After a much needed night of sleep, the day today began by piling into a bright purple coach bus. After stopping briefly at The Little Mermaid sculpture, we headed to Frederiksborg Castle, Fredensborg Castle, Kronborg Castle, and the Maritime Museum.
It's incredible to me how common castles are here. The second castle we stopped at, the Fronborg castle, is the Queen's spring and autumn residence. We drove past one that was the King's hunting house, one that was a princess's summer home, and another one that is also a residence of the queen while not under restoration. Those were only a fraction of the castles in the area. In fact, while they were all exquisite and lavish and incredibly effective at making me feel like a peasant, by the end of the day, the four castles we've seen so far just began to blend together in my head.
While we spent a large portion of the day learning about the history of Danish monarchy, we were also able to see considerable amount of modern Scandinavian innovation and design. In fact, I have been blown away with how ceaselessly the rich, historical side of this country blends with a hyper-modern, cutting-edge design aesthetic. One moment you're walking the corridors of an eight hundred year-old castle, conjuring images of Renaissance-age artists at magnificent parties; and the next, you're in a gift shop with crisp edges, suspended shelves, and 5000pt letters stencilled on the wall, wondering if somehow you've stepped 20 years into the future. Perhaps the contrast between these two styles is part of what makes them each so impressive.
Unfortunately, I didn't take many photos on my phone of what was definitely my favourite part of the day - the Louisiana Art Museum. Normally, I'm not the biggest fan of contemporary art or large museums, but I easily could have spent a whole day at this place. Again, there was a quaint historical house where the museum started out (contrasted with a very modern entranceway and gift shop inside), but neither the art nor the museum was constrained to a single building. Instead, it too became a piece of art; made to be enjoyable as more than a two-dimensional rectangle on a wall. The entrance building led to a garden with statues, mobiles, lush lawns and a gorgeous cafe, all with the backdrop of the bright blue sky and ocean. There were so many people on the deck of the cafe and sprawled across the lawns. If we hadn't had to spend so little time there, I would've loved to have also laid on the grass and gazed at Sweden across the water. This scene was surrounded by various other buildings that incorporated windows, wood panelling, and empty space to create a feeling that not only was the garden meant to compliment the art museum, but vice versa.
After a full day, we spent the evening with a bit of free time at Tivoli Gardens - the world's oldest amusement park. It was a bit too dark for any great photos, but it was equal parts restaurants and rides. I had a lovely sit-down meal with Katie, Hui Wen and Amanda, whose birthday happened to be today.
The holiday we know as "Good Friday" in Canada is called "Long Friday" here, which seems strangely ironic as today felt so short after our 30-hour marathon yesterday. Nonetheless, it was a wonderful day.
Tomorrow we will be spending more time within Copenhagen itself, and after a day that was mostly on the road, I can't wait to continue exploring by foot.