10/8 Copenhagen

Friday 10^th Wonderful wonderful Copenhagen

The 3 Germans got up and started packing to go about 7.30am. This took about an hour, during which they whispered but still managed to make more noise than Stalingrad 1944. J formatted the latest round of hostel bookings for printing while I went and returned with contraband yoghurt for brekky with our stash of cereal.

We headed off and wandered around for hours, including a stay of about an hour at the Palace. The changing of the guard dragged on for the longest time after the actual change over. I was hoping for a re-enactment of the way they did it in 1979 when I was last here, which was to run off as though they had just heard that lunch was ready but there wasn’t enough to go round.

Marble church near the palaces. 

We saw an interesting dog there with a young couple. It had floppy ears and a generally dolorous look but longer legs than a basset. We asked and they were very happy to expound about this rare French Hunting Dog. We googled it and it probably is a form of basset with typical black and tan German markings.

We had focaccias for lunch and resumed wandering. Eventually J determined that it was Museum Time so C headed off back to the hostel to print hostel vouchers, passing Herr Basset and family at the Stork Fountain.

J stayed in the museum till closing and still didn't get to see it all.  Well worth a visit - and it was free.

These bikes are secured out the front of a department store similar to Myers.  Near the entry door they are totally blocking the path.  No one cares and you just move onto the road to walk around them.  Can you see this happening in Australia?  I doubt it.  Yet it caters for environment, economy and general health and wellbeing.  It has to be a good thing.

We needed to be in the Tivoli Gardens before 8pm because the price goes up on Fridays when they have concerts. We had cheeseburgers and chips on the way there (even in Copenhagen Maccas manage to serve cheeseburgers for less than $2). Apparently Tivoli was the inspiration for Disneyland.It was only about a couple of hectares and pretty tightly filled up with outlets for food and drink and the full selection of all the traditional sideshows, rides etc.

There was very little for nothing and to a large extent the park was a place where you pay $16 to get access to bars and restaurants and a heap of carnival rip-offs.

The one free activity was an old-fashioned pantomime (with the accent on mime) – pretty silly repetitive slapstick. This was in the open air and it was trying to decide whether it was going to rain. We had seats but the plebs came and stood in front of us so we gave up and went and stood in front of them.

Theatre

We then spent a lot of time watching the roller coaster and the airplane ride.  The roller coaster was pretty small but still managed to extract squeals. We couldn’t imagine ourselves wanting to try the loop-the-loop or the corkscrew part of the ride – its bad enough while you are upright. No we aren’t thrill seekers.

The airplane was infinitely worse. Each one held 4 passenger/victims, who spun at increasing speeds through vertical circles on a beam that must have been about 10 metres long. The centrifugal force would drain the blood and oxygen from your brain and then the plane started rotating sideways as well. There was a lot of screaming and some of the young blokes who emerged didn’t look too flash.

The main attraction was a rock concert in the middle of the gardens. Some Danish band.

We walked back about 11pm – there were still heaps of people walking around town as well as a lot of cycle rickshaws. Some of the youngsters were a bit rowdy but there didn’t seem to be any aggravation or the sort of mayhem that erupts in Perth whenever the morons get onto the turps.