I had a 12 hour layover between flights at Stansted which I decided to spend at the airport to try and save myself some money. The long stopover was made a lot less lonely after spotting Miriam and Dee, two Kiwi friends who had been on my Istanbul to London Topdeck tour. The stay did not seem that long and I said goodbye to them again and boarded the plane for Denmark.
Cyclists rule in Denmark. That is the first thing you notice when you arrive. I flew into Aarhus to meet my mate Cory from Deakin who is currently studying at the Uni there. I hired a bike by depositing a coin to unlock a chain of a city bike. They are located throughout Aarhus and Copenhagen and when you return the bike you get the coin back.
Cory showed me the sights of the city. It is a seaside city and the second largest in Denmark after Copenhagen. We took a tour through Den Gamble By, the old city set up for tourists to experience what it was like to live in a market town in the old days. On the day we went there was really not much going on so it wasn't real exciting.
After dinner and a few beers at Cory's residences we headed into town to a pub where they were serving cough medicine in test tubes and trying to pass them off as shots. What I found surprising was on our walk into town just after midnight you could still see a glimmer of daylight.
We rode the train on Friday morning to Copenhagen for a weekend trip. We visited many of the sights of the city. We climbed to the top of a church for views across the city. You can see for miles as Denmark is a very flat country. We also entered the world of Christiana. The alternative community which still has the feel of a hippy village in the 1970's. Selling drugs is somewhat illegal there but still freely available.
The city has many statues and we rode past many of them on some City Bikes including the very famous yet not all that exciting Little Mermaid statue. Drinking on the streets is legal throughout the country as it is in most European countries therefore we joined the hundreds of people on the banks of the canal in Nyhavn.
We found one of the houses of the Danish royal family. The residences of Tasmanian born Princess Mary and her husband Prince Frederick.
''Probably the best beer in the World,'' Carlsberg has a visitors centre and brewery just outside the city which Cory and I took a tour through. It is not my favourite beer. ''Probably the best...'' is the slogan they have used to promote their beer for over 30 years.
Copenhagen has many events throughout the year, especially in summer and we were in town during the Copenhagen Carnival. Thousands of people all dancing away to different music styles in big tents in one of the city parks.
Tivoli Gardens and amusement park is the main tourist attraction in the city and we could not leave without going inside. Cory and I each paid to get in and wandered around for a few hours without going on any rides as they cost more. After leaving Tivoli we boarded the train back for Aarhus. My last night in Denmark we went for a walk to the yacht club and had an ice cream as the Danish love their ice cream.
The following morning I made my way back to the airport and back to London.
I enjoyed my time in Denmark although one thing I did not like about Denmark was how expensive it was. It cost me more catch a bus from the train station to the airport than the flight itself.
One other thing about the country is they are very environmentally friendly. There are large windmills spread throughout the country and you have to pay a tax when buying bottles that you can claim back when you return the bottles. This mode of recycling leads to many poorer people walking through the cities collecting bottles.
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