Copenhagen Turnaround

We finally arrived at our final port for the first part of the cruise – Copenhagen.  As we had done a city tour and walked around ourselves the first time we were here, we again decided to do something that would let us see more of the country.  So we booked yet another all-day tour, this time to the castles of North Zealand.  Of course, no trip to Copenhagen is complete without a visit to the Little Mermaid…

Our tour took us to Kronborg Castle, best known as the setting for Shakespeare’s Hamlet.  And, although we haven’t posted the photo, we’re still batting a thousand on our scaffolding theme – one side of the castle was under renovation.  The castle is open for pre-arranged tours, but we wouldn’t have enough time to do that and everything else on the list, so we had to be content with walking around the ‘castle close’, the area within the walls but outside of the building itself, and check out the courtyard.

It was almost as though Shakespeare himself was handling the setting for our visit. The day started out very nice, but clouded over and cooled off, and even sprinkled a little with rain, while we were at Kronborg.

The interesting thing about the courtyard is that is still used for concerts and there is the annual presentation of Hamlet by various international Shakespearean companies. This year it will be around the beginning of August, with the Globe Theatre (the theatre that originally presented Shakespeare’s works in London) presenting the play. Our tour guide, Avril, said that it is always a wonderful experience. The play is presented outside in the courtyard as the sun goes down, and the castle lighting adds to the overall effect of the story. It seems that Shakespeare was related to someone (through his wife) who visited Kronborg on a regular basis and told him about the castle and what went on there, and who also told him the folk tale of Amleth, a Danish prince. So Shakespeare just embellished the story and set it in the castle. And by the way, the Rosenkranz and Guildenstern families really did exist in Denmark around Shakespeare’s time, which gives more credence to the story behind Hamlet’s writing.

After Kronborg, we drove out toward another palace, a much brighter and happier place called Fredensborg, or Freedom Palace.  Oddly enough, as you can see from the photo, the weather cleared again and was nice for the rest of the afternoon.  Fredensborg is used as the summer residence of the Danish royal family.  Queen Margrethe II is the monarch and she was in residence, as is evidenced by the royal guard at the gate.  It is apparently not unusual to see the queen or other members of the family riding their bikes or taking walks around town.  Everyone gives them their privacy but the family, especially Crown Prince Frederick and Princess Mary and their four children, are quite approachable.  Sorry, Mom, we didn’t see anyone during our brief stop.

Then it was on to Asminderød and lunch.  Our buffet included a number of traditional Danish dishes – herring marinated two ways, potato salad, breaded and pan-fried plaice, marinated vegetables and salad, and was very good.  But of course, every little town also had interesting things to see within walking distance of the inn.  It was no exception here.  The church was right across the street, and the cemetery was beautiful, too.  In Denmark, people don’t just bury a family member and put up a headstone.  No, the Danes are so into recycling that the practice is to put up a small headstone and plant a bit of a garden.  The plots are separated by low box or yew hedges.  You pay for 30 years of maintenance for the hedge and the plot as necessary.  We assume that if you want to bury other family members as well, you just keep adding time as you go.  After the 30 years, the church contacts the family and asks if you want to continue to use the plot.  If you don’t, they will remove your headstone and garden, and offer the plot to somebody else.  Taking recycling to an extreme?  Who knows, but it works.

The Inn where we had lunch

The garden at one of the nearby homes

After lunch we headed out again to the last stop – Fredericksborg Palace.  This was originally a summer home for a very rich merchant.  The king of Denmark at the time (somewhere in the 1500’s) loved the palace so much that he made a deal with the merchant to trade him for one of the king’s other palaces.  So that’s how the palace came to be a royal home.  Nowadays it is used as a national history museum.  The outside is maintained by the state, but all the exhibits and the inside are maintained and added to by the Carlsberg and Tuborg Foundations.  The founder of Carlsberg Breweries, Carl Carlsson, wanted to make sure that the Danish people were able to see and connect with their history, so the Foundation bought the castle and turned it into a museum.  It is a very interesting place, similar in some respects to the Hermitage in the sheer number and type of artefacts and paintings on display.  The gardens, too, are quite beautiful and planted in the baroque style similar to the displays at Versailles outside of Paris.



The view over the gardens from one of the windows

Coutyard fountain

One thing we have to say about Denmark is that everything is so open and accessible. It was a long weekend – Whitsunday or Pentecost – with a Monday holiday, so there were lots of people out and about with their families, visiting the parks and gardens.


Sunday evening was the last night for the people getting off the Baltic segment in Copenhagen. We had had a great time with one of the couples from our table, Brian and Cynthia from LA, and Jay, from Chicago, the son of one of the lecturers. We got together for a while in the Avenue Saloon. The photo is of Cynthia, Brian, Larry and Jay. They all expressed their “jealousy” as they went off to finish their packing………… and we ordered another drink!!

 

Monday was “turnaround day” for the crew, with the old passengers leaving and getting the ship ready for the new passengers arriving. As is our custom (from our whole ONE other back-to-back cruise) we had breakfast in our cabin so as to stay “out of the way” during disembarkation. Unfortunately Captain Glenn had parked the ship with the “wrong” side (not ours) against the pier, so we were not able to fully enjoy that other aspect of a B2B; standing on the balcony and watching people leave the ship!  So we had breakfast in our stateroom instead to keep out of everyone’s way.

Crystal offered a shuttle into downtown Copenhagen for “in transit” guests so we headed into the city about 11:30 to visit Tivoli Gardens, an amusement park/restaurant complex in the middle of downtown. Picture holding the CNE, on a much smaller scale, at Nathan Phillips Square and you get the idea. We were last here in 1996 and what surprised us is how little it had changed in 15 years. Even the restaurant we had dinner at with Norm and Barb was still there! We wandered the grounds for a while before stopping at MadKlubben, a restaurant on the grounds, for a traditional Danish lunch. They offer small dishes at a flat rate per dish and recommend a minimum of three per person. With help from our server, we had a smorgasbord of herring, eel, Danish meatballs, Danish pork roast, a vegetable tartlette and salad, all washed down with wine, (non-alcoholic) beer and a schnapps (for Monica anyway). Well fed, we waddled back to the shuttle and the ship where we whiled away the rest of afternoon, finishing the day with dinner at Prego and a visit to The Avenue.

Larry with Clark, Benjamin and a couple of the other Pool Guys who came into town on the same shuttle bus.



The lake at Tivoli Garden



Monica with her smoked eel and Akvavit

Larry with a selection of our small plates