she knits. she purls.: January 2012

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Copenhagen, Denmark

**Photo heavy post**

Home from a great trip to Copenhagen. Just a quick 1:25min flight away is the beautiful coastal city of Copenhagen. The people are just as beautiful as the scenery, everyone is so friendly and welcoming.

Veggie Brunch

Pickled Herring Assortment

We arrived nice and early and easily found our hostel, very close to all the sights of Copenhagen. We then wandered to find some food; since we were starving by that point and stumbled upon a great library/gallery/cafe. We were so pleased with the amazing food we had; Katie had a veggie brunch and I had the pickled herring assortment. Both were extremely flavorful and beautifully presented.

A little bit of snow

We then just wandered the streets checking things out until we could check into the hostel and have a well desereved nap, followed by an amazing supper of salmon baked on a oak plank covered in the smoothest mashed potatos I've ever had. Amazing food, yum!

A cute alley way

On the second day we took a walking tour of the city where we learned some interesting history about Copenhagen and saw some beautiful sights and historical buildings, many of which were replacements of the originals since Copenhagen had 3 devastating fires burning many buildings twice before they decided to build the buildings out of something other than wood!

At the Royal Palace

The snow finally made an appearance when we were in the royal palace courtyard and it was just beautiful. Unfortunatley the snow only lasted maybe 30min. We also visited the national museum. They have a lot of viking artifacts which are very interesting. Even preserved bodies that were pulled out of the peat bogs they were sunk into hundreds of years ago fully preserved similar to mummification. The bodies were put into the peat because the vikings thought that the deceased would return to the world as spirits of the earth if they did this.

Since there are so many sand banks in the waters outside Denmark fixed lighthouses were no use, so they had 'light-ships' that would move as the sandbanks moved

Nyhavn - The harbor area of Copenhagen

One of the many canals

Under water Statue

The next day we went on a river tour of the city and saw more amazing sights. This tour included a trip to Christiania, an area of Copenhagen that considers itself separate from Denmark, and doesn't follow any of the laws of Denmark. It is also legal to purchase and smoke marijuana in Christiania. The city occupies an old army base and the people live in the old army barracks and have also built their own houses out of found materials. It was quite interesting and very organic smelling indeed.

Noma, voted the best restaurant in the world several years running, a 12 course meal will cost you 200£ which I think is resonable if its the best restaurant in the world.

The black diamond - The national library

Sunset over Copenhagen

The Little Mermaid - From author Hans Christian Anderson

Copenhagen at night

Our last day involved a lot of royalty, we watched the changing of the guard at the royal palace which was a lot of pomp and circumstance for what it was, but we found out from a policeman that a new princess was born that morning, so there was extra 'pomp' so to speak. We then went to the Christianborg Palace where royal gatherings are held as well as where the parliment is. It was quite royal we even had to wear little O.R. type shoe covers when we went inside to protect the palace.

A Royal guard

Pomp and Circumstance for changing of the guard

Me and the guards

Katie likes them too...

Fancy shoe covers in the Christianborg Palace

Posing like a fool

We had yet another warm drink to warm us up since it was so chilly in Copenhagen and then we headed to the airport to sadly return to London.

Sunday, January 8, 2012

Touristy London

I've been remembering to take my camera more places now, so I thought I'd share some of the places I've been out and about to see over the past little while.


Cute shirts in the market

The busy streets on a holiday Monday

Last week I ventured to the Camden Market, which, sadly was like a lot of the other markets here in London, a lot of the same stuff for sale. It was the atmosphere that really got me though. Camden is known for its rocker grunge vibe, and was the starting point/hangout spot for the likes of Amy Whinehouse, Oasis and Blur. Its got a really cool vibe and tons of market left fr me to explore. I found out later that 'the stables' is the best part of the market, but I missed that part, guess theres always next week. Also Camden has tons of restaurants, street food and patios, oh the patios, a summer sun spot to remember for sure.

The damn gap...

Yesterday I went for a walk along the Thames path, it is a walk that oddly enough, goes along the Thames river. The whole path is about 180 miles long, so clearly I only did a portion. A very small portion indeed, since I hopped on a river boat to cut out some of the path.

Canary wharf in the background

The river boat was great, sped right along and it was a neat vantage point to see the city, also would be great in the summer, guess I'll have to stick around till then.

St Pauls Cathedral

The London Eye

I got off the boat at London Bridge and continued the walk onto the London Eye and the Houses of Parliment. It still gets me every time seeing these iconic structures in everyday life. Kinda like the north shore mountains I suppose. You just get used to them after awhile, but these landmarks are still very new and exciting to me. Speaking of the mountains, never thought I'd miss them, but I was wrong, I miss seeing them all snowy and pretty that's for sure!

Big Ben and the Houses of Parliment

I also bought a new book called 'I didn't know that about London' suggested to me by a co-worker, its amazing and full of great tidbits like this fun fact I'll leave you with. Who knew that wharf stood for anything, I thought it was just another word for pier or dock. Nope stands for Warehouse At River Front*, neat hey and a great tidbit! Always good to learn something new!

*Thanks Claire for this one :)

Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Brussels, Belgium

Rail Ticket

I went to Brussels with Katie (my roommate The American) for the weekend and after a short (2 hr) train ride we arrived, me over tried from working all night and The American just tired from getting up so early and the train ride.

We arrive at the train station to a overly helpful (note a large dose of sarcasm) ‘information person’. We get into the metro and its filthy. I mean gross, piss smelling filthy. I thought, right, metro not the cleanest place in a city to start with so keep an open mind. We finally find the hotel; right beside the European Union, and I tuck in for a well needed nap.

We head to the Christmas markets, which we are quite excited to check out since we have read so much about them online and are apparently some of the best in Europe. WRONG, everything at the markets are either made in India or China which would be fine if they were Indian or Chinese Christmas items, they are not, furthermore everything is so overpriced that even if you did find something you liked you wouldn’t want to pay the obscene price requested for said Indian/Chinese item.

Huge Ferris Wheel at the Christmas market

Although I do sound like a real Debbie-downer, I did enjoy going to a new place, and I understand that you can’t love everywhere you go!

So lets end on a high note shall we. We did go on a great hop-on hop-off bus tour that showed us all the great sights, so it was great to see the Royal palace and the Atomium. The beer was also amazing, and so many to choose from. The chocolate was also good, for a girl who isn’t a big chocolate fan I was really impressed with the amazing quality of the chocolates. We also found the Mannequin Pis, which is literally a statue of a little boy peeing into a fountain. This is one of the main attractions in Brussels, the statue even gets festively dressed up throughout the year. Very odd indeed.