Hey, remember that time that I was like, “I’ll just continue this post tomorrow,” and actually believed it? That was a funny time. Anyways, it seems I am now really behind so I’ll be trying to catch you up. I’ve had some interesting times and might as well share. I’m also trying to catch up on posting pictures too since apparently I hadn’t posted pictures since September. So where was I. OK, landing in Copenhagen. The weather was also pretty consistently rainy and cloudy and cold there. Nothing too drastic but I definitely could have used some sun to spruce up my pictures. (I mean, given the scenery, you can take all the help you can get right?) But anyways, we found a map and found that we weren’t really too far from what we gathered to be the old city. See, in every city we’ve been to so far there is one conveniently centrally located area called the Altstadt which is both the most beautiful, interesting and touristy. I don’t know what I’d do if I came to a city where you had to go all over to see the sights. The “sights” need to be located in one area so you can walk from one thing to another, with the option of stopping to get something to eat or drink along the way. But anyways. So it was about, I’m going to say a 20 minute walk to the “altstadt”? (I’m just going to look up and see if it has a real name. The German word for “old city” probably isn’t it) (It looks like it’s just called “City” which is nice because I don’t know how to write those o’s with a line through it, so that makes things simpler.)
We first wanted to find something to eat. So we dropped by a place that seemed to be under the impression it had a western theme? Like, all the barstools were like saddles and all the decor seemed to be hinting that this was a real taste of the West. Well, whatever the theme was, I did have a very interesting chicken salad. As it was the cheapest thing on the menu. (Have I mentioned? Copenhagen is actually, very expensive!) I was also feeling short on cash so I was trying not to spend money wherever possible. We were going to spend the rest of the day just wandering I guess but none of us really knew anything about Kopenhagen so I don’t know how fun that was going to be. As it happened we ran into this corner where two different tourist bus companies were both staked out, waiting to bother passer-by to see if they wanted to ride it. At first I was like, Heck no, keep walking but Megan immediately asked, How much. He said it was normally 160 Kronor but he could give it to us for 120 each and I was like, Absolutely not. But then this OTHER guy from the red bus company came over and was like, No, you don’t want this bus, you don’t see anything, come on ours! And then there was this great back and forth between the two guys. The red shirt guy was older and said things like, “What do you know, you’ve been here one day, I’ve been here 12 years!!” so which the younger green shirt replied, “So what?” “No, no, no, you don’t want to go on this bus, you don’t see anything. Come on this one and you see everything.” “What do you mean you don’t see anything, no, look see, you see all these things on the map here” “No, no, they can’t–see, they can’t come inside the city and they go around. This one you see everything here and there are 3 buses you can take and–” “No, you don’t want to do that, this one is just ONE bus, you don’t have to change at all, you just stay on….” etc. And during all this Megan kept driving down the price and we finally got the younger guy to get us tickets for 50 each. This is like 6 or 7 Euro, and if the normal price was 160, quite a steal. Plus it was valid for 48 hours so we could use it the next day too if we wanted. It turned out he gave us children’s tickets, so like as if we were under 14, but no one looked at our tickets after that so it was fine. It was actually a really good idea, since we wouldn’t have known what to see and since this one did drive around more we saw things we wouldn’t have been able to walk to. Plus they had these headphones so you could learn things as well. That’s how I learned one of the most popular tourist attractions in Copenhagen was the statue of the Little Mermaid, which is usually right here but this year it was moved to China to represent Denmark in some exhibition. Also we passed a statue of a guy on a horse and it was supposed to be trotting or something but the statue wasn’t stable enough so the artist added a naked guy underneath that the horse was trampling as the rider paid him no mind. Actually I didn’t know the man was naked or being trampled until later when we got off the bus and I could see what they were talking about. The bus was fun and I saw a lot but a lot of my pictures were blurry, obviously, because the bus can’t stop in the middle of traffic so I can get all my pictures but the recording didn’t always match what I was seeing so I kind of had to figure that out later when we were walking around.
So that night we went to a Schawarma place (So good!! I like it so much better than the Döner I’ve had in Heidelberg so far) which was cheap too and then took an early-ish night. The next day, we decided to pop over to Sweden for the afternoon and have lunch. We learned on our bus tour that trains went to Malmö every 20 minutes and the trip was only about 40 minutes. Plus things were cheaper over there. You can see why I was so on board with this. Of course, Swedish Kronor are different from Danish so I had to withdraw more but I easily exchanged it when we got back to the train station. And we got to be in Sweden for a while! That day was also pretty cloudy and cold and I wanted to get a scarf because everyone else in the world had one and I had cleverly forgotten all mine in Heidelberg. I saw an absolutely gorgeous one in a window and later found out it was 450 Swedish Kronor. I don’t know exactly how much that is but I only withdrew 300 Kronor, as that’s the least possible option at the ATM. So, too much. We found an H&M though (love H&M!) and I got a purple scarf (love purple!) for 80 Kronor, which I figured was like, 8 to 9 Euro. We also found this giant tower in Malmö but had more trouble finding it than you’d expect, seeing as all the pictures we’d seen in the souvenir shops (the only reason I knew to look for it was because the Malmö shot glasses had this giant twisty tower on it) all showed it towering above everything else. Well, apparently we just need to walk down by the water and get an angle where it wasn’t blocked by other tall-ish buildings. The sun was setting then but because it was so cloudy, it doesn’t really show up well in my pictures. But it was a cool experience. After that we walked back to the train station and took a train back to Denmark. (oh, la de da…switching countries again…)
The next morning we got up bright and early to find our way to the airport and take off at 8am. This bakery around the corner from our hotel was just opening at 6 so we got to get something to eat and drink on our way to the metro. That place is heaven PS. I wish I could have tried so much more. I got a chocolate croissant and the most delicious chocolate milk in the world!! I don’t know what it was about it, but it was better than anything you can imagine!! Just trust me. It was a great breakfast. Mmm…it makes me smile to remember it. Anyways. So we checked in fine, no last minute €110 problems like last time. We were actually as early as we planned though, so we had some waiting time. The actual flight was OK too. We weren’t sitting together but each middle seat was open. So I had a space between me and the Asian fellow on the aisle. Taking off was fine, which was good because I was slightly worried about my ear. I had had trouble sleeping the night before because it was bothering me so much but it stopped hurting in the morning but I was so tired I couldn’t decide if I dreamed the whole thing or not. I did not. Whatever reason taking off was so jolly did not seem to apply to landing. It was unpleasant but I managed not to squirm too much, as I’m sure the Asian guy would not have understood why I was rocking back and forth so much. Anyways, my ear was plugged most of the rest of the day though. We took a nice train from Dusseldorf back to Mannheim though. We didn’t reserve seats but luckily got some unreserved ones. Plus I had just gotten a delicious sandwich from Kamps at the Dusseldorf train station!! The brötchen was perfectly light and fresh and there was lettuce and tomato and Frischkäse…I didn’t know what Frischkäse was before but it is so good! It’s like cream cheese but more like actual cheese. I don’t know. Again, you’re just going to have to trust me.
I was so excited to get home again though, I didn’t sleep on the way back. And on the short ride from Mannheim to Heidelberg I was trying not to jump up and down. There were these other kids falling asleep in front of me and I was like, Really? How can you sleep at a time like this? Plus the weather in Heidelberg was sunny and warm. Basically: amazing. And it was Saturday, not Sunday like I kept thinking so I could still go to stores and get food! So cheap! And I had all afternoon so it was really nice. It was a fun trip and we saw a lot but it was so exhausting and plus I was getting sick too. I’m mostly over that now though. Alright, I’m still behind but next time I can talk about the amazing time we had in Salzburg last weekend. (I went with Annika, Sarah and Haleigh and it was certainly interesting!)