Pillsbury Press: Denmark: Free Walking Tour of Copenhagen

As we walked up to steps of Radhuspladsen, Copenhagen's City Hall at 10 AM on our first morning, we discovered Copenhagen has two Free Tours -- the red umbrella ones and the yellow umbrella ones. We took the yellow umbrella tour, but I suspect the red umbrella tour is very similar. It is run by a college student who expects a tip (in any currency) at the end of the tour. This is a great way to unload currency from places near and far as all the tour guides enjoy traveling and will put the money to use, though American money is appreciated the most. They also offer tours in Spanish.

Our guide, Luis, originally hails from Peru. He fell in love with a Danish woman and has since become a Danish citizen. It is not easy to become Danish, if only because you first have to master its complicated language. We had a born-and-bred Dane on our tour (hanging with his friend from Germany) who tried not to snicker at his pronunciation. For example, the main shopping street in Copenhagen (Strøget) is pronounced "Stroll." Yeah, I don't see it, either.

One theme of the tour was fires. In Luis's opinion, a building is not truly historic unless it has burned at least twice. In the 18th century there was a fire that burned half of the city for three days. Evidently no lessons were learned from that and to this day candles are still seen burning in book shops and other unnecessary places.

The other theme was beer -- especially Carlsberg beer: "Probably the best beer in the world," or so they say. In Denmark it is illegal to make false claims in advertising. Until the 1960's it was legal to drink beer in prisons. Until 2000, construction workers could drink up to SIX beers at lunchtime. Carl Christian Jacobsen, the founder of Carlsberg beer, standardized beer production on September 2, 1811, and in 1847 published detailed information about how to make beer.

Denmark is a fairly progressive city. In 1950 they opened their first openly gay bar. It's real claim to fame on that particular day (the hottest in Danish history, expected to reach around 90 degrees Fahrenheit) was it is one of five places in Copenhagen with air conditioning. In 1989 they had their first Civil Union (not marriage, which came in 2012). In 1915 women got the right to vote--five years before the United States.

Luis pointed way up to the highest point in Copenhagen -- all of 90 meters high -- to where Absalom built Our Lady of the Savior. To return to the first theme, it burned seven times. We were told to return to see it at night, because it is all lit up in club lighting and open until midnight. In the haze of vacation, I totally forgot that until now. It is worth climbing the 398 steps, and paying 40-45 DKK ($6.50-$7.50) to see the view, but again, we forgot to do it. We had the time, but ran out of steam.

We did find the energy to hoof it to Copenhagen's most famous, and most underwhelming, landmark: The Little Mermaid statue. According to Luis it rates up there with the Mona Lisa and the Manneken Pis and Europe's most disappointing pieces of art.


Look over Ashley's shoulder to see		it

Back to the tour. We walked along the 1000 year old "May Stroll," no idea what the correct spelling is, but I can research that later. The street survived the 1728 three day fire, and the 1795 three day fire, each of which rocked Copenhagen. Copenhagen is a very flat city and the winds just blow from everywhere, the reason I didn't wear a hat on this trip. The city is 1200 years old, no exact date for its founding, but estimated to be from the 700s.

On this street is the Cultural City Cafe, home to two theaters, many board games, and over 130 events a month. They even show movies in English. Around the corner is the ICC Theater with improvised comedy in English.

Luis shared with us the 150 year old fighting with Sweden. They have a competition for the tallest city hall -- as one adds on to theirs, the other adds on, too. We did not have time to compare Sweden's, as you'll read when I write about that part of our adventures.

This is the point in the 2 1/2 hour tour (had I realized it was that long, I would have eaten breakfast first) when we have our lesson in the benefits of paying really high taxes. In Denmark college students are paid to go to college. This is in addition to receiving free education. So yes, Danes pay between 36% and 68% of their salary to taxes, but this is one perk. Another is a year of paid maternity leave, and six months paid paternity leave per child (which can be taken up until the child turns seven). Plus a cash bonus for having a child, and extra money given to help support your children. Oh and five to six weeks vacation. As our AirBNB hostess said, she couldn't afford not to return to Denmark after her children were born (she was living in NYC at the time).

Fortunately we had a bathroom break. Unlike many places in Europe, there were plenty of free and extremely clean places to go to the bathroom. A treat to not have to pay the bathroom lady. I used the opportunity to get a hot dog. Yes, I got a hot dog. And it was good. Food was so expensive in Copenhagen, that $6 (30 DKK) hot dog was considered a bargain. I remember them being cheaper in Iceland, which is also a horribly expensive place to eat.

Back to the statue of Absalom to continue our tour.

We walked over to Paris, I mean the Magazin du Nord. Hans Christian Anderson used to have an apartment in the upper floor. It is conveniently located across the street from the Danish Royal, a private theater until the 1840s. He moved here to stalk a ballerina. Turns out the future writer of children's stories ("Ugly Duckling" and "The Little Mermaid") had a beautiful soprano voice as a 14-year old, which didn't last long. He received a scholarship from friends to attend school and overcame his dyslexia to become a world-famous author.

Tons of on-going construction in this immediate area. The city boasts two parallel subway lines. Yes, parallel, as in they do not intersect. Another stop was being built in the Kongens Nytorv (King's Square).

Our guide led us to the famous port in Copenhagen. The one seen with a picturesque blue sky and no people in it -- which Luis swears is impossible, you can have one or the other, but not both. We were not set free to take pictures, instead we were encouraged to return later at our leisure. Oh, and keep an eye out for pickpockets. Evidently everywhere we went was the worst place on the planet for pickpockets (we managed to return home with our valuables, including passports).

Our tour concluded with the daily changing of the guards. Which is as low-key an experience as possible, unless Queen Margarethe II is in residence. As a good European, she is not home in August.

In the end, I never saw them change places with the guard in the little red shack.

We heard wonderful things about the monarchy. Though they have zero power, they have the love of the Danes, and a few fancy places to live. Prince Frederick (the next in line) would take his kids to school in the front of his bicycle when they were little. Queen Margarethe used to design clothes and costumes for the theater, and was also an archaeologist. She translated the "Lord of the Rings" into Danish and illustrated the first version. Her biggest negative is she is a chain smoker. I was surprised to see how many Danes smoke (according to Luis 1/3 of the population) because many of them are avid cyclists. It seems contradictory to me.

Luis encouraged us to get a burger from his favorite haunt, Gasoline Burgers. With a name like that, who could refuse? It was so warm that day, and I nearly passed out from lack of eating, that I also got a frozen lemonade. Happily most places will give you free tap water, which helped our budget. As you can tell, not an extensive menu.