Copenhagen for nine-year-olds (then and now)

At the age of nine, I visited Copenhagen for the first time. I clearly remember visiting the amusement park, Tivoli, seeing the (very) Little Mermaid, and not much else. In fact, what I recall most vividly is arguing with my parents because I wanted them to buy me a red and white scarf! 

This time, I returned with my very own nine-year-old, along with some really high expectations to love this much-heralded Danish capital (and hopes that he wouldn’t argue with me over a much-wanted purchase). Spoiler alert: not only were there no arguments, but Copenhagen actually exceeded these expectations.

If you’re headed there any time soon, then I hope our recommendations help out. With a preference for slow travel, we didn’t set out to tick off every sightseeing spot, but to enjoy an immersed Danish week and experience a few key places, and we loved every minute of it. (Okay, except the minute I fell off my bike. More on that later!)

Cruising Copenhagen with Hey Captain

I knew I wanted to take to the water somehow in Copenhagen and my research unearthed a tour company called Hey Captain – with their emphasis on local discovery in small groups, they were exactly what I was after. We only had nine passengers in our boat – my son and I, plus an extended family of seven – and their tour numbers don’t get much bigger than that. Drinks are included, and we adults enjoyed our rosé wine while the kids had a drink my son dubbed ‘Danish Fanta’.

The two-hour Hidden Gems trip left from Ofelia Plads just east of the city centre, and our captain was Victor, an economics student and son of a naval officer. He steered us around the harbour and beyond with lots of informative chat and the clear intent to make sure his stories were tailored to his current passengers – nothing formulaic about it.

Victor had so many tales to tell us: one I especially remember was a tale from his childhood when he regularly walked the family dog in the park near the Little Mermaid. A tourist came up to him once and asked where he could buy tickets to the Little Mermaid, saying, ‘I want to climb right into the top of it for a view over Copenhagen!’ Yeah, poor Victor had to confess that it’s not quite Statue of Liberty size … or even human sized!

With kids and teens on board, Victor added a stop in Nordhavn, a rapidly changing neighbourhood, and took us to a special playground and exercise area built on top of a multi-storey parking lot – one of many examples I came across of clever Danish ideas in action.  The whole morning felt like a boat trip out with friends rather than a tourist activity.

Thanks to the friendly company, the delicious wine, the sunshine, and especially the stories from Victor, the Hey Captain outing proved to be my favourite activity in Copenhagen.

Fun in Tivoli Gardens

Although I remembered the rides and lights of Tivoli from my childhood, I’d completely forgotten its central location. On our first full day in Copenhagen, we ‘accidentally’ cycled past it on our way into town, because it’s right in the heart of the city – yet once you step inside, it’s so gently colourful and peaceful that you feel you’re somewhere quite separate.

We spent almost a full day there, beginning on the ferris wheel to get an overview of the park, and indeed scenic views over Copenhagen. We negotiated some not-too-scary rides including The Mine (we really thought we were going to get saturated on this!), and an original wooden rollercoaster from 1914 (I assured my son it had been well-maintained and probably modified since then), to name a couple of favourites.

At Tivoli you can either pay per ride or get an all-day pass – we chose the latter which is so much more fun, rather than constantly rationalising whether you should or shouldn’t, or if a particular ride is ‘worth it’.

Surprisingly the food options in the park were both delicious and not overly pricey (or at least no more expensive than Copenhagen in general – compared to eating out in Perth, it was still cheaper). We stayed for an early dinner and splurged in a slightly upmarket restaurant there, and I fully embraced the Danish cuisine by ordering my first smørrebrød (open sandwich) with pickled herring. Much yummier than I’d imagined! My son picked chicken over pickled herring, I have to admit.

Danish bakery treats

Before I went to Iceland, I learnt from Helen Russell’s book The Year of Living Danishly that Danish bakeries were going to be our friend and that the simple treat to look out for was a snegle – basically a cinnamon bun.

Let me tell you, even my first snegle from Aldi was amazing. We experienced all manner of Danish bakery treats while in Copenhagen though, not just our daily snegle. On the very day we arrived, our delightful Airbnb landlord gave us amazing baked goods from the famous La Glace because she works there part-time! We were so spoilt.

Luckily we did lots of walking and cycling (see below …) to at least partly offset our calorie intake.

Louisiana Museum of Modern Art

The Louisiana is not strictly in Copenhagen, but it’s a very common day trip, being a half-hour train ride north of Copenhagen in the small town of Humlebæk. My Copenhagen resident friend Erin glowingly recommended the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art to me a couple of years ago when we recorded a chat for the podcast and I’ve kept it in mind ever since.

It is much more than just an art gallery … the Louisiana is a complete destination! It’s one of those art museums where even if you took the Picassos off the walls it would still be a fascinating place to visit, with architecturally interesting, interconnecting buildings and a cafe with views across the water to Sweden. In fact, it’s probably best described by this quote from founder Knud W. Jensen:

I wanted to create a new kind of museum where the visitor would have the sense of being the guest in the home of an eccentric uncle who collects art.

Knud W. Jensen

That’s exactly how it comes across. (A rich eccentric uncle though, as it’s a vast area with multiple buildings and lots of garden space.) There was so much we loved, including, at the time of our visit, the colourful and quirky Pippilotti Rist exhibition, and the permanent Yayoi Kusuma room with its lights and mirrors.

By far the highlight, though, was the children’s wing, with three floors of welcoming hands-on activities. Together, my son and I made colourful collages in TV frames and tiny matchstick-and-fabric  furniture times, both connected to the Pippilotti Rist exhibition, then played with the all-yellow Lego, and could barely tear ourselves away to go and experience some of the rest of the art.

Renting bicycles from Baisikeli in Copenhagen

You know I love to try and do local kind of things when I travel. The more I read about Copenhagen, the more I realised that although we could easily use their excellent public transport, the proper Danish way to get around while based at our Airbnb in a inner-city neighbourhood would be to rent bikes. Given that my son loves hopping on his bike it seemed like a sensible move – and I also thought the exercise would justify more bakery visits!

Google turned up Baiskeli which not only rents bikes at a very reasonable cost (we paid 630DKK for two bikes for a week including helmets) but is also a social enterprise. They ship bicycles down to Mozambique several times a year, and send along Danes to train locals there to work as bicycle mechanics, creating ongoing employment for them.

We learnt a lot about being locals in Copenhagen while riding our bikes. It didn’t take us long to get the hang of the road rules, although when we first set off we actually rode down one bike lane the wrong way – never again, we were quickly told off by an older Dane riding towards us! We also learnt how to correctly make a left turn, and how to make sure we could find our bikes again after locking them up in a bicycle parking area filled with literally hundreds of bikes.

Confession time: I also learnt not to try to look at my phone while riding … I know, it should be something I already know but I was trying to navigate and … well let’s just say I had some very bruised knees, and a bit of bruised pride too. Let this be a lesson to you all!

Lego Store (and the Strøget)

The Strøget is the main pedestrian mall area in central Copenhagen and it’s a vast area which is cut off to cars. We explored here on our first full day, proudly cycling in and locking up our bikes before heading to my son’s most important destination, the flagship Lego Store! I loved the enormous Lego mosaic straight out of a Copenhagen street view, and the fun and helpful staff there.

We strolled further, investigated a few more shops; I’d promised to buy my son a soccer ball so he’d have something to kick around during our two weeks in Denmark, and it turned out to be a very worthwhile purchase. At lunchtime, we stopped for hot dogs. Not just any hot dogs, of course: in true Copenhagen style they were organic, packed with extra ingredients, and tasted amazing. I wasn’t surprised by this quality of food for much longer though – I soon learnt that Denmark is all about high quality food and those hot dogs were certainly no exception. So good!!

Aquarium life at Den Blå Planet

Den Blå Planet, Denmark’s national aquarium, was a surprise extra on the morning we arrived. We flew in from Bangkok early in the morning and our Airbnb host couldn’t check us in until mid-afternoon, but a quick internet search to find a way to amuse ourselves showed me the aquarium was walking distance from the airport. We threw our luggage in an airport locker and off we went. From the airport to Den Blå Planet it’s just a fifteen-minute walk through suburbia, which seemed a gentle introduction to Copenhagen after a long-haul flight from Asia.

Being a Sunday, we found lots of Danish families with young kids were there too, and I was impressed with how much thought was given to the kinds of activities kids would enjoy. As well as the usual aquarium displays, there was a vast water playground out the back (overlooking the harbour no less) with various taps to pump and buckets to fill, plus a huge pond area with nets and buckets for kids to use to collect up tadpoles or other creatures. Once they’d caught something, they could use microscopes set up on tables nearby to have a good look at them, and scientists were on hand to chat with them, too.

I laughed when I heard an announcement over the aquarium PA explaining bilingually that a dissection was about to take place. In there book, Helen Russell had written that this was a common thing in Denmark, yet I’d barely believed it and there we were, our first hours in Denmark and we got to see Lise the educator give a squid dissection demonstration. It was very educational, I must say!

So, are you going to Copenhagen now?

I look back to photos of nine-year-old me on that ride in Tivoli – we searched to find that same ride, but it must have made way for something more modern – and I look happy – despite not getting my own way with that scarf purchase. And I look at pictures of my own nine-year-old boy after our week in Copenhagen and know he was happy, too. I don’t think Copenhagen is a city that would let anyone down, so if you get the chance to visit, grab it! 

 

Disclosure bit: Thanks to Hey Captain, Tivoli Gardens and the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art for their support in waiving entry fees and showing us around. As always, of course, all my views are my own.