I can’t quite believe that we are at the end of our Baltic 6 series! Travelling the Baltics has been such an amazing experience and it has opened my eyes to the Scandinavian way of life. Today we are visiting no other but the centre for design – Copenhagen! Along with Oslo, Copenhagen is somewhere I’ve always dreamed of visiting and it definitely won’t disappoint…
Copenhagen is a huge city! Unfortunately we didn’t have very long at all since we’d squeezed this trip in on our last day however thanks to previously planning a route through the main sites/districts, we were able to cover a huge amount in just about four hours! To add to the adventure, I created a bucket list of things to do in Copenhagen and somehow managed quite a few!
First of all, we walked to Nyhavn, the more famous 17th century waterfront and canal, adorned with colourful restaurants and cafes. We went over the bridge and followed the canal round to the open water where we came across a lot of modern architecture.
The district was number one on my bucket list so it was great to be able to see it however due to the rush, I felt like I didn’t fully experience it and would love to go back and spend afternoon exploring the region!
Our planned route then took us through the Amaliehavn, past the fountain in the garden of the Amalienborg Palace. We stopped off at the Design Museum, and eventually made it up to the little mermaid statue. The design museum again was a must see on the bucket list. Not only was it free to go in, but the exhibitions were amazing! We set ourselves a strict 40 minutes and were blown away by the features. I have honestly never been inside such a creative design museum! The main exhibitions included a chair design exhibition, full of the most genius and crazy chairs ever, an architecture exhibition, fashion design and also Oriental art and design. It explained design processes and concepts as well as being a maze of creative exploration.
Next on the list? You should know by now that exploring the quieter residential areas is always my goal! We walked back from the Mermaid (that happened to be right on the outskirts) through the Center of Churchill Park in Kastellet and then through residential streets. The neighbourhoods in these regions were so distinct and separate from each other in their architecture! We walked past colourful residentials, cobbled blocks of houses, and little bakeries which led to our next bucket list goal – to hunt down the best danish pastry!
If you think we’d already walked a huge distance at half time, you’re right. But the challenge had only just begun. Surprisingly, danish pastries are hard to find in Copenhagen! We could have settled with a supermarket savoury looking pastry, or we could have walked miles for another hour, winding in and out of cobbled lanes and peering in cafe windows… Of course we chose the latter.
We headed to shopping central, Stroget which is home to designer boutiques, the stork fountain and hundreds of coffee shops. We spent time wandering through the main shopping street, exploring the square and 
stepping up and down all of the cobbled side-streets, window shopping and trying to sniff out the best place for a coffee (and pastry!) This challenge spurred us on and actually forced us to make the most of our time by constantly looking for more! We just kept turning corners, finding churches or new avenues. Half of what we saw, most wouldn’t have due to disregarding side streets when route planning. It was also an excellent way to try and soak up as much of the atmosphere and lifestyle as possible in our limited time.
Eventually we made our way back to our starting point, Borsen. Then we found it – the trusty 7eleven selling every kind of pastry you could imagine! 7eleven is essentially a Scandinavian chain. I guess it’s a cross between a newsagents and a UK Gregg’s, selling coffee, bakery items, sweets and other snacks… I chose a jumbo kanelsnegle (cinnamon bun) and it was definitely worth the wait! It was enormous too! With about 40 minutes to spare we decided to call it a day, resign to a bench in the square and enjoy pastries whilst watching the city go by. It’s the moments like these that give you that content feeling in your heart – Copenhagen we loved you!
Thank you for coming along with me this summer! We’ve hit Oslo, Gdansk, St.Petersburg, Helsinki, Stockholm and Copenhagen! Which is your favourite? I have to say that Oslo, Stockholm and Copenhagen all come close. I would love to visit Copenhagen again one day – it’s one of the largest cities that I visited and there’s a huge list of things still left to do there! But who knows where we will go next? All I know is that I can’t wait to take you all along with me!
Eleanor ♥
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