Let’s see just how many places we can cram into a single day!
Children playing in a schoolyard, people having a conversation on the train, announcements over the intercom–it’s amazing how all these things sound just like they do at home, even in a country where you have no hope of understanding any of the words due to the unique accents and pronunciations of words with 12 syllables which somehow sound like they have only three.
We arrived without issue in Copenhagen on Sunday afternoon after a trouble-free flight, aside from the seats being a bit cramped for two economy plus individuals like Jesse and myself. We checked into our shockingly colorful lodging which (unbeknownst to me) turned out to be an apartment, the House of Flying Daggers, er…Colors, a lovely four room flat located two blocks from the Lergravsparken Metro station in a quiet residential area. After serious de-griming of the airplane gunk acquired from 14 hours in the air, we were met by Mike and Monica, who seemed entirely too energetic for us given our 9 hour time difference.
The M’s proceeded to give us an EVEN QUICKER 5 hour version of the 8 hour downtown Copenhagen tour I took with them in 2006. While Jesse admired the unique buildings tightly packed together with an explosion of color, I took the time to get used to my new camera which did well in the test photo opportunities I had taken earlier. It came through with flying colors this time too. Again I noted how under-dressed I felt given that a large portion of the locals we passed looked like they walked straight off the pages of a fashion magazine. We ended the night with dinner at Tivoli, a new destination for me, surprisingly not cheesy for an amusement park.
The next morning as Jesse was getting ready, I checked the Interwebs to brush up on our intended destinations, Helsingor and Roskilde (both in Denmark), and somehow found lovely pictures of Helsingborg, Sweden, across the way from Helsingor. I suggested taking a $12 ferry ride there just to say we visited Sweden, and Jesse was all for it. So we ended up adding a bonus country to our already packed itinerary, equalling the number of destinations I visited in my 26 day trip in 2006.
In Helsingor, we were greeted by a well-kept Kronborg Castle overlooking the sea, complete with canons aimed at anyone who would dare invade. We had delicious sandwiches at a tiny shop hidden away in a small but cheerful alley. Also nice was that this shop didnÕt cause wallet shock like the other places in Denmark we had seen.
Next up was the 20 minute ferry ride to Helsingborg. We noticed a rather high number of liquor stores built into the ferry terminal. The M’s later explained this as a big draw for the Swedes, who cross the channel with huge bags and rolling carts to stock up on liquor since itÕs so heavily taxed in Sweden, and they’re, well, alcoholics. Helsingborg proved to be a nice diversion with the looming rain clouds over Denmark from afar. Unfortunately no new passport stamps resulted from this much to our disappointment.
Back in Denmark (and without having purchased a cart of beer or wine like our Swedish counterparts), we were returning to Copenhagen when Jesse suggested we use our timed “all zones” pass to go to Roskilde even though it was quite late in the day. Much to my surprise, I agreed to this. So we wound up in Roskilde under ominous skies and not entirely sure where we were headed due to the city center of Roskilde not having a single road that goes all the way through. Sure enough, we missed by a few kilometers and took the scenic ring road to the Viking Ship Museum, during which time Mother Nature decided we should have a large amount of water poured on us. We did actually make it to the museum only to discover our diversion had made us just late enough for it to be closed. Fortunately there were some smaller ships and exhibits to be seen outside–thank the Europeans for not having the entire area closed off after hours.
On the ride home, we consulted with the M’s to see where they wanted to meet up. Kobenhavn H station–no problem. Although we’d be a little late, that was a good place to meet. Not realizing we had already added a side trip to Sweden earlier in the day, the M’s wanted to help us add a bonus city/country to our trip by taking us to dinner in Malmo, Sweden, just over the bridge from Copenhagen. Who were we to refuse?
Malmo looked quite small on the map but it turned out to be rather large, a giant shopping maze of large buildings in an urban environment. We ate dinner at a steakhouse and a lovely pair of “hookup drawers” on one of our fellow diners later, toured around Malmo even more, not reaching the end of the shopping area. By then Jesse and I were completely burned out from having trekked so far (just under 9 miles by foot for the day as it turned out, many, many more by train).
We bid farewell to our hosts Mike and Monica and would continue our adventures in Hamburg the next day.
Back to the U.S.A.
London: The final destination.
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Originally uploaded by Poom247.
Written at 1840 on 10/29.
Paris kicked my ass hard. First there was the 28 hours of trekking all over the city trying to squeeze in as much as possible; much of my fatigue here was brought on by trying to see as much of the Louvre as possible…not a good idea when you’ve been doing way more walking than usual for the past three weeks and get tired really easily as a result. Then there was the stress of trying to figure out how to get to London without paying the outrageous sum of 223 euro for a Eurostar ticket because of the French holiday on which apparently all the Parisians go to London.
To top off that chain of events, I was welcomed to London by the crappiest hostel I stayed at during my entire trip, the London House Hotel. The reception area was nice enough…it makes an okay first impression. The rooms were a little spartan, but passable (especially since they couldn’t identify my gender from my name and placed me in a room with four women). The bathroom, on the other hand was so scary I didn’t take a shower until I got to my final hotel at Tower Hill on Friday. Anyone who knows me realizes just how significant my not showering is; I’m a bit of a morning shower freak and feel grimy and filthy all day if I don’t get my morning shower. I’m not that fussy about bathroom facilities, so for a bathroom to be scary enough for me to not use it? Yeah, that’s gotta be mildly frightening. The Tower Hotel was quite nice though, located next to the London Tower with my room’s view overlooking some impressive sailing ships on St. Katharine’s Dock.
By this time, I was completely exhausted from roaming all over Paris, going back to Brussels, and finally arriving in London. I did what I could in London as far as getting to the essential places, but I did sleep in quite late (11am-noon) both days at the Tower Hotel, which was also the first time I didn’t have to worry about an afternoon lockout and had my own bathroom in about 10 days. This might not have been a bad thing though, considering London makes Paris and every other city I saw look downright inexpensive and cheap by comparison.. EVERYTHING in London is hideously overpriced. Despite that fact, I chose to contribute to the London economy by spending a truckload of money at HMV and Virgin Megastore on music and other goodies not available in the U.S. I think Sir Richard Branson owes me a complimentary flight on his airline for my next trip or something for my patronage.
On Sunday morning, I chose to take the Underground to Heathrow instead of the safer, more timely taxi. The reason? The concierge told me a taxi trip would have taken around 40 minutes and been around £75, or $145. Um, yeah. I chose the £4 but longer Underground ride instead. I left the hotel more than three hours before my flight was scheduled to depart and still barely made it after a long train ride and a security line of extreme lengths at Heathrow. Spooks/MI-5 really isn’t exagerrating about how the U.K. is becoming a police state like the U.S. with regards to extreme measures to protect its national security…some might say they’re going too far as well just like the U.S. administration. Playing “spot the CCTV camera” was an interesting diversion while walking around though.
What I managed to see of London seemed like enough fun, but next time I’ll devote a whole trip to this city instead of two days after wandering all over Western Europe. I just didn’t have the energy, money or patience to do as much as I could have there.
Paris…c’est un tres grande ville.
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Originally uploaded by Poom247.
Written at 1329 on 10/29.
My second to last destination, Paris turned out to have more noteworthy attractions spread over a larger area than I had anticipated. I was rather enjoying how compact European cities were, as that made getting around quite easy. Paris was the largest city I had visited up to that point and also had many, many places I wanted to see, which meant I had to make extensive use of the public transit system. Unfortunately that system is quite the opposite of user-friendly, unlike the transit networks in Berlin and Amsterdam. The stops weren’t announced or posted on most of the lines, which meant you pretty much have to know exactly where you’re going and pay attention to the stops or end up making some sidetrips (not entirely a bad thing, but annoying when you’re trying to get to a specific place). Once you adjusted to how everything works, it was fine though.
On Monday, I arrived in Paris late in the afternoon and promptly went to the Eiffel Tower. By the time I left on Wednesday after walking around the strangely sparsely-populated La Villette, I had engaged in 28 full hours of wandering around taking in the sites and felt like I had barely scraped the surface of all that Paris has to offer. Surprising considering I wasn’t even planning on spending an afternoon in the actual museum, the most impressive place to me was the Louvre. As Andreas from Bavaria suggested, it sure was a whole lot of museum even if you only saw one wing of the permanent exhibits (out of three plus a few temporary exhibits). I would’ve been quite happy paying the 8,50 euro admission fee if the museum didn’t have any exhibits and just let you walk around and see the history of the Louvre and its evolution over the centuries (architecture and newfound history freak that I am)–those alone were far more interesting than I would’ve ever guessed. My other favorite place in Paris was the Catacombes. I was honestly surprised they let you into all the parts they did–I thought that more of it would be considered off-limits. Hundreds of thousands of human bones…freaky to say the least. The least impressive places? Notre Dame, which looked much more impressive in pictures and Moulin Rouge, which I was hoping would be a fraction as cool on the outside as in the movie of the same name, but wasn’t even as aesthetically-pleasing as the strip clubs in San Francisco’s North Beach. All told, Paris is a beautiful city.
For my dose of French culture, I had dinner at a little cafe near the Sorbonne on my last night there. Thanks to a handy fixed price menu (which seemed to be the norm in that particular area) I got to sample some actual French cuisine while watching a surprisingly captivating soccer game playing on a TV (Lyon came back to beat Paris after being down 1-0, and managed to get two goals with less than three minutes in regulation time–oops). These little excursions via public transit have been very enjoyable and it’s been nice to get a little bit off the beaten path with them.
Prior to my trip, I had heard some bad things about the French and their attitude. Well it’s true–they do have a distinct attitude and are walking ashtrays for the most part. But I don’t think I’d say their attitude was incredibly snotty or anything like that. Have you ever seen how the average American acts? The words “arrogant self-centered jackasses with an inflated sense of entitlement” come to mind. The attitude of the average American is certainly not better in any way…just different.
If I had to do things differently, I would’ve put Paris (and London) at the front of my trip, as they were by far the two biggest cities on my itinerary and alloted more time there. My 28 hours of tourist hijinks probably wouldn’t have been any easier, but might’ve not drained me so much for the next and final stop, London.
Success! But not with this friggin’ French keyboard.
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Originally uploaded by Poom247.
To recap what I did after yesterday’s Paris to London Eurostar debacle, I’m headed to Brussels (again) and taking the Eurostar from there to London for a total of $86; luckily it’s only a French holiday and not a Belgian one as well. It adds an extra 2-3 hours to my journey but beats the assreaming I would’ve paid going from Paris.
I’ve spent a grand total of almost 30 actual hours being a touron around Paris and feel like I’ve barely seen everything–it’s quite crazy. I can’t stand this French keyboard which has just enough keys out of place to give even a crappy typist like me seizures. I’ll try to post my thoughts on Paris while in London, though I can’t guarantee anything since I only have two days there. If you don’t hear from me, I’ll be sure to fill you in when I get home!
