(no subject)
I'm in Denmark! :D
Er, I meant to do a post before I went to say that I'm going to Denmark for Christmas and yay, how exciting! But, yes, it all got rather busy at the end, so, uh, I'm here already? And yes, it is indeed exciting. :D
So, after a long and not very enjoyable flight (the part of travel I really hate is the actual travelling. Well, the 24 hour plane ride from Australia to here, anyway.) I got to Copenhagen, where Mum and Erik (her partner) met me. We spent a few days in Copenhagen first to see the sights before going to their house in Odder (most awesome name for a town ever or what?) - which was great, but I was too jet-lagged to properly enjoy, unfortunately.
So, the first night we went to Tivoli - which is kind of an amusement park, but a really old one, and much classier than, say, Luna Park or equivalent. :) Well, Mum and Erik thought it was getting tackier than it used to be, but coming from the glorious levels of tackiness of an Australian Christmas, believe me, it was the height of class. :)
So, we looked around at all the little stalls, and I was delighted by all the fir trees with lights everywhere (including randomly among the runways at the airport), and tried to get used to the cold and the fact it gets dark at 3 in the afternoon. So, yes, pretty dark, so I couldn't take many pictures. Here's a guy dressed as a more Danish Santa:
As I suspected, the clothes I packed are in no way warm enough for a Danish winter. Well, the coat turned out pretty well. Oh yes, made myself a fancy wool coat to wear, since I was determined to have a red woolen coat with a hood to wear in the snow. No snow yet, but still hoping for it soon! Haven't taken a decent photo of it yet, will do so...
The next day I decided I really wanted to see Rosenborg Slot again (Not sure how Slot is spelled, but it means castle) - I saw it last time I was here, but lots of it was closed for renovation, and besides, I can never get enough of castles. :) Here's me in red coat in front of it:
And it was gorgeous and wonderful and makes me want to live in Europe, because they have all this history around all the time, and actual 17th century art all over the place, and aaargh, I am jealous of anyone who gets to live here. So, as per usual I took a whole lot of photos of paintings with people wearing outfits I liked, because it always comes back to costume for me. Here's a kid in puffy pants:
And my favorite era of dress, as taken from a weird angle to avoid reflections:
Also, there was a very amusing clock which played a little tune and had little gold people moving about on the hour. I'm sure it was the height of sophistication at the time, but the tune was so amusing that I just stood there and giggled at it. Er, I think this is a picture of a different fancy clock, but anyway:
And here's a painting of a little dog I liked:
Oh yes, this one is for you Dad: it is, in fact, a lathe. No idea what it's doing in a fancy room in a palace, but there you go:
And here's some fancy jewellery:
And here's a creepy eyeless puppet thing in fabulous costume:
And here's some royal silhouette pictures I thought were cool:
And here's the obligatory throne room:
After that we went to the ruins under...er... Christianborg Palace? I think? Damn, losing track already! Which were really interesting, and I once again had trouble getting my head around buildings that had been around since the 12th century. We also went on a tour of the palace, and heard of the history of the place and the royal family, which was very interesting indeed, and also proves if there's one thing the Danes are really good at, it's accidentally burning down palaces. Hopefully they'll get to keep the current one, because it's very nice indeed! :D The guide was very good on the tour, which really makes all the difference. I wasn't allowed to take pictures there, so have a picture of Mum standing in front of a statue of a horse fighting a snake instead?
In a spectacular display of lack-of-skill, Mum and I not only managed to get lost amongst the clearly signposted ruins - twice - we then also got lost every single time we ventured into Copenhagen away from Erik. Seriously, we are the worst navigation team ever. Give us directions to somewhere in a straight line and finish with "and you can't miss it," and we will end up in Antarctica.
I also saw a performance of the Nutcracker, which was my Christmas present from Mum - it was lovely! Making what is apparently a tradition for me and seeing ballets in Denmark, the Queen of Denmark was also there - this time she was in the royal boxseat though, not four seats in front of me. :) There are a lot of kids performing in the Nutcracker, and adorably, they couldn't quite resist peering up to look at the Queen too!
...So then we drove and took the ferry back to Mum's house, and since then I have just been relaxing and getting my head into the right timezone. Heh, so that was catching up on the first few days. :) Seeing a historical village type thing today, so hopefully can take lots of photos of that and update again soon!
Meanwhile, here's a pic of their lovely house and the woods around it:
Er, I meant to do a post before I went to say that I'm going to Denmark for Christmas and yay, how exciting! But, yes, it all got rather busy at the end, so, uh, I'm here already? And yes, it is indeed exciting. :D
So, after a long and not very enjoyable flight (the part of travel I really hate is the actual travelling. Well, the 24 hour plane ride from Australia to here, anyway.) I got to Copenhagen, where Mum and Erik (her partner) met me. We spent a few days in Copenhagen first to see the sights before going to their house in Odder (most awesome name for a town ever or what?) - which was great, but I was too jet-lagged to properly enjoy, unfortunately.
So, the first night we went to Tivoli - which is kind of an amusement park, but a really old one, and much classier than, say, Luna Park or equivalent. :) Well, Mum and Erik thought it was getting tackier than it used to be, but coming from the glorious levels of tackiness of an Australian Christmas, believe me, it was the height of class. :)
So, we looked around at all the little stalls, and I was delighted by all the fir trees with lights everywhere (including randomly among the runways at the airport), and tried to get used to the cold and the fact it gets dark at 3 in the afternoon. So, yes, pretty dark, so I couldn't take many pictures. Here's a guy dressed as a more Danish Santa:
As I suspected, the clothes I packed are in no way warm enough for a Danish winter. Well, the coat turned out pretty well. Oh yes, made myself a fancy wool coat to wear, since I was determined to have a red woolen coat with a hood to wear in the snow. No snow yet, but still hoping for it soon! Haven't taken a decent photo of it yet, will do so...
The next day I decided I really wanted to see Rosenborg Slot again (Not sure how Slot is spelled, but it means castle) - I saw it last time I was here, but lots of it was closed for renovation, and besides, I can never get enough of castles. :) Here's me in red coat in front of it:
And it was gorgeous and wonderful and makes me want to live in Europe, because they have all this history around all the time, and actual 17th century art all over the place, and aaargh, I am jealous of anyone who gets to live here. So, as per usual I took a whole lot of photos of paintings with people wearing outfits I liked, because it always comes back to costume for me. Here's a kid in puffy pants:
And my favorite era of dress, as taken from a weird angle to avoid reflections:
Also, there was a very amusing clock which played a little tune and had little gold people moving about on the hour. I'm sure it was the height of sophistication at the time, but the tune was so amusing that I just stood there and giggled at it. Er, I think this is a picture of a different fancy clock, but anyway:
And here's a painting of a little dog I liked:
Oh yes, this one is for you Dad: it is, in fact, a lathe. No idea what it's doing in a fancy room in a palace, but there you go:
And here's some fancy jewellery:
And here's a creepy eyeless puppet thing in fabulous costume:
And here's some royal silhouette pictures I thought were cool:
And here's the obligatory throne room:
After that we went to the ruins under...er... Christianborg Palace? I think? Damn, losing track already! Which were really interesting, and I once again had trouble getting my head around buildings that had been around since the 12th century. We also went on a tour of the palace, and heard of the history of the place and the royal family, which was very interesting indeed, and also proves if there's one thing the Danes are really good at, it's accidentally burning down palaces. Hopefully they'll get to keep the current one, because it's very nice indeed! :D The guide was very good on the tour, which really makes all the difference. I wasn't allowed to take pictures there, so have a picture of Mum standing in front of a statue of a horse fighting a snake instead?
In a spectacular display of lack-of-skill, Mum and I not only managed to get lost amongst the clearly signposted ruins - twice - we then also got lost every single time we ventured into Copenhagen away from Erik. Seriously, we are the worst navigation team ever. Give us directions to somewhere in a straight line and finish with "and you can't miss it," and we will end up in Antarctica.
I also saw a performance of the Nutcracker, which was my Christmas present from Mum - it was lovely! Making what is apparently a tradition for me and seeing ballets in Denmark, the Queen of Denmark was also there - this time she was in the royal boxseat though, not four seats in front of me. :) There are a lot of kids performing in the Nutcracker, and adorably, they couldn't quite resist peering up to look at the Queen too!
...So then we drove and took the ferry back to Mum's house, and since then I have just been relaxing and getting my head into the right timezone. Heh, so that was catching up on the first few days. :) Seeing a historical village type thing today, so hopefully can take lots of photos of that and update again soon!
Meanwhile, here's a pic of their lovely house and the woods around it: