The Contiki tour of Copenhagen was fairly quick, but we got a little history and, though we did see much of the stuff I'd seen the day prior, we got some interesting background and also some things I'd missed like the Little Mermaid statue (H.C. Anderson wrote the original that Disney based their version on).
We also got to check out the famed Carlsberg brewery, which was quite interesting in that it showed the history of beer drinking in Denmark and the development of modern beer brewing methodologies over time as related to Carlsberg. Some things they haven't changed, however. For example, they still use big Clidesdale horses to haul beer kegs from place to place and they have a stable of them for this purpose. Then it was time to taste the fruits of their labour, a nice sampling of beer at noon in true Danish style. An intersting way to start the day. After that, as is par for the course on Contiki, it was free time time. Time.
I took a canal tour which took us near many of the sites of Copenhagen by water but, unbeknownst to me at the time, was unguided. So it was a little, shall we say, dull, if not relaxing. I grabbed myself some lunch (a cheap hotdog - food is pricey!) and an ice cream (well, to wash away the hot dog taste - even if I accidentally ordered rum & raisin) and I walked with Emma and Naomi to this church that resembles the tour of Babylon. There's a big black and gold steeple with a winding staircase on the outside that was a lot of fun to climb, and climb we did. Naomi is apparently a little frightened of heights but she did alright regardless and we snapped a few photos and took in the scenery from the top before heading down again and splitting off. Them to shop, me to Tivoli. I actually did shop a little for a t-shirt since in the morning the weather had been very overcast and cool and it had warmed up considerably leaving me stranded in a sweater and black jeans.
Now, I hear the few of you who made it this far asking, Tivoli? No folks, that's not a typo. Or a type of beer. It's a little amusement park in the heart of Copenhagen and the first one in the world. In fact, it is the park that inspired a man by the man of Walt to build a park by the name of Disneyland some time ago. It was neat in there, a few rides (which were far too expensive to think about riding) and all sorts of themed areas, restaurants, and games. A group of us met up in Tivoli, though I can't remember many of the people that were there at this point, but we hung around for a few hours and then went back to the hostel and hung out in someone's room and chatted while I uploaded some of my pictures which you undoubtedly have viewed many times.
The next morning, we left for Stockholm, Sweden. I sat with Allison on the bus, which was interesting. You see, we have a morning song which is slightly punkish in leanings and inspires her to head bang like crazy. Which is all good, I admire her lack of inhibition, but when you're sitting beside her at this point, those two ponytails are potentially lethal and definitely frightening as well as life-altering. As time progressed, however, the morning headbang would become more integral than the song itself.
It was a long bus ride with the occasional stops and not much for scenery, so we were feeling a little antsy when we arrived. So much so, that I went for a jog (yes, you read that right) with Naomi and Gord for a couple k. At which point I finally had to give up. We went looking for the train station but invariably went the wrong way and wound up at the next stop believe it or not. We made it back in time for din-din, and then a group of us went out that night. We met up with a friend of Naomi's who lived there and brought us to a second-storie bar overlooking the square which was somewhat dead but the place itself was decent and they actually stayed open an extra hour or two for us. It was a great night with some very interesting conversation going on and we managed to make the last train back to the hostel which was a nice treat as well.
No comments:
Post a Comment