Denmark 1: The Bridge to Malmö and a walk around Copenhagen

  I have had my eye on Denmark after watching the show, The Bridge, on Hulu, many years ago.  It depicted a cooperative investigation between the police forces of Malmö, Sweden on one side of the Oresund Bridge, and Copenhagen, Denmark on the other side.  I found the insight into these two cultures to be fascinating, as I knew little about either one.

  Denmark recently lifted many covid restrictions, and with an extremely high vaccination rate, I decided it was time for Miles and I to journey again together.  Our last traveling partnership was made to Iceland, in November of 2019.  Iceland, once part of Denmark, has been its own country since its 1944 Declaration of Independence.  Both contain freakishly tall blond people, with the love of Skyr.

  Miles and I arrived without incident, yesterday afternoon.  The only strange occurrence was that the German immigration control asked me if Miles' mother was already ahead of us, in Denmark.  I coolly responded that we had been divorced for many, many years.  

  We arrived at our hotel room at a little after 1:00pm, Denmark time.  Miles demanded that we eat "real food"(hamburgers) henceforth, and promptly fell asleep on the bed as he said so.  We napped until I forced us up around 5:00.  This proved to be too much sleep for me, because it took me until 5:00 AM that night to fall asleep.

  The hotel is situated near the city center, and came with free coffee in the lobby.  Unfortunately, it was instead a twisted mockery of what coffee should be.  I woke up, went back to sleep, and then got us out around 10:30 AM.  Our first destination was to be Malmö.  Unfortunately, the train crosses the bridge by travelling underneath it.  All you can see is a wind farm.  A young woman sat across from us and naturally, a conversation ensued.  She was from the US and Canada and seemed upset about how the covid testing requirements to cross the Canadian/American border are detrimental to a large segment of the less wealthy population.  Despite myself agreeing with her, multiple times, she was quite insistent that this was the case.

  After departing a small train station, we made our way to Malmö castle.  The only thing thing remotely castle like about it was its moat.  

  We took the bridge over the moat, paid an exorbitant price, spent 20 minutes running into dead ends in the poor museum, and decided to give up and walk out.  These are the three standout images from this experience:

  Perhaps if the inhabitants were more humanoid, they would have figured out that it takes more than a moat to make a castle.

  Around the back of the premises was a very nice park with view of the Turning Torso building in the distance and a very nice windmill.

  We proceeded down the street to the Falafel Master restaurant.

  The Falafel Master informed me that he had family in San Francisco.

  We walked into the lilla torg(small square) and found some eateries, including the incredibly disappointing sight of a T.G.I. Fridays.

  We found a church, bought a magnet for a friend, and returned to Copenhagen Main Station.

  I rushed us on over to see Rosenborg Castle, but they turned us away despite arriving twenty minutes before close.  We will return tomorrow.  

We crossed the park and headed toward Frederik's Church.  Miles was not pleased that we were visiting a church, as he has seen many in the past.  He informed me that this was not what a church looks like, and that this was more like "Roman stuff."

    Nearly across the street was Amalienborg, an 18th century complex of palaces.  As we walked in, guards were at at attention and were then marched off.

    We walked toward Nyhavn, a place where people congregate to eat, in front of old and colorful houses.

  We embarked upon our final walk, toward a boardgaming haven called the Bastard Cafe.  We took a quick and disappointed stop at the garden of the Royal Library.  We passed the former stock exchange, Børsen, and the Christiansborg Palace, both front and back(or back and front?).

  Finally, we arrived at the end of our day's journey.  The Bastard Cafe.

  Miles took one look at the unmasked gamers and remarked that he didn't like it in there.  We walked home.  Once back at our hotel, we walked to the nearest convenience store and supermarket hybrid and bought our dinner.  I asked the cashier if they sold coffee.  He pointed me to a machine and informed me that coffee was free.  With the small cup in hand, I tasted it as we walked home.  Even without any cream, it tasted better than our hotel's.  I later returned under the guise of purchasing something new so I could grab another coffee.