I went on a trip! I flew into Copenhagen, Denmark and flew out of Paris, France. I had a lot of stops in between.
I love to travel and go on adventures! Before this trip, I hadn’t been out of the country since July 2019. I had been thinking a lot about going on an international trip since I got my new job last year. I have been accruing PTO and I decided a trip to Europe this fall was a great time to go.
I had enough PTO and traveling off peak season is nice. So I looked at a flight map to see which cities were cheap to fly into and out of and then booked my flights.
The places I stayed on my trip:
Copenhagen, Denmark- 1 night
Haarlem, Netherlands-3 nights
Antwerp, Belgium- 1 night
Luxembourg, Luxembourg- 1 night
Rennes, France- 2 nights
Paris, France- 1 night
Part of the reason I went to five different countries on this trip was because the countries seemed relatively easy to get to from each other and I hadn’t been to four of the countries before this trip.
My first glimpse of Nyhavn area!
Before I left the Nyhavn area, I came across a free toilet there. I decided to use it while I could. That ended up being the best restroom on the whole trip.
The top of the building on the other side of the fountain is across some water and is the Copenhagen Opera House.
Amalienborg Plaza one more time before I headed to my next stop.
I really liked walking around Kastellet. It was such a pretty area!
I ended up sitting around here and eating a sourdough roll I had bought earlier. While I was eating, there were some birds who got really close to me wanting my bread. I did not feed them any though.
One of the birds that kept on getting too close to me while I was eating my bread.
My next stop was Rosenborg Castle. Rosenborg Castle was originally built in the early 1600s by Christian IV.
Different views of Rosenborg Castle. I enjoyed exploring the castle inside and out.
After I ate, I made my way to Rundetaarn.
One of the views from the top of Rundetaarn.
After Rundetaarn, it was time for me to return to my hotel to pick up my luggage and go to the airport for my flight to Amsterdam, Netherlands.
This is me at the airport waiting for my flight to Lisbon, Portugal (my layover). This is the only time my hair looked cute the whole trip. 🤣
I paid extra on my long haul flight to get an aisle seat but I got assigned an aisle exit row seat on my second flight. I loved how much leg room there was on the exit row. ;)
Day 1
I arrived in Copenhagen, Denmark, the first stop on my trip. To get to my hotel, I just hopped on the metro at the airport and then it was about a 15 minute ride to the stop closest to my hotel. Then about a 5-10 minute walk to the hotel. This picture was taken from the metro.
I checked into my hotel, dropped off my stuff and then went in search of food.
As I was planning my trip, I had looked into food near my hotel and found an indoor market that was really close. Although by the time I got there a lot of the places were closing down for the day, there was one place still open.
The place was called Paleo and it had pretty good food! I will say it was expensive though, but Copenhagen was kind of expensive in general.
Outside the indoor market!
Day 2
I didn’t sleep super well that night but my body still woke me up for the day earlier than I wanted to be.
I got ready for the day and headed to Assistens cemetery about a mile from my hotel.
The picture above and below were some scenes from my walk to the cemetery. It was a really nice morning and it ended up being really nice the whole day!
Near the cemetery was a bakery that came highly recommended to me (Andersen and Maillard). I got an almond croissant there and it was the best almond croissant I have ever had. It was so good. 😋
One of the entrances to the cemetery.
Assistens cemetery has some famous Danish people buried there, such as Hans Christian Andersen, Soren Kierkegaard and Niels Bohr.
The cemetery was quite large and I only saw a small fraction of it, but it was beautiful!
This picture and the next few pictures are from the cemetery!
The gravestone of Hans Christian Andersen!
A church in the cemetery.
I just couldn’t get over how pretty the cemetery was!
This was outside the cemetery walls!
After the cemetery, I went back to my hotel, finished packing up and then checked out. I stored my luggage there until my flight to Amsterdam, Netherlands later that evening.
I started off by walking toward Nyhavn.
Copenhagen is a pretty cool looking city. This road was a pedestrian/bike road only.
A town square!
Still on my way to Nyhavn.
Look at those pretty colorful buildings!
I started taking a selfie here but some nice lady offered to take my picture so I let her. My only non-selfie picture in Copenhagen.
The restroom was clean, nice looking and free to use! There was even an attendant on duty who would make sure the stalls were clean after every use.
The clean nice restroom made me happy!
I finished walking around Nyhavn and headed toward Kastellet and The Little Mermaid statue (which were relatively close to one another).
I ran into some cool buildings along the way.
It’s hard to tell in this picture but I was walking on a plaza near Nyhavn and I started hearing music playing in the distance. It got closer and closer until I could see a military marching band marching around the plaza and then they continued on their way through the streets of Copenhagen.
I wish I had gotten a video of it or at least a better picture, but alas I did not. But it was cool to see and hear the marching band marching along the streets of Copenhagen.
I didn’t know this at the time but I just read that the military marching band was probably part of the changing of the guard process at Amalienborg Palace.
For changing of the guard they march from Rosenborg Castle to Amalienborg Palace usually accompanied by music. The plaza I was at was along the path to the palace and it was about the right time of day that they would have been having changing of the guard.
It was cool seeing the marching band then even not knowing what was happening, but now knowing what it was for makes it even cooler. :)
After seeing the marching band, I continued on my way to Kastellet and ran into Frederik’s Kirke. It wasn’t open at the time I walked past but I did walk around the whole outside.
Across the street from Frederik’s Kirke is Amalienborg. Amalienborg is home to the royal family and a museum about the Danish Monarchy.
I did not go inside because for some reason I thought it was closed the day I was there but when I look at the website now, it does look like it was open the day I went. Oh well.
Amalienborg was still cool to see from the outside!
On the plaza at Amalienborg
I was kind of tired from the walking I had already done this day so I rested here by this fountain for a little bit. It was a really nice day!
In this picture (on the other side of the fountain) is Frederik’s Kirke and Amalienborg.
An interesting statue I saw as I was walking to Kastellet.
Kastellet was built in the 17th Century and is one of the best preserved fortresses in Northern Europe. If you look at a map you can see that it is star shaped.
The next several pictures are all from inside Kastellet.
Kastellet covers a decent sized area and is beautiful!
So pretty!
The barracks.
A monument at Kastellet dedicated to the Danish people who were deployed to conflict or disaster areas around the world. The next three pictures are of the monument.
You can read more about the monument four pictures down from here.
I sat here for awhile resting and soaking up the views! Have I mentioned what a nice day it was this day?! Well it was a lovely day in the high 50s and sunny.
After I was through walking around Kastellet, I made my way to The Little Mermaid statue.
Getting close to The Little Mermaid statue.
And I found The Little Mermaid statue. I just needed to follow the crowds of people.
This is as close as I got the statue because I had no desire to brave the crowd that were closest to the statue. And I was okay with that.
This picture was still near The Little Mermaid and the crowd you see is the people trying to see the statue.
A Maritime Monument close to The Little Mermaid
There’s a lot of history in this castle!
I took a picture of the thrones because the sign said the throne on the left was made of narwhal tusk. And the one on the right of silver.
A trouser-wetting chair. Read more about it in the picture below.
I just thought it was so random and funny that I had to take a picture.
It had to have been a practical joke chair, right?!
I think this was Christian III’s sword of state. Made in 1551 and last used in 1648 at the coronation of Frederik III.
Some Crown Jewels at Rosenborg Castle.
Some more Crown Jewels.
I sat here for awhile and enjoyed the view and the nice weather!
I was pretty hungry at this point. I had only eaten the almond croissant and the sourdough roll the whole day and it was already late afternoon.
My next goal was to find food!
I went back to an area that I had walked past earlier that had quite a few restaurant options.
I ended up going to a crepe truck and bought a galette with ham, egg and cheese. I really enjoyed it!
On my way to my next stop, I saw a store full of just duck items! I didn’t go inside but I did look in the window and everything was duck related.
Rundetaarn was built in the 17th century by Christian IV as an astronomical observatory.
Now one can walk to the top and see the beautiful views of the city from above.
The walkway up to see the view from the top!
I appreciated that it was a round slope up instead of a bunch of stairs.
The next eight pictures are views from the top! It was beautiful!
I got over 32,000 steps this day. I was exhausted but it was a lovely day! I really enjoyed Copenhagen and am glad I got to visit even if it was a short amount of time.
This is going to be more detail than anyone wanted to know, but since this record is mostly for me, I am going to write it down.
Getting to the airport was a little more difficult than getting to my hotel from the airport. There was only one train line to and from the airport. But the station near my hotel had multiple train lines that stopped there and there was not clear signage about which track had the line to the airport.
I ended up asking two ladies who spoke a little English for help and thanks to them I found my way to the correct train.
Since I didn’t know what to expect flying out of Copenhagen airport, I gave myself plenty of time to get to the airport and get through security etc. I’m glad I did because it ended up taking me 45 minutes to get through the security line. Although once I got through, they didn’t even have the gate for my flight yet.
So I just waited somewhere with chairs until the screens showed my gate. They finally showed my gate number about an hour before my flight time (which I find super obnoxious but a lot of European airports do that).
Then my gate was a 20-minute walk away. And I’m not even exaggerating because that’s also what the screen said. But I made it to my gate and onto my flight to Amsterdam.
Stay tuned for more posts about my trip!
