Here, I will be telling my story and love-hate relationship with this city called Copenhagen.
Our flight from Manchester landed in Copenhagen and we took a train to and from Lund for a conference I was attending. It was just a 40-mins train ride that took us across the Oresund Bridge (bridge linking Sweden and Denmark) that stopped at Malmo before Lund. After the conference ended, we took the train again back into Copenhagen to make the most of our 1-day visit in this city.
It was raining for an hour, and then the sun started peeking out, and then it started raining again, this time quite heavily - not surprised, hey, we're in Europe! In the limited time that we have, we took the bus straight from Copenhagen Central Station to one of Europe's most popular harbour, Nyhavn. But because it was raining quite heavily, we decided to walk up to the Papiroen / the Copenhagen Street Food market, which took us about 15-20mins walk. We crossed the Inderhavnsbroen bridge at one end of Nyhavn. This bridge is specifically for cyclists and pedestrians, which crosses the inner harbour of Copenhagen. The view crossing this river is pretty amazing, you can see the Royal Danish Playhouse theatre from the front and side views.
The Royal Danish Playhouse.
A cute floating house.
The pedestrian side of the bridge.
And some nice views and cool architecture.
Copenhagen Street Food
When we entered the market, we were given a little bite of heavenly taste. We tasted some panko shrimp from a sushi stall (among the first stalls that we encountered) and it was the best I've had in my life! Their homemade sauces were fantastic and the shrimp tasted so fresh! I couldn't keep my mind of it while I walked around looking at other food stalls. There were abundant choices of food from all over the world! See here for more info on stalls - we gave in and bought the shrimp in the end, yay! After lunch, it was time for us to separate with Kak Sarah and Abg Jo because they had a flight to catch for Bologna, Italy for another conference. Here are some photos of how cool the 'food court' looks:
Fizal couldn't keep his hand of the whole bunch of the panko shrimp testers.
Neither can Kak Sarah. :p
Happy tummy, happy people.
No rain can stop you from getting your food right!
Some halal Moroccan dish.
No wonder this food market is the hype of the town. Definitely worth going especially for y'all food lovers out there.
Nyhavn
As we were walking back towards Nyhavn, the clouds started to clear up leaving us some blue sky and a little sun shine (but only for a short while). We took the opportunity to walk along the waterfront canal and took some photos while it was nice and bright.
Apologies for the vain photos. :p
Final group photo!
Such beautiful sights call for lots of photos from different angles, haha.
The area around Strøget.
Found our favourite shop (in Lund), but this one is 3 times bigger!
As much as I actually enjoyed our brief time in Copenhagen and I thought that it was a beautiful city, there was bitter part to it.
The unplanned extended stay
Until then!
Our flight from Manchester landed in Copenhagen and we took a train to and from Lund for a conference I was attending. It was just a 40-mins train ride that took us across the Oresund Bridge (bridge linking Sweden and Denmark) that stopped at Malmo before Lund. After the conference ended, we took the train again back into Copenhagen to make the most of our 1-day visit in this city.
It was raining for an hour, and then the sun started peeking out, and then it started raining again, this time quite heavily - not surprised, hey, we're in Europe! In the limited time that we have, we took the bus straight from Copenhagen Central Station to one of Europe's most popular harbour, Nyhavn. But because it was raining quite heavily, we decided to walk up to the Papiroen / the Copenhagen Street Food market, which took us about 15-20mins walk. We crossed the Inderhavnsbroen bridge at one end of Nyhavn. This bridge is specifically for cyclists and pedestrians, which crosses the inner harbour of Copenhagen. The view crossing this river is pretty amazing, you can see the Royal Danish Playhouse theatre from the front and side views.
Copenhagen Street Food
When we entered the market, we were given a little bite of heavenly taste. We tasted some panko shrimp from a sushi stall (among the first stalls that we encountered) and it was the best I've had in my life! Their homemade sauces were fantastic and the shrimp tasted so fresh! I couldn't keep my mind of it while I walked around looking at other food stalls. There were abundant choices of food from all over the world! See here for more info on stalls - we gave in and bought the shrimp in the end, yay! After lunch, it was time for us to separate with Kak Sarah and Abg Jo because they had a flight to catch for Bologna, Italy for another conference. Here are some photos of how cool the 'food court' looks:
No wonder this food market is the hype of the town. Definitely worth going especially for y'all food lovers out there.
Nyhavn
As we were walking back towards Nyhavn, the clouds started to clear up leaving us some blue sky and a little sun shine (but only for a short while). We took the opportunity to walk along the waterfront canal and took some photos while it was nice and bright.
You can never get enough of colourful Nordic buildings.
I briefly mentioned this book in a previous post, and now I am able to set foot on this 'hyggelig' land and see for myself how the Danes live and manage their lives, and being the happiest people in the world (didn't get to see much though cuz of our time constraint).
From Nyhavn, we walked up to Strøget, which was a long stretch of shops with high and low end shops, perfect for shopping, with also various cafes and restaurants. The area was busy and very lively, filled with street buskers playing the accordion of some classical music. We walked from one end to the other looking for souvenir shops. We had lunch at one of the halal restaurants and had some Italian gelato (no gelato is enough gelato, right? hehe). When we finally can't go on any longer cuz we've tired ourselves out, we made our way back to the Central Station and to the airport for our night flight.
As much as I actually enjoyed our brief time in Copenhagen and I thought that it was a beautiful city, there was bitter part to it.
The unplanned extended stay
We arrived at Copenhagen Airport about 2.5 hours before our flight is due to depart. We had a bit of Danish Krones left, so I had already imagined spending the money on some nice things from the duty free range, or maybe get some coffee before our flight. It was not until we checked the flights information board and saw that our flight to Manchester was cancelled. Confused, I checked my email and messages to see if I had missed their notification, but nope, nothing. So we went to the check in counter, but everything seemed normal. We wanted to go to the counter to ask, but they seemed to be under-staffed and asked us to get in the queue (with the people wanting to check in luggages). We met with some other passengers who were also confused about the cancelled flights. We waited for a long time until someone finally attend to us, giving us some care cards for 'cancelled flights'. We were asked to find alternative flights by ourselves (we had to book a flight into London Gatwick, and take the train back to Sheffield). We were eventually given our accommodation for the night, at Clarion Hotel Copenhagen Airport. Exhausted from a whole day of walking around Copenhagen city, we had a good night's rest.
The next morning, while we were having our breakfast, we met one of the passengers from the cancelled flight last night. He told us that the terminal that our flight was supposed to be in was closed due to some security threat. Again, confused, we made our way to the airport only to find what the man said was true. Terminal 2 was closed and there were lots of people waiting outside of the terminal. Some flights had to be cancelled. We waited patiently for some good news, really hoping that our flight isn't cancelled again (I really had to be back for some work and appointments). After some time, the terminal was re-opened and operated like usual. Our flight was delayed a little bit, but it doesn't matter, I was happy enough that we took off and landed safely in London.
The next morning, while we were having our breakfast, we met one of the passengers from the cancelled flight last night. He told us that the terminal that our flight was supposed to be in was closed due to some security threat. Again, confused, we made our way to the airport only to find what the man said was true. Terminal 2 was closed and there were lots of people waiting outside of the terminal. Some flights had to be cancelled. We waited patiently for some good news, really hoping that our flight isn't cancelled again (I really had to be back for some work and appointments). After some time, the terminal was re-opened and operated like usual. Our flight was delayed a little bit, but it doesn't matter, I was happy enough that we took off and landed safely in London.
Oh well, all journeys have their own story, and this is mine. At least I have something to look back on when I think of Copenhagen. :)
Alhamdulillah, we're now safely back in Sheffield and I'm able to write to post today. To more safe and worry-free adventures in the future!
Until then!
