Sunday began with the much anticipated danish pastry making class. The whole group went together and learned how to make four different pastries. The long twisted sticks have two types of seeds on them (our instructor says if you put seeds on anything, the danish love it and will buy it). The rectangles with the braided top have chocolate in them (these were my favorite). The white granules you see on these and the square danishes are actually sugar crystals, not salt. The square danishes have fresh vanilla cream on top, and then of course we have the round cinnamon rolls.
The class took about 4.5 hours and was a lot of fun. We learned a lot about making pastries, though I’m not sure we’ll be able to replicate them at home.
After taking our 24 pastries (minus the three we ate and one we gave away) back to the hotel, mom and I decided to head out on our own for the Cisternerne. The Cisternerne is an art gallery, water reservoir, and urban dripstone cave. It was originally created to house and filter drinking water, but has since been drained and converted into part of the Frederiksburg Museums. Each year an artist is invited to create an exhibit specifically for the space. We saw the exhibition created by Korean artist Kimsooja which incorporates light and color with the water and the architecture of the cisternerne. It was really beautiful and we enjoyed it tremendously.
Right across the street from the Cisternerne is the Copenhagen Zoo, so we decided to pop in there for a bit after we had finished enjoying the art. The zoo was beautifully designed and very large - we didn’t even see all the habitats before it was closing. Many of the animals were napping late in the afternoon, but we still got to see some activity from the baboons, otters, and kangaroos.
After leaving the zoo, we took the bus and headed over to Church of our Savior which is one of Copenhagen’s most famous churches because of its spire which you can climb up to get a panoramic view of the city. Unfortunately, when we got there we learned that we needed a timed reservation because they limit the number of people that go up at once, so we could not go in but we did make a reservation to come back the next day (Monday).
By then we were tired and hungry so we headed back to our hotel. We stopped in a grocery store along the way to pick up a salad, some salami, and cheese to go with our danish pastries back at the room.
Monday we had some free time in the morning, so we decided to take a train out to Roskilde Cathedral, which is where all the danish monarchs are buried. Although our app said the cathedral opened at 10 on Mondays, when we got there the sign out front said they didn’t open until 1pm. Unfortunately we could not stay that long because we had plans with the group starting at lunch time. We walked around the outside of the cathedral and through the town a little bit to find the Roskilde Museum. The museum was interesting and had lots of play areas for small children, though it was fairly empty at the time.
Next we took the train back to the city where we met up with the rest of the group for lunch (burgers) and then a canal boat tour. The boat tour was given in English and Italian and was very informative. Denmark has a lot of strict guidelines about building, so most of the time, old buildings get repurposed rather than torn down which leaves the city with quite a lot of history.
After the canal boat tour, mom and I planned to walk through the free town of Christiania and go back to church of our savior for our reservation to climb the tower. Two other members of our group decided to join us, and the four of us had a great time. Christiania is known for its open sale and use of marijuana so the rule is no cameras allowed within the town. At the church, we climbed 400 stairs to the top of the tower. Most of the stairs are inside the tower, but the last section is actually external stairs that wrap around the tower. The only disappointment was that we did not get to go inside the actual church, only the bell tower.
Tuesday was our last day in Copenhagen and Denmark so after breakfast we checked out of our hotel, asked the front desk to store our bags, and headed down the street to Tivoli Gardens. Tivoli is an amusement park that is said to have been the inspiration for Walt Disney to build Disney World and Disneyland. There are rides, arcade games, food, shops, an aquarium, and beautiful gardens. The gardens and restaurants themed for different countries felt like Epcot, and of course the rides felt like magic kingdom. There did not appear to be the cohesive theming Disney has, and we only saw one character in costume performing for a group of small children. Mom and I did not go on any rides, but we did have some candy and ice cream and enjoyed the ambiance.
Around 3pm we all picked up our bags and headed to the train station to take a train to the airport. Our scheduled 1 hour flight to Stavanger, Norway ended up being delayed about half an hour, but thankfully that was the only snag we hit.
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