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For this blog:

This blog is about our trip to Europe with our grandson, Liam.  We spent a month with him visiting Copenhagen and Legoland, Paris, and England/Scotland (seeing "all things Harry Potter"). 

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July 6/7 – Heading to Copenhagen

We are switching grandkids in JFK airport.  We are bringing Charlie back from Paris, and picking Liam up to go to Europe.  We spent the morning and early afternoon with Jessica, Charlie and Liam at the hotel.  Jessica and Charlie headed back to Vegas mid-afternoon and the rest of us didn’t leave for the terminal until late afternoon for our flight to Copenhagen.

Before getting on the plane we bought Liam a pizza slice.  Charlie had recommended getting him food because it was unlikely he would like any of the airplane food (they were quite correct…nothing on the menu that he liked except dessert).

The flight was comfortable enough.  Mary slept an hour or two, Liam said he didn’t sleep at all, Paul thought he might have slept a bit but wasn’t sure.

We arrived at the Copenhagen airport late morning.  By the time we were at the hotel it was early afternoon.  Liam badly wanted a nap so we let him sleep a couple of hours…but it was too early to let him sleep through the night because it would make it that much harder to adjust to the time change.

We headed down to Nyhavn Street for an early dinner.  This is a really pretty little street right on a canal.  Liam was hard to get up and practically staggered down the street.  He did wake up enough to eat his hamburger and fries…and he was back in bed as soon as we got back to the room.  In fact, we were all in bed by about 6:00.

July 8 – Massive amounts of walking and the Kastelette

What a weird day.  We all had a long night’s sleep after our flight from JFK and then headed out mid/late morning to find the Tourist Services in downtown Copenhagen.  The walk took us back along Nyhavn Street.  Even on an overcast day it is very pretty.

Unfortunately, there were two almost identically named streets off of a main square and we (Mary) ended up going in the wrong direction.  A loooonnng way in the wrong direction.

The upside is we saw quite a bit of Copenhagen we had never visited before.

And we stumbled across the Kastellet (old fortification with earthen works, a windmill, cannons, and lots of older buildings).

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More Kastellet
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We wandered through Oster Anlaeg Park where Liam spent time on a swing

and we found a neat plaza for lunch with an outdoor table. 

Nearby was on of the types of street performers we have been seeing around Europe...the type that is suspended in space. 

Downside is we walked over 8 miles (groaning feet all around).  Liam was a pretty good trooper though and didn’t really complain and only asked “how much longer” a few times.

July 9 – Experimentarium

Today Liam got his first choice in sightseeing/activities…the Experimentarium.  This is a bit like the Exploratorium in San Francisco or the Discovery Center in Las Vegas.  This place had lots of hands on activities and Liam was in Heaven.  We closed the place down.

We took the metro to the Experimentarium.  On our walk to the metro we walked through Amalienborg Plaza.  

The plaza has four large buildings surrounding it.  Turns out they are homes of various members of the Danish royal family. 

Nearby was Frederiks Church.

July 10 – Viking Boat Museum

 We took a short walk this morning to the metro station where we caught a train to the central train station.  There (with help from a local who helped us find our train) we caught a train to Roskilde).  

The train station.

After getting to Roskilde we stopped for lunch and then took off through the streets of town.  It was a pretty little town, lots of flowers.  But there weren't a lot of people out and about.  

Our destination was the Viking Boat Museum.  Roskilde was a former (Viking era) capital of Denmark and the harbor here was a major hub of shipping activity.  Several old boats have been found in the last few decades and they now have a very nice museum with some of the preserved boats. 

There were interesting computer and physical models of the original boats...

and a life size one. 

Mary and Liam participated in a rowing activity.  The old Viking ships used sails but were also rowed by oarsmen…and we got to be oarsmen for this activity.  It’s a bit harder than one might think.

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Video of rowing
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The harbor and marina had a lot of boats.

On our walk back to the train station we stopped and visited the Roskilde Cathedral.  

A number of Danish kings and their queens are buried here. Their tombs were very elaborate.

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More Roskilde Cathedral
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Plaza near the cathedral.

We were back in Copenhagen at a reasonable time so decided to take a harbor cruise.  The cruise boats left from a dock on Nyhavn Street…one of the prettiest streets anywhere. 

The cruise wandered out into the harbor and along the canals.  We saw a lot of Copenhagen from the water.  

We saw the statue of the Little Mermaid (from Hans Christian Anderson’s fairy tale by the same name).

There was a large crane where we saw a bungy jumper.

The Our Saviors Church with it's spiral stairs on the outside of the steeple.

This was the brewery from one of the earlier Danish kings.

The waste treatment plant has a sky slope on the top and the largest climbing wall in Denmark on its side.

Nearby were these old military buildings.  

We also saw the Royal Library (it is housed in several different buildings but this very modern, boxy building is one of the newest).

Hans Christian Anderson spent time in this yellow building.

Colorful kayakers on a sunny day.