Copenhagen Travelogue

A few days ago I got back from a trip to Copenhagen – Thursday the 18th through Thursday the 25th. My friend Rich was there for much of it, and had gotten there two days before me. For the first half of the trip we stayed near Gammel Strand.

Thursday

Thursday I landed and took the metro to the place Rich had rented to drop off stuff and take a short nap. Afterward we explored the Broens outdoor food market and wandered around the neighborhood. Later we checked out a cocktail bar called Bird (uptown). It’s a cool listening bar with a great menu and excellent music playing on vinyl. For dinner we went to Barr, which is in the space that used to be Noma.

Our rental was at the top floor of a building in Gammel Strand area, and the basement of that building is a bar called the Lord Nelson. We went there Thursday night and had a ball talking to regulars and the bartender. I returned to the Lord Nelson a few times during my stay just because it was so super friendly and always open late.

Friday

Rich and I took a day trip into Sweden – to Malmö, which is an easy trip by train across the Øresundsbroen.

Unfortunately the city was pretty shut down for the Midsommar festival, and we didn’t get it together in time to find a place to try to experience that; so we just ended up walking around a relatively quiet Malmö for a few hours. I’m easily amused and thought it was very funny that there’s a sign banning balloons. Turns out there is even a discussion about this on Reddit.

After that we headed back to Copenhagen. We walked around Tivoli Gardens, then decided to check out the brewery tour at the “Home of Carlsberg”. We had dinner close to the rental, then watched the USA World Cup match at Lord Nelson.

Saturday

Saturday morning I woke up super early on just a few hours sleep and decided to get on the metro and just go somewhere. I ended up wandering around the Fisketorvet mall with almost no one in it while the shops were opening, and taking pictures of the installation art there. After forcing myself to nap for an hour, we checked out of the rental near Gammel Strand, and switched to staying in a house boat that is docked on the Christianshavns Kanal. On the way, I grabbed breakfast at Lille Fugl, and got eggs that were so good they brought me back there twice(!) during the trip. I am so mad that I didn’t get a picture of the eggs. Staying on the house boat was neat but also very uncomfortable, both in terms of the temperature and humidity, and general cramped-ness. One cool thing about it was just being able to sit on the roof deck and watch the little boats go by in the canal.

Later Saturday, we did a nice long walk to Kongens Have park, walked around (but unfortunately not onto) Kastellet, and saw the Lille Havfrue (Little Mermaid) statue. We grabbed dinner at Tiger Lily on Paper Island (Papirøen), then later on went to Strøm for cocktails.

Sunday

On Sunday we got to the Statens Museum for Kunst, which is a can’t-miss for Nordic art, as well as the Hirschsprung Collection which felt like happening into the private residence of an art collector, in the manner of the erstwhile Barnes collection. We rode bikes to Warpigs for dinner – excellent barbecue that didn’t break the bank and also one million amazing beers. We shared a flight of 8 and they were each so so good. We walked back, and crossed the Lille Langebro on the way back to the boat. I grabbed drinks at the Victory Cocktail Bar, a top-floor bar in the same building as Tiger Lily.

Monday

On Monday Rich and I did our own things during the day. I took a train up to Helsingør and saw the castle there (“Elsinore” in English – the one where Shakespeare filmed Hamlet). I wandered around there for a bit then took a ferry across back into Helsingborg, Sweden, where I wandered around for a bit and looked around at really cool little music shop, Beme Music. I took a train from there back into Copenhagen. When I got back I wandered around Freetown Christiania on the way back to the boat. Rich and I grabbed dinner in Nyhavn and then I went over to the Tipsy Mermaid – a bar-on-a-boat owned by the same guy who owns the Lord Nelson.

Tuesday

I hung out at P88, a nice little coffee shop on Paper Island, and did some catching up with my journal and writing. Rich and I met at the Designmuseum Danmark. They had some really cool displays, and a neat scattered history of design, with a focus on the history of Danish design. I took a metro back to the Fisketorvet, and rented a bike to go across the Bryggebroen, another modern pedestrian and cycle bridge. I also walked across the Stadsgraven on the Eli Møllers Bro. I got dinner at Fiat in Nyhavn / Kongens Nytorv and then Rich and I grabbed drinks at the other Bird location in Indre By to round out our trip.

Wednesday

Rich had to leave on Wednesday, so we checked out of the boat and killed the morning just chilling and helping him get a few gifts he wanted to pick up for friends.

After he headed to the airport I got a really solid Neapolitan style pizza at Luca near Gammel Strand. I spent the day doing a lot of wandering, and spent a bunch of time at a really cool acoustic guitar store, Akustikken. I also watched some bands setting up and doing sound check at Byhaven. I also stopped in at a super nice cafe, Buna & Co., and chatted with the owner there, who had recently experienced some Instagram virality due to the drummer for Alice Cooper or something like that visiting and sharing a picture of a matcha latte.

I headed to the hotel and vegged for a little bit (enjoying the prospect of sleeping on solid ground). I got dinner at this place called Tom’s Oysterhouse, which I’d been low-key trying to get to the whole week but was hard to get a reservation. That really rounded out my week of being more adventurous trying oysters: they had 6 or 8 different kinds, and I tried a few of those. Of course on my last night I hung out at the Lord Nelson once again, where I ran into the Greenlandic couple I’d met the first night I was there.

Thursday

Had to head home Thursday afternoon, but of course not before I grabbed those eggs from Lille Fugl one more time. Oh, and I found a picture. If you go, get them with the mushrooms.