Upcoming adventures

    Next Sunday I will be heading to the city of Amsterdam with a few friends to visit the Anne Frank house, the Royal Palace, and observe the culture so different from ours. It should be a very eye opening experience, literally. We are heading there on the 28th, because on the 30th, it will be Queensday! This is the last Queensday as Queen Beatrix will be stepping down. In 2014, the holiday will become known as Koningsdag or King's Day following the investiture of Willem-Alexander as king of the Netherlands. Every one dresses in orange and gathers in the city to celebrate their queen. I get to act like I'm Dutch for a few days!

After returning from Amsterdam (don't worry we don't have school Wednesday and I'll be working before to make up missing Monday and Tuesday Mom and Dad), I will repack, attend class Thursday, and then head on my way to Milan and Varese, Italy with my friends Simon, Matt and Nicola. Nicola will be our generous host as he is from Milan and studies near Varese. He's already planned for us to experience the Italian fine dining and luxurious sea side, as well as going to view The Last Supper, and shop (for me). I'll be gone for a while so I'll post my adventures when I can!

Milan

Varese

A day trip to the seaside!

 Dragør

The Harbor

 I think the people were tiny!!

 The Danish flag presents itself everywhere

Sunshine is so fine

   This past weekend me and my friend Audrey headed on an adventure. Instead of using the public transportation we decided to use our nifty danish bikes and head on down to a coastal town called Dragør. Dragør has roughly around 11,000 people living there and it was one of the nicest Saturdays I've had since I've been here. The weather is getting to the point where I can wear my Mountain Hardware jacket instead of my big white coat, and we can bike outside without getting completely frozen! We left from her apartment in Nørrebro and biked through the city and along the seaside for about 2 hours. Since we took the scenic route it took a little longer then expected, but it was well worth it! We walked right up to the seaside where we could see the spectacular bridge going to Malmö (my next destination), and then headed to walk around the town. 

   The town has traditional Danish style houses with thatched roofs and cobblestone roads. It was picturesque with the small houses lining the roads with bikes and little sailboats in the windows. 

   Dragør was a prosperous seafaring town in the end of the 19th century with a harbor front that is still used today. It was founded in the 12th century and grew into a fishing port rather quickly. It continued to grow exponentially into the home of one of the largest fishing fleets in the country and as a base for salting and processing fish. 

   The first part of the name, Drag-, refers to drawing (dragging) boats ashore. The ending -ør is common in Scandinavian placenames and means a beach covered in sand or gravel.

   Now, since you've had a little history lesson, I can talk about the incredible burger I ate at the restaurant located on the side of the harbor with large windows to see outside. Yes, I ordered a burger at a harbor side restaurant. It was just too tempting. It included their homemade version of bbq sauce and a burger from a local farm with onions, cheese, bacon, lettuce, tomato, and more I'm sure. Yes I ate it all. 

  After trying to recover from my food coma, we headed back along the shore, viewing the ridiculously nice houses behind a fence lining the sea. The houses were all clean and crisp architectural designs with large windows and personal gazebo's with white table clothes, candles, and flowers. Since it was dinner time they were all enjoying fancy dinner parties that I wouldn't have minded being a part of... One day.. one day. We took a detour on a country road while we got to enjoy the sunset and horses on either sides of the road... romantic huh?
   It was a wonderful day and I'm sure I'll go back sometime in May. Maybe my legs will be in better shape. I could hardly walk the next few days. I swear, the wind goes whatever direction you're not. I hope everyone is doing well!

The Danish castles

Our awesome orange car

Frederiksborg Castle

Inside the Frederiksborg Castle and the Chapel inside the Hamlet Castle 

Hamlet Castle

Louisiana Museum  

The Belgian crew and me

Just casually reading Hamlet 

   Last Tuesday was a great day. Spring is finally starting to arrive in Denmark, so me and four Belgians rented a car and hit the road for a day of tourism. First we went to the Frederiksborg Castle located in Hillerød, Denmark. The oldest parts of the castle date back to the 1560 structure built by Frederick II but most of the current castle was constructed by Christian IV between 1602 and 1620. After Christian IV's death in 1648, the palace was used mainly for ceremonial events. The church has also been used as the knight's chapel for the Order of the Elephant and the Order of the Dannebrog since 1693; housed the Danish royal family's art collection, notably works on the life of Jesus by Danish painter Carl Heinrich Bloch; and was the site of the 1720 Treaty of Frederiksborg. It has now been made into the Museum of National History where you can view numerous painting and much more. After the first castle we drove up to the sea side where the Hamlet, or Kronborg, castle is located near the town of Helsingør, Denmark. Immortalized as Elsinore in William Shakespeare's play Hamlet, Kronborg is one of the most important Renaissance castles in Northern Europe. In 1785 the castle ceased to be a royal residence and was converted into barracks for the army. The army left the castle in 1923, and after a thorough renovation it was opened to the public. You could see Sweden right over the Baltic Sea, where we enjoyed an hour long lunch enjoying the sun for the first time in a couple of months. 

   After visiting the Castle's chapel and dungeons, we headed to the most famous art museum in Denmark, the Louisiana Museum. It houses a ton of pop art, from Andy Warhol and several others, and even paintings of Picasso. There were several other well known artists with artwork on display inside, and outside in the sculpture garden. Although I didn't really understand half of the pop art being artwork, it was still a fascinating museum to visit and luckily we had our own personal Belgian tour guide who knew everything about the artists and could give us some history lessons.. thanks Bram!