España: Esto No Es La Vida Real: København, Denmark!

Oh Copenhagen. Words cannot possibly describe how in love with that city I am. I feel like it is such an underrated city. I never hear anyone talk about it and even when one of my best friends said she was going to study abroad there, I specifically remember asking why? When she returned she had nothing but amazing things to say about it. She said if I ever had the chance to go there, I needed to go. Alex was absolutely telling the truth. Im not going to lie, I had no idea what to expect from Copenhagen other than cold weather and expensive price tags. It proved to be so much more than I could have ever dreamed of.

My Danish adventures began last Wednesday. My roommate Kelly and I had a 9am flight from Sevilla to Barcelona. During the layover in Barca, I shelled out my last remaining euros to purchase an American cosmo. Probably one of the best things I could have spent 5 euros on. God I’ve missed those 107 things to do with a silk tie articles. After a quick layover, we were off to Copenhagen. I saw more blondes boarding the plane than I had seen over the past 3 months in Spain. Little did I know what I was getting into. It was only a three hour flight and we were finally in Denmark! Stepping off the plane was brutal. We had gone from 35C to a mere 7C but I didn’t care since we were in CPH. We stood in such awe of the Danish everywhere and then soon realized we couldn’t even begin to pretend we understood what was being said. Good thing the danes realize no one else speaks Danish and had English subtitles under everything. After a quick metro ride to the central train station and a three minute walk to the hotel, we immediately dropped our bags off and began exploring the amazing city. It was about 530 when we started to wander. We decided to walk down Strøget which is Europe’s longest pedestrian walkway. It was over a kilometer long and it was lined with little restaurants, pastry places and shops. We stumbled upon this store called Made in America. It sold all sorts of American delicacies like jello, marshmellow fluff, mountain dew, reeses and cheetos. We were in such awe and seriously considered shelling out some big bucks for these treats. Side note, Denmark uses the Danish krone. So 1 USD equals a little more than 5 krone. Anyways, one pack of reese’s were 20 krone so we passed on that fast. We couldn’t help but notice all the 7-11’s that lined the Strøget. It was insane, like how dunks or starbucks is in Boston is how 7-11 is in Copenhagen. We assumed that they would have cheap prices for things, but we were mistaken. We were in CPH so everything was pricey. A carton of Ben and Jerrys was 50 krone. Yep $10 dollars. For dinner we settled for a box of Chinese takeout for 45 krone. We decided to call it a night after that and headed back to our hotel room, ate our Chinese food and watched a little Jersey shore in Danish. What could be better!

Thursday brought endless adventures. It turns out we picked some of the best days to be in Copenhagen. Thursday was opening day at Tivoli, which is an old amusement park which Walt Disney based Disneyland off of. There were Easter decorations everywhere and I felt like a little kid again running around in such awe of everything Tivoli had to offer. The highlight of Tivoli during the day was certainly stumbling upon a wild peacock. It was making such god awful squawking noises at me but I honestly don’t think I’ve seen a peacock in person before. It was so beautiful and I knew Nini would be insanely jealous. After meandering though the park, we discovered they were having a fireworks show at night to commemorate opening day. We were thrilled since we both absolutely love fireworks. After Tivoli we ventured to try and find the famed Little Mermaid statue. We navigated though the confusing street names until we came across this area which said it contained the Little Mermaid. Im not sure what I thought the Little Mermaid would be but it was literally a small rock with a bronze mermaid on the top that was no bigger than I was. Oh well. I couldn’t hate since I love the Little Mermaid terribly. Walking back towards the city center, we stopped to get Pølsers which are Danish hotdogs essentially. Next stop was Christiania, little did we know we would be in for a royal treat on our way there. We came across these massive crowds and tv crews and literally had no clue what was going on. We asked a few locals and they said it in a few minutes the Danish royal family would be arriving to the church for the baptism of the royal twins, the new prince and princess of Denmark. We stuck around and caught a glimpse of the Danish royal family! It was so cool and I’m sure we couldn’t have even found this place if we tried. Next stop before reaching Christiania, was climbing this church to seeing panoramic views of Copenhagen. Of course we got their right before it was closing so we had to run up and down in record time. The views from the top were spectacular and it was a little frightening since once we had made it through the church, there was a spiral staircase on the steeple. I loved every second of being up there. Seeing the city from up high was definitely the best way to do it. After the church we made it to Christiania. Words cannot describe this place and neither can pictures since photography is prohibited. It’s basically this outlaw community that isn’t technically a part of the European union. They sell weed in little baggies like its candy and there are no cars there. It’s a very hippy community with a really cool vibe and intricate graffiti everywhere. Kelly described it as a Morocco with blondes.

One of the best things about Copenhagen is their men. It is such a 180 from Spanish men. Spaniards are most of the time shorter than I am and have very dark features. Danish men are tall, blonde and have amazing blue eyes. It was heaven for sure. On our way back from our adventures, we grabbed some typical Danish pastries and went back to the hotel to get ready for the fireworks. Went ventured back out to Tivoli at 10 for the show. Even though they were only 15 minutes long, I still loved every second of it. Fireworks are my favorite part of 4^th of July and it just reminded me of being back on the cape. IT was the perfect way to spend our last night in CPH. Friday we had a 5pm flight to Budapest so we could spend a few hours in the city before we left. We decided to take a walk along the canals and played with the geese! Our last stop was the famed Nyhavn district. It is the most picturesque area of Copenhagen. It’s a canal lined with boats and various colored houses. I wish we could sit at an outdoor restaurant and stay there forever. I loved Copenhagen so much and am literally going to tell everyone I know to visit there. I want everyone else to loved Copenhagen as much as I did. It’s just an indescribable feeling but seriously, I cannot wait to someday return to this amazing ciy. Jeg elsker København :)