Copenhagen Trip - Conclusion

This was an amazingly great vacation, and we wouldn't hesitate to come to Copenhagen again. Denmark is such a friendly place, and so easy to get around in. There's plenty in the city we didn't see, and outside of town there's of course Sweden as well as other museums and castles on the Danish side.

We came out really well on budget, too, spending only about 60% of the cash we'd expected to use. Having that kitchenette in the hotel room was a real money-saver - and we still got to experience fresh, healthy Danish food. Ann appreciated the ability to just relax - read - and not have to rush anywhere. Wynn loves spending every hour with us. And I light up exploring a new culture and figuring out how to get around.

Ann finally got the time and space to read a few novels just for enjoyment, instead of for school

Monday morning we set out at 7 am for the train station, catching the 7:11 to Copenhagen's airport to allow plenty of time for our 10:15 to Amsterdam. (I like lots of time in airports...) And it was good that we arrived early, because when we went to the KLM/Air France/Delta counter to check in and drop off our luggage, the agent couldn't find our reservation.

Turns out Delta had cancelled the Amsterdam-Minneapolis flight we were supposed to be on, and rebooked us on another flight instead. (They emailed us, but in the middle of the night Copenhagen time, so we didn't have a clue...)

Instead of being put on a Delta flight directly from Copenhagen to Atlanta or New York, instead we were routed on a British Airways flight to London's Heathrow Airport, to connect to Delta's London-Minneapolis nonstop. It would add another 2 hours to our travel time, and we didn't have seat assignments on the Delta flight, but our little family is a band of explorers, after all, and what choice did we have?

It gave us an extra half-hour in Copenhagen's airport, which may well be the nicest airport on the planet. Wood floors, friendly security agents (great with kids), a full-on shopping mall airside, including an H&M, lots of places to eat, plenty of windows and sunlight and green plants. And enough seating for everyone to be comfortable.

Plus, a teensy Little Mermaid on the international wing for little girls to pose next to...

None of us had ever been on British Airways or through Heathrow before, so this was going to be interesting

Spare time to goof off at Copenhagen

Arrival at London was a little early, but the way Heathrow is set up - with five different terminals spread around the outside of the property instead of next to each other - required a long shuttle bus ride from BA at Terminal 5 to Delta at Terminal 4. (But we got to see all sorts of airplanes really close up, so I'm not complaining about that.)

Where we will complain is about the decidedly third-world setup for transfer passengers at Terminal 4, and how Delta and its partner airlines manage their London operation. We waited in line in the bowels of the building for a half-hour, bouncing from unmarked line to unmarked line and among three staff before obtaining boarding documents - but still not seat assignments.

We hoofed it up to the gate level to get to the gate for seat assignments (our worry being that we were going to be split up with neither of us next to Wynn) - to find no agents at the gate. I stayed at the gate area with Wynn while Ann ran back to a Starbucks for drinks and a sandwich - by the time she returned a few agents and another hundred passengers had shown up, all wanting to ask questions. (No monitors or self-service terminals for passengers to figure things out on their own - and the computers the agents were using were laptops, with tractor-feed paper printouts to try to determine last-minute seat assignments.)

These weren't Delta staff, by the way, rather a mix of Alitalia and contract agents, whose fist language was not English. The Olympics are in 14 months, are these people going to be ready?

We did end up sitting near each other - Ann and Wynn together, with me in the next seat across the left-hand aisle. Wynn was awake most of the way, only sleeping for the last two hours of the flight. We landed at Minneapolis about 5:20 - and waited another 15 minutes for the jetway to be repaired so we could get off. At least we didn't have to wait for our luggage!

Wynn likes having the personal touchscreen system - she hung out with Elmo most of the way over...

We finally got home about 7 pm last night (or about 2 am Copenhagen time) - I was in bed and passed out by 8:30 (and down for the count as well); Wynn and Ann only got a couple hours' sleep and have been up and down all day today.

Even though the last bit was messed up, we still got home safe and sound with all our stuff, and having had a marvelous adventure. Tomorrow, back to everyday life.

Copenhagen Trip - Day Six

11 pm last night – looking toward downtown under clouds. Copenhagen – the city of steeples.

We decided not to go to Malmo this morning, as we hadn’t really finished our souvenir shopping in Copenhagen. The stores in Sweden weren’t opening until noon, and we would have had to buy both roundtrip tickets to cross the Oresund Bridge, as well as transit passes in Malmo, since the places we were most interested in weren’t easily connected on foot. And we would’ve needed to convert more money, since neither Sweden nor Denmark use the Euro, and neither country wants to use the other’s currency. By the time we got back to Denmark, the stores that were open here today would have closed...

The weather was cloudy and sunny with gusty winds and occasional sudden drenching downpours, or, as it goes, another typical day. Ann remarked we’d be huddling under an awning in Sweden, too, if we’d gone over there.

Instead, we headed back downtown and worked our way from Central Station out through the shopping streets and back.

These polser trailers are EVERYWHERE - you can get your sausage fix at pretty much any public square in the entire country. There's even one set up at baggage claim at the airport...

Wynn found several more elephants to pose with:

Posing with some kind of royal elephant-dragon-griffin critter in front of City Hall.

The Stroget after a nice stiff rainshower. Not nearly as many tourists out on a Sunday morning; it was a good idea to come back here as we could really take the time to look instead of just get pushed along by the crowd.

We went into Tivoli Gardens again (the Copenhagen Card gives free admission, so why not?) and had a very nice Scandinavian lunch. The music stages all over Tivoli were featuring high-school and college bands and singing groups – a very Glee-kind-of-vibe going on, including the songs being performed (“Forget You” – but since this is Denmark, the uncensored version… yes, with little kids walking all over the place… no, nobody got fired or even seemed concerned… the adults and teenagers seemed to be enjoying it…)

After returning to the hotel, I picked up a few last-minute items for dinner and treats to take back to the States, and then we went for a swim in the hotel pool. Ann & Wynn took a nap afterward while I worked through the leftovers in the fridge.

Tonight we’re running one last load of laundry and have the suitcases opened up on the floor, figuring out what gets packed where. We’ll head out bright and early to the train station – leaving the hotel about 7 am; our flight leaves at 10 for Amsterdam, where we have about 2 hours to connect, and then a 9-hour flight back to Minneapolis.

We still have Danish cash to blow at the airport – here’s 91,50 DKK just in coins to burn (that’s almost US$20). They don’t make 5 Kr coins for some reason, just 50 ore, 1 Kr, 2, 10, and 20. At 50 Kr (US$10) they switch over to bills – under that it’s only coins. And they won't convert Danish coins back into US$ at the Travelex at MSP...

Here's one last photo from downtown

This will be the last posting until we get back to the States. Happy Fathers Day, Happy Gotcha Day, and wish us good luck on our travels tomorrow!

Copenhagen Trip - Day Four

A late start this morning – we didn’t get out of the hotel until after 10:00 am – but we managed to cover a lot of ground nonetheless.

Our exploration today took us first to Copenhagen’s Central Station – a vast and magnificent building from 1911. Virtually all the long-haul, regional, and local trains pass through here and the place is alive day and night. There’s a small shopping center inside the main hall, and hotels ring the station for blocks around.

A big model railroad diorama inside the train station - how perfect! For 20 DKK you can run the trains around, too.

Our next train took us 35 minutes west to Roskilde (pronounced ROASH-keel, rhymes with “roast eel”), the ancient capital of Denmark. Narrow streets, cute houses, six-hundred-year-old graveyards, ethnic restaurants – plus the home of one of Europe’s biggest annual music festivals (happening in another few weeks), and also home to the Viking Ship Museum.

Inside the museum they’ve partially reconstructed various vessels that were recovered from the fjord outside. They’ve also built a new vessel using ancient plans, and sailed it all over the North Atlantic.

While the reconstructed ships are quite delicate, most of the museum is actually hands-on, and there are a couple replica boats in the main hall kids can romp around in.

Here's the replica longship the researchers built and sailed - the performance was better than anyone had expected. These guys were really tough to have this in the open ocean!

Wiped out, passed out on the train back home.

For dinner tonight: fresh Danish strawberries, mixed greens salad, multigrain toast, and chicken breast sauteed in creamy sweet Danish butter.

The train back to Copenhagen delivered us straight to our home base, and after cooking dinner we headed out again to Central Station and across the street to Tivoli – the famous amusement park. It’s not terribly large, but the location downtown can’t be beat, and there are dozens of restaurants, several live performance stages, thrill rides, and private halls for ticketed concerts. The mix of food, activities, and people-watching appeals to little kids, teenagers, and grown-ups equally. At night the entire place is lit up with thousands of electric bulbs on every tree, ride, and building.

We walked all over the grounds, and Wynn got to go on a couple kiddie rides. We left about 7 pm – the crowd was getting pretty thick as we headed out – it’s a nice Friday evening and Tivoli is the place to be to start the weekend.

In front of the Chinese Pavilion - they stage pantomime shows here. Wynn wants to go back tomorrow for more rides...

Copenhagen Trip - Day Three, Part Two

After dinner (leftovers from all the cooking we’ve been doing) we took the train one stop down to Norreport and walked a couple blocks to the Rundetaarn (Round Tower), an astronomical observatory built in 1642 and dedicated to Tycho Brahe.

Happy ballet dance on the train platform

"Rush hour" in Copenhagen is office workers walking across downtown to the train stations. Hardly any auto traffic on the streets. How refreshing.

Awesome. Older than almost anything in America. Taller than the churches in the name of science (although there's a church attached to it - remember where the money was...)

There is a spiral ramp leading almost all the way up (to make it easier to move equipment and supplies); stairs for just the last two floors. On top, you can walk all the way around outside. It’s Copenhagen’s Space Needle!

I love how the evening sun illuminates the brickwork and Wynn in this shot.

The city views just can't be beat from here. You can really see how the people go about their lives and their work.

Since virtually all the stores downtown close by 7pm, we took the train back to our station and walked around the residential neighborhood on the other side of the tracks. It’s the embassy district – hello Russian security dudes – and packed with international schools and gorgeous condominiums, dripping with history and architectural detail on the outside, sleek furnishing and modern design on the inside.
Wynn’s in bed; we’re running a load of laundry and relaxing with books while a rainshower passes through. Tomorrow we are thinking about visiting the Viking Ship Museum in Roskilde, about a half-hour west of here; we’ll see how the weather holds up.

Copenhagen Trip - Day One

Our flight from Minneapolis left on time at 9:40 pm last night. Wynn was dressed in her pajamas to be ready to fall asleep on the airplane. Ann was packing a melatonin sleep aid, and I was carrying Tylenol PM, plus sleep masks for all of us.

Wynn stayed awake while we waited to board and as we taxied out for takeoff. Our seats were the middle three in the row on our 767; as it was a night flight it didn’t really matter about getting a window seat, yet we didn’t have to share space with anyone else. Wynn was out within 20 minutes of takeoff and stayed asleep until about an hour before landing, so about 6-1/2 hours. Ann got about 5-1/2 hours of zzzzs, and I managed to get about 4 – off and on, not in a solid block. (I just couldn’t figure out where to put my long legs…) That’s a personal best for Ann and me on long trips, and nothing surprising at all for Wynnie.

We got into Amsterdam about 15 minutes behind schedule, each of us still a bit tired and hungry despite having varying amounts of food on the flight. (I was the only one of us still awake for the dinner service; Wynn didn’t really eat her breakfast sandwich.) With about 2 hours between flights, we had enough time for a sorely needed McDonald’s break (as it was about breakfast-time back in Minnesota) before going through passport control and another security scan.

The scanner we went through at Amsterdam was an old-school magnetometer, so passengers weren’t being asked to take off their shoes. Wynn danced through it and got a beep; she had to go through again – and got another beep. We took her shoes off and put them with the bag going through the x-ray. Ann went through to the other side with no problem while I stayed behind (with 10 people behind me) – and Wynn froze up, utterly refusing to go through the scanner. Ann was encouraging her to walk, the security agents were getting antsy, and there were now 20 people behind us. She wasn’t listening to either of us, so I gave her butt a little push and she tottered through the portal without a beep. We collected our materials at the end of the line, and Wynn started crying the big tears of embarrassment and being scared and not wanting to be forced to do something.

The KLM flight to Copenhagen was a breeze; partly cloudy skies and good views of northern Europe for a short hop. Wynn was back in good spirits and being charming for the cabin crew, and arrival at Copenhagen airport was drama-free. I picked up rail passes out in the ticketing lobby and we took the train to the Osterport station – the neighborhood where our hotel is. It was a 15-minute walk from the train station to the hotel, something we do regularly in our neighborhood, but after 12 hours in transit, those cobblestones were a rough slog.

Our hotel room is quite nice – full size bathroom, a functional kitchen, plus a separate bedroom. There’s a Netto grocery store just around the corner (bigger than a convenience store, smaller than a ‘real’ grocery – kind of like an Aldi, but with name-brands) where we picked up chicken, eggs, bread, milk, vegetables, and juice so we could make our own dinner tonight. It’s nice after a day of hard travel to have a home-cooked meal.

It was about 7:45pm local time when we finished dinner, but our internal clocks haven’t tuned to local time yet – and sunset here is about 10 pm. So we walked several blocks down to the harborside to see the Little Mermaid statue. Wow, they aren’t kidding about the “little” part. Plenty of tourists around to take pictures of her, though. Wynn wants to come back and pose on the rocks near the statue.

She finally got into bed about 10pm local time – that’s about 3pm Minnesota time. Sunrise here is just after 4am – but we’re hoping to all sleep in late tomorrow.

There are places we’d definitely like to see on this trip, but for now we’re going to take it easy – more of a picnic-in-the-park trip rather than a race-around adventure.

It's 10:45 pm Danish time - about 3:45 Central time. This is probably when we'll be posting each day, so please check in with us each afternoon!

Hong Kong Videos

Here's a shout to the good work being done over at weninchina.com - lots of helpful travel tips and cultural insights for adoptive families.

Fresh videos were recently posted to show other families some of the fun and interesting things in Hong Kong. This is just some of what we were describing back in November...

Catching up: Happy Birthday!

Wynn turned 5 this January. Her schoolmate Peter has the same birth date, and his parents gave him a big party at the Shoreview Community Center with a magician, cake, and a couple hours in the five-story-tall jungle gym / super slide / Borg Cube they've got there. So she got to play with all her friends at a birthday-themed party.

For her own birthday party, we kept it low-key - just the family.

Shadow at the ready to help with the cake. Wynn blew all the candles out, and ate the piece with the biggest frosting.

Wynn made up her own party game. She cut out little airplanes and had each of us color one.

All lined up on the runway, we each had to close our eyes, take our plane, and stick it to a world map.

A modern update on "pin the tail on the donkey" by our little jetsetter. Again, entirely her own idea - no coaching from me whatsoever. But hey, that's my girl!

Last Day in HK

Since it's traditional to stand in long lines on Black Friday, we did. Except the line we stood in wasn't to get a great deal on a DVD player at Best Buy; it was to ride a glass-floored cable car for 3.5 miles. Up the side of a mountain. To see a giant Buddha (and a Starbucks!) at the top.

Scroll through the pictures and say, "Whoa!" a few times. And, yes, it was awesome!