Saturday 14th September
It was an early start today, having to wake up at 3.30, to get everything finalised. In the end we loaded up the car and were en route by about 4.50.
We got to Heathrow without much of a hitch (except finding the pod parking itself), parked and then had to take a bus as the pods were not running. Getting in we went to the family check in and dropped the bags of, before going thorough security – when will we learn not to have full bottles of water which we have to drink?
Not much shopping or browsing then we were getting onto the plane – Airyen still in his PJ’s, for a 7am flight. The flight was mostly uneventful apart from Airyen not wanting to settle down and sit at all.
We arrived in Copenhagen just before 10am local time, with us getting out and collecting our bags in about 30 mins. Then we made our way to the trains – catching one to Nordhavn. We had to activate our 48H Copenhagen card.
We dropped of our bags at Charlottehaven, which was a 5 minute walk from the station then took the train back into the town center at Norreport.
We made our way to the round tower, making our way up to the fist show area. Here we found that Airyen had fallen asleep. Continuing to the top area – hard work pushing a pushchair all the way up – we took turns to have a lookout from the top, which was a brilliant view of the city, before going down.
As Airyen was sleeping, we thought it best to go for lunch. We made our way to SimpleRaw – a vegan restraunt and had some nice food there; a temph burger and a take on a full breakfast with tofu eggs.
Making our way to the Christiansborg Palace, we stopped at the boat tours at Ved Straden and booked out place for 3.30. At the palace, we sat outside and gave Airyen Lunch, before going inside to look at opulent the palace. We even managed to keep Airyen occupied for a while by counting clocks and “playing” in the rooms.
We got to the boat with only a few minutes to spare, so it was quite full by then. It was an hour tour around the waterways, seeing some of the modern architecture – most things pointed our were made after 2000, such as the opera house and library. A bit too long for Airyen though as he wanted to run around by the end.
After docking we walked to Trivoli Gardens (having a bit of fun finding the entrance). The person at the gate asked are we sure we wanted to use the card today to get in as it was quite late – I guess most people spend a long time here and I can see why, lots to see even without the rides.
We were immediately greeted by a parade, after which we had a wonder – eventually making our way to the lake where Airyen and Bhavni had a ride on the flying Animal ride. Airyen then caught sight of a playground, so spent some time there. We had some ice cream and enjoyed seeing all the areas before leaving after 7pm.
Getting the train back from Norreport, we went to Aldi and picked up some pasta and sauce for dinner, before finally checking in at Charlottehaven. Dinner was quick, but it was dark by the time we were eating. Then we settled in for the night.
Sunday 15th September
After a breakfast which had cereal with silly amounts of sweet chocolate, we headed out. The idea was to catch the bus (and we waited a good 15 mins), but we were told by some locals that the service is not running due to the Copenhagen marathon taking place, so we took the train into town then out to Valby.
Here it was a bit of a walk (20 mins) in the breeze to the zoo. Getting in we wondered around seeing the animals. The first was the elusive polar bear – only because after going through the whole enclosure they were at the last place. Then it was the bears and wolves, pandas, mountain leopards then the monkeys and lemurs in their habitats. Finally on this side we found the elephants inside their enclosure, where we stopped for a bit.
We then took the tunnel to the other side of the road – initially for the petting zoo, where Airyen tried to pet some goats. A few had washes later, he found the playground, so was occupied for half an hour. We thought about eating lunch here, but the choice was not that great.
So after we had a look at the savannah animals. With the giraffes and antelope. We found the rhinos after ascending the upper walkway and facing the meerkats.
Crossing back under the tunnel, we had a look at the main restaurant area – the first we walked into they cautiously told us it was a pure vegan restaurant, and the menu seemed good – perfect! We ordered a few sharing plates – including falafel and a kids platter for Airyen.
After lunch we headed out of the zoo and walked north to Fasanvej St and caught the metro there, (Airyen fell asleep on the walk after he accepted having the plastic wind shield on him). We caught the train all the way to Kastrup which was just before the airport.
From Kastrup it was a 10 minute walk to the National Aquarium. One thing to notice was all the street furniture had changed to have wavy blue accents.
At the Aquarium, we started to explore; the aquarium was vaguely split into 3 areas – tropical, ocean and northern. We started in the ocean area and had a walk around to the tropical and rainforest areas. We even watched a film about coral reefs.
Airyen woke and was happy to find himself in another place he could see things. We spent a while looking at different areas including trying to see if Airyen could pet the rays – no too fast.
We then went to a talk outside about feeding the arctic otters, which we watched only for a while as it was a bit cold outside standing still.
Back inside we spent a while infront of the main tank (with the sharks and other ocean animals), before leaving with the closing of the aquarium.
We caught the train to Norreport as we had decided with all the good restaurants to have dinner in town. Bhavni had been looking at a restaurant on the other side of the canal, which was a 20 minuite walk away, but with the breezy evening we came up to Souls which was another vegan restaurant we recognised.
We had a short wait before we were seated. I ordered a beyond meat burger and Bhavni had a nice big bowl. The food was quite good, though the people serving seemed to forget things a bit.
After dinner we walked back to the station and caught the train back to Nordhavn and the apartment. They had changed our beds to 2 single beds after we asked them in the morning after having an uncomfortable night.
Monday 16th September
After a morning breakfast, with Bhavni having taken the chocolate out of the cereal, we checked out and left our bags at the reception. It was then a train to Norreport, where we walked to the Rosenburg Castle. We were there just after opening, so there was a queue, but not that bad. We placed our stuff in some lockers and then had a small wonder as we still had 20 minuites until our timed entry.
Getting in, we followed the way looking at all the different rooms, starting on the fist floor before going all the way to the top throne rooms. There were lots of interesting items around, and some weirder ones such as the display of glass.
After getting out of the main house we could go to the basement which was full of the treasure and expensive artefacts. First was things such as Ivory and similar things of which there were a lot. Unfortunately Airyen wanted to get out so Bhavni and he did not get to see the next rooms – through a vault door – which were the royal crowns, jewellery and swords.
Getting out we saw a small marching display just outside before we wondered out and went across the road to the grounds around the Botanical and Geological museums. Really nice gardens, though as we realised the time we thought we better leave to go for lunch, however as there was lots of renovation work getting done we found it hard to get out – ending up walking all the way to the way we walked in.
Bhavni wanted to go to a restaurant called sidecar, but that was quite a walk away so we instead went to cafe Bla – another vegan cafe. We ended up ordering a large sharing platter, some side and a children’s plate – far too much food.
After a quite long meal, we realised we needed to get a move on – since we had a plane to get. However instead of getting back to the train it was quicker getting a bus – which we had to get a ticket for as our Copenhagen card passes had expired.
We rushed and got our bags then headed on the train to the Airport. We arrived just before 3pm and checked our bags in. We got through security and did a bit of shopping (biscuits and such). Soon we were boarding the plane and on our way (after a bit of reshuffling bags).
Was mostly uneventful a flight apart from Airyen not wanting to sit with a belt on his own. We were meant to be early in, but the plane had a go around, so we pretty much were on time at 17:30. Getting through imigration and getting the bags went smoothly and we got the pod back to the car park, which was a novel experience. It was then a drive round the M25 to home.