2009 - Scandinavia - Day 1 - Copenhagen, Denmark

I arrived in Salt Lake City on Friday evening. Mom picked me up and we spent an hour going through our bags and making sure we weren’t over our allowed 44 lbs. Saturday morning, Carl made us breakfast while we got ready, and arrived at the airport at 7:30 am. We flew to Atlanta, and we had a couple hours until our next flight, so we ate at a TGI Fridays in the airport for an early dinner. Our flight from Atlanta to Copenhagen, Denmark was 9 hours. Mom and I watched 2 movies, the first was Duplicity, which neither of us liked, and the second was Last Chance Harvey, mom enjoyed it. Not me so much. Afterwards we tried to sleep, but in the row next to us was a crying baby. I tried using my MP3 player to help drown out the crying. I slept a little off and on, but gave up and decided to read instead. We arrived in Copenhagen Sunday morning around 9 am. We then had a full 9 hour touring day. The first day of touring is always a bit rough, because of lack of sleep and no showers, same clothes, needing to brush hair and teeth, etc. but it was a neat day. We drove through the main part of the city, seeing the neat buildings and canals. We talked about Hans Christian Anderson, the fairy tale writer, and saw the red house he grew up in next to the canal. I took a picture of it. We stopped at the Royal Palace where the queen lives and took pictures inside the courtyard, and also of the opera house across the canal. We then went to visit the famous mermaid statue, based on the mermaid story written by Hans Christian Andersen. We also stopped at the immigration docks and saw a statue named Kristina, as a monument for the Mormon immigrants. Kristina was the great grandmother of the sculptor, who was a Mormon immigrant in the 1850’s to Utah. We stopped next at the church called Church of Our Lady, where the original Christus stands, plus 12 statues of the apostles. Wow they were amazing. My camera batteries died here, so I only got a couple of pictures here. I could have stayed and looked at those statues much longer. Michael Wilcox told us before we got there, that things such as art or music, if it tells truth, it will be beautiful and good. And those statures, plus the paintings we see later in the Fredericksburg Castle left me with such awe, because of the beauty and goodness portrayed. It spoke the truth to my heart. We then went on to a castle that the queen likes to stay at during the winter months. We just got some ice-cream and took some pictures of the outside. Then we continued on to the Fredericksburg Castle. It was a magnificent castle. It was built centuries ago, destroyed by fire in the 1700’s and restored rebuilt in the 1800’s. The monarchs don’t care to live in it anymore, so now it is used as a museum. We were able to hear the world’s oldest organ being played; it takes 3 people to play it. Our guide said it was very rare to hear it being played Of the 5 years of bringing tours through the museum; this was the first time he saw and heard it being played. The chapel and ballroom and all the ceilings were so magnificent. The best part was the King’s prayer room, where all the original famous paintings of Christ’s life were. And the gardens in the back looked amazing, I would have loved for time to walk in them. On the way to the castle, we took a 30 minute coastal drive. I kept dozing off though, no matter how hard I tried to keep my eyes open, I love the coast! Today was a good day. We saw some neat things and places. Unfortunately, we are leaving Denmark tomorrow morning. I would have liked to spend more time here.