Day 11: Panoramagander

I got up way too early today. Well ahead of Bill and well ahead of anything on the street outside.  Which meant I got to spend a little time with the tour book and lament our lack of coffee.

Once we were both up, we headed to a coffee shop Bill had read about with excellent pastries. Bonus surprise for me, the seating was inside Copenhagen's main library (Københavns Hovedbibliotek). Also, the pastries were quite good.

On the walk back, we ducked into a game shop to look around, and then resisted the urge to stop in about 30 other places. Our next destination was the canal tour, after a stop at the Nespresso shop for a sleeve of coffee packets for the machine in our room. That stop proved valuable in that the workers there were able to answer some sight seeing questions and add a park and a pastry shop to our list of places to visit. Apparently a lot of Americans have been in recently to buy coffee because they are staying in rooms that have Nespresso machines, but nothing to put in them.

Next, we took a slight detour to walk through the southern end of the Kings Garden.

The gardens lead to, home of the crown jewels. We meandered about taking pictures of anything that looked interesting and Bill started grousing about my panorama shenanigans, which quickly turned into me being a super villain called Panoramagander.

We eventually did make our way to the canal tour's starting point, and got in line early enough to have our pick of seats. The tour included an audio tour in multiple languages with no volume controls we could figure out. At one point, while twisting around to photograph something, I bumped the headphone jack with a leg and that seemed to help the volume a little.

The tour goes around an island that used to house the Navy, but now is home to the opera. Long buildings that used to house ships have been converted to apartments. On the other shore is Free Christiania.

Next, the boat went a bit further out in the harbor to go past the Little Mermaid statue and then cut south again, passing the Royal Pavilions where official visitors arriving by boat are greeted.

We also passed a green cigar-shaped building that used to be a customs house, several historic warehouses, and a building called the Black Diamond that I completely missed the significance of.

The canal portion of the tour went around the island housing Christiansborg Slot. The bridges here were quite close to the top of the boat.

After the tour, we hit a grocery store so I'd have cream for my coffee and Bill would have beer to drink while writing blog posts. On the way out of the apartment, I stopped at the gelato place for a raspberry gelato to eat on the walk to see the Little Mermaid from the shore. We walked to central station and then walked along Øster Voldgade towards the shore. This meant walking past the other side of Rosenborg Slot and two sides of the Kastellet, a star shaped fortress now housing a museum.

Then we finally got to the statue and it was not as crowded as it had been earlier when we passed it by boat.

This part of town is also home to the Danish Design Museum, so we continued our walk around the Kastellet, finding a badass Norse goddess.

The museum had a lot of interesting exhibits, but I was mostly there for the chairs.

From there, we headed towards dinner, walking through the Amalienborg and then across one of the many bridges we'd gone under earlier in the day.

We were a bit early, so we walked around the island before going into Restaurant Barr, the current tenants in the location that was formerly Noma. We ordered the 4 course tasting menu with beer pairings, because of course we did. In addition to the menu items, there was also bread with both butter and a spread made from pork fat, chicken skin, and lemon. We thought we were full after the cod, but the crispy waffle dessert was so good we apparently were not full.

The menu had also listed a house aquavit and seasonal schnapps. We got one of each. The seasonal schnapps was cucumber and dill, which smelled like sweet pickles, but tasted like refreshing cucumber with a hint of herbs.

After dinner, we headed back to Ruby to try more of the 10 year anniversary menu. Once again, our first round we ended up trading drinks as Bill's turned out to be a carrot bloody Mary, which was definitely more to my taste. It was also quite a robust serving, so while Bill had 3 cocktails, I just sipped on my excellent carrot and ginger concoction.

Day 11: Copenhagen - Food

Breakfast at Democratic Coffee

Dinner at Restaurant Barr

Day 11: Copenhagen - The Obligatory Mermaid Visit

We slept in this morning, which seemed fine since most things seem to open around 10:00 in this part of Copenhagen.  Our rental place has a Nespresso coffee maker in the kitchen...but much to our dismay, no Nespresso pods.  We decide to head out to one of the many coffee shops in the surrounding area.  I had read about one called Democratic Coffee not too far from our place that also supposedly has some of the best croissants in Copenhagen.  That was enough to get Dawn to buy into the plan.  We we get there, it turns out that it’s also in the lobby of a local library and Dawn declares it to be ideal.

On the way back to the room we stumble across a game store and Dawn buys the card game version of SuperHot.  We’re in the middle of the shopping district so it’s not hard to find interesting stores on our way to and from the rental.  It’s interesting moving from a very remote island in Norway to a big city in Denmark.  To resolve the lack of Nespresso pods problem I do a google search discover that there is a Nespresso boutique just down the street.  It seems whatever we need is now within walking distance.

After that we decide to start knocking out Dawn’s short list of things to do in Copenhagen.  First off, is do a canal tour.  We buy tickets and hop on a boat that takes us around the city.  The audio on the boat is provided by ear-buds in multiple languages and the volume is such that the boat’s motor makes it very difficult to follow.  I think the gist is that everything was built in the 1700’s and is the first or oldest in the world. The tour boat has to go under some very low bridges, and the captain said that the tide was high. I was impress by how little clearance the captain needed to confidently steer the boat under some of the bridges. (Arms and heads inside the boat indeed!)  During the canal tour clouds start to roll in and threaten to rain, so we head back to the room to get jackets.

Next up we walk to the Little Mermaid statue in the Copenhagen harbor.  The tour books so it’s kind of meh, but obligatory.  When we get there we find a crowd of people taking photos of a bronze statue in the water.  It’s an alright statue.  We take our photos of it.  I overhear one of the tour guides telling her group that the statue has lost its head twice.  The first time the head or the perpetrator was not recovered, so the current head is a reproduction.

After the Little Mermaid we visit the Design Museum of Denmark.  It’s an industrial design museum that focuses on Danish design.  There is a display of hundreds of chair designs.  We also see fashion and a whole section on how Danish minimalism harmoniously pairs with Japanese minimalism.  One of the displays is a cardboard chair that our cat Clawhammer would think is the best thing in the world.

By the time we’re done with the museum it’s only an hour until dinner so we start to walk in that direction.  Dinner tonight is as Barr which is the restaurant that now occupies where Noma used to be.  Currently Noma is closed while it relocates, so we can eat their.  A related restaurant has opened in it’s old location focusing on food inspiration from Europe’s beer belt.  We get the four course dinner with beer pairing.  The first dish had both caviar and ants!  All the food is delicious.  Some of the standouts are crispy chicken skin blended into the butter with the seeded rye bread,  fava beans with the beef tartare, and a really sour raspberry beer with a sweet raspberry dessert.  After the meal Dawn and I order one each of their local drams.  They have a house-made aquavit and a snaps made from gherkins and dill.  The aquavit is awesome.  They make it in cooperation with Copenhagen distillery.  We might try and visit it on Friday.  Dawn has the gherkins and dill snaps and it’s also very nice.  All and all it’s a very happy meal.

After we head back to the room for a bit we decide to hit the town again and revisit the Ruby cocktail bar.  We’re able to find a table and order a couple of rounds.  Damn, their menu is amazing.  Although the first drink I ordered wasn’t too my liking.  It was called Carrot Head and the ingredient list looked intriguing, but when I tasted it I thought to myself “this is like a bloody mary with carrot juice.”  Dawn thought the same thing, and being our different feelings about the virtues of bloody marys, we traded drinks.

Day 10: Mall Walk

We got up bright and early to finish packing and straighten up the rental before leaving. We were well ahead of schedule on the way out so we took the coastal route to the airport.

Our flight to Oslo was on the same kind of tiny prop plane we arrived in.

I was able to catch a little sleep on the flight and get a sandwich during the layover. The second flight was considerably shorter but less pleasant. The woman next to me spent most of the flight elbowing me and eventually spilled a glass of wine on me. So I was grumpy at the airport and probably very short with the lady doing currency exchange.

We got a metro ticket into the city. One ticket for 2 people, which I have never seen. It also didn't say anywhere we could figure out if it was metro or train. I had picked a metro stop as a destination, though, so we went with that. The metro stop turned out to be in the middle of a department store? We eventually found our way out onto the street and headed towards the apartment Bill had rented. It's above a shoe store on a pedestrian street full of shops. Basically, this is what every outdoor mall is trying to mimic. We are staying at what Bridge Street wishes it was. And while the view is no longer an idyllic fishing village pier, I can see a gelato stand.

Also, it's 2 floors up and only accessible via a narrow spiral staircase.

So after we dragged the bags up and I took a much needed shower, we headed back out for dinner. We're very close to one of the 3 cocktail bars Bill wanted to visit. We were going to get dinner first at Restaurant Puk, but didn't have reservations. They said we could come back in 45 minutes, so we agreed and got a cocktail at Ruby first.

The cocktail menu looked excellent. I ordered a Scotch based drink and Bill got something with an herbal nose and a citrus tang. Mine turned out to have a bit of a licorice finish, so we traded. And spent a while talking to a Norwegian customer about how we liked his country, but alcohol was so expensive.

Next up, dinner was a danish sausage plate and a smoked salmon salad with smoked cheese and radishes.

And now I'm ready to sleep off the rest of that hike.

Day 10: Copenhagen - Food

Cocktails at Ruby

Dinner at Puk

Day 10: Copenhagen - From Remote Fishing Island to the Middle of the City

Travel day!  We get up at 6:00 in the morning (ewww) and prepare to leave our fishing village harbourside retreat for the city of Copenhagen.  Our flight is at noon, but we need to pack, and drive back to Leknes.  It turns out that we’re running ahead of schedule so we take the coastal route back to Leknes.  One last beautiful drive through Lofoten.  

It’s amazing how much smoother the driving goes than my first attempt on the island.  My theory is that the first time you drive on Lofoten you are over stimulated.  You’re trying to learn a new car, new roads, new road rules….and on top of that there is the staggeringly beautiful scenery that keeps demanding your attention.  It’s just too much and your attention is too fragmented.  Now that I got a handle on the car, the roads, and the rules, the strain isn’t as crippling.  There are still moments where I have to tear my attention away from the scenery… but I’m coping much better.  

Even after gassing up the car we end up getting to the airport a bit too early.  We actually have to wait awhile to check-in because this airport doesn’t have separate staff for check-ins, security, and take-offs and landings.  One crew kind of does it all.  My bags get the most thorough x-ray screening that they ever have.  This might be a small one-gate airport, but it’s not slacking on security.

Our flight to Oslo is pretty uneventful.  It’s a two hour flight in a turboprop plane.  One thing that momentarily confused me in Oslo was having trouble finding our flight to Copenhagen on the departures board.  It turns out that the Danes don’t spell Copenhagen the same we that we do.  So while I’m looking for something that starts with a ‘C’ our flight is listed under København.  The flight from Oslo to Copenhagen is a bit more eventful because Dawn gets a cup of wine dumped in her lap...but I’m sure she’ll cover that.  

We reclaim our bags and try to figure out the Copenhagen public transport system.  I fail miserably at deciphering it, but Dawn does an admirable job.  Judging from the wet people getting onto the metro, it is pouring outside, but by the time we get off it’s not raining.  It looks like we just missed the downpour.  After a 10 minute walk we find our place in Copenhagen.  We’re renting a studio apartment in the shopping district and the place is pretty swank.  It’s the most room we’ve had during this trip so far.  My first impression of the shopping district is that this is what they keep patterning open-air malls after. It seems large and bustling.

Copenhagen seems to have an active restaurant and bar scene and we have many many options just a short walk from our place.  We decide to try Restaurant Puk because it claims to offer traditional Danish food in a historic building.  One of the reasons we decided to visit Copenhagen was to take in the new Nordic food scene, so it makes sense to start with traditional fare as a baseline.  Puk is hopping and informs us that without a reservation we can’t get in...on a Monday night… but if we come back in 45 minutes they can fit us in.  That gives us time to try out Ruby, which is a cocktail bar I had already scoped out.  And as it happens, it’s only a short walk from Puk.  The entire menu at Ruby looks amazing and our first two cocktails guarantee that we’ll be trying to visit this place again to try out more of their menu.  While there we run into a friendly and talkative Norwegian who asks how long we’ve been in town and tells us that we need to visit Norway.  We tell him that we just came from Norway and he seems pleased by that.  He orders a gin and tonic and asks if Americans put cucumbers and black pepper in their gin in our tonics.  As far as I’m concerned, we do now.

Eventually we make our way back to Puk and have a lovely meal.  One standout item on the charcuterie plate is pickled vegetables in what seems like honey mustard.  I ask about it and get a roaming answer that tries to communicate how they are picked but doesn’t really help because I have no point of reference for the words he’s using.  It might deserve further research.