiania, including some of the original founding members, and its goal is to "build a self-governing society in which each individual can freely develop under the responsibility of the community." There was a lot of controversy and insecurity at the beginning, but today Christiania is still self-governed, has no cars allowed, and promotes a sustainable way of living.
The area has calmed down a lot since the 1970s, but still has a lot of its charm and alternative atmosphere. We were all a bit surprised to see this very colourful, spray-painted neighbourhood in the middle of Copenhagen. It made for a lot of really neat pictures. Before getting to Christiania, we were warned about an area called the Green Light District, where you are not allowed to take pictures. The reason is that there are a lot of people on this street and in this area who sell cannabis, and any pictures could be used by the police. Selling cannabis is still illegal in Denmark, but the police don’t seem to be too strict with Christiania. When we past the street, it was full of vendors who had set up booths with signs and prices, selling their weed. It seemed like a very official market considering that selling cannabis is prohibited by the law, but nobody seemed too worried. Overall, Christiania was a really interesting area, and all four of us had it in our top three places to visit in Copenhagen.
After Christiania, we visited another cool area of Copenhagen, called Nyhavn. “Ny” means “new” and “havy” means “harbour” and it was very much a typical “European-looking” area. All full of colourful buildings, and boats in the canals, it looked just what I picture when I think about Europe. We took some pictures here and had a bite to eat to warm up. It wasn’t so cold in terms of temperature but there was a crazy wind that made us all freeze. According to the people at the hotel, it was the coldest week so far this winter, and while it definitely wasn’t as cold as Lapland, none of us expected it.
Once we had some food and warmed up a little, we headed up to one of the iconic spots in Copenhagen to see the Little Mermaid statue. Along the way, we stopped at the Royal Palace, and took a tour around the inside. The palace was really nice, and it's pretty cool that some of the Royal family still lives there! The Little Mermaid statue is right on the water, and is one of those pictures that you see on a ton of postcards, magnets and general souvenirs from Copenhagen. We were already freezing, and the walk to the mermaid just made it worse! The statue was so small, and not very exciting at all, and I think it’s fair to say that we were all underwhelmed. But it was still one of those things you have to see when you’re in Copenhagen.
After the Little Mermaid, we went back to the hostel for a bit. I had a Skype interview for a summer job, and I think we all needed a little rest. Once it got dark, we went back out to see some of the other art installations of the Light Festival. Again, I was pretty struck by the contrast of modern architecture and design with the old, traditional stone buildings. I think Copenhagen has done so well in creating a really good balance of old and new within the city centre. We stopped at a few sights, and took some pictures, and then it was time to head to the bus station.
We decided to book an overnight bus from Copenhagen to Oslo so that we could save money and also maximize our time in the cities. In theory this seems like a really good idea, but in practice it really doesn’t measure up. Our bus left at 9:40, and it was a little stressful because we got lost on our way to the platform. I think it would have been a really nice ride if the bus hadn’t been FREEZING cold. There were hardly any passengers, so we all spread out across our own seats, but it was so cold we all had to sleep in our full winter jackets, hats and mittens. I do think it was worth it though, but if I had the time or the money I would have just stayed another night in Copenhagen.
I hope you enjoyed this post, even if I am a couple of days behind…we are currently on a train from Oslo to Bergen, and it is the prettiest train ride I have ever been on – the landscape is just stunning. As always, thank you for reading, I’ll have Oslo’s post coming soon, so stay tuned :)
