My parents came to visit me in Copenhagen, so I planned a full 3-day itinerary for their time here. They arrived Thursday afternoon and I met them after my classes ended. We walked to a cocktail and pizza restaurant called Neighborhood for dinner.
We struggled a bit to eat the pizza because the crust was super thin, almost like a cracker crust. But the toppings were great and we enjoyed our time. Then we took the metro to Frederiksberg so they could see my apartment and meet some of my roommates. Luckily Ida and Lennart were home so they got to meet them, and my friends Lexi and Sophie came upstairs to say hi as well.
The next morning I met my parents at their hotel and we headed to Grød for breakfast. Grød is a local porridge and oatmeal restaurant in Copenhagen. This was my first time trying it out. My mom got the Oat Porridge 1, which is topped with caramel sauce, fresh apples and roasted almonds, and my dad and I both got the Overnight Oats, which was made of rolled oats, apple juice, cinnamon, chia seeds and Icelandic yoghurt, and topped with GRØDs Granola, rhubarb compote, roasted coconut flakes, almond butter and fresh apples. We loved all of it!
Then we headed to Nyhavn and boarded a canal cruise I booked. The back of the boat was uncovered so we sat there to get some fresh air and see the sights without looking through the glass windows. It was a great cruise to see a lot of the city from the water, and we learned some fun facts from the guide’s explanations. The boat was the exact size to fit under the very low bridges, with just inches of extra room on every side.
When we got back, we took some time walking down Nyhavn and taking pictures with the classic colorful buildings.
We took a quick walk to the waterfront to jump on the street trampolines. They are a set of four trampolines built into the pavement for the public to enjoy.
Then we headed to the Glass Market, one of my favorite places in Copenhagen. It is two huge glass buildings filled with food vendors, like a permanent farmers market. I told them they had to try smørrebørd, a classic Danish meal of an open-faced sandwich on rye bread. I got the vegetarian option which had roasted potatoes and onions, and my parents split a chicken salad with bacon, and one with salmon. We sat outside to enjoy the sun and tried our best to eat them- it was really windy and they are really messy sandwiches!
For dessert we tried another place in the Glass Market called Glean. They had flødeboller, a chocolate-coated marshmallow treat and traditional Danish dessert. However this place was plant-based so they made their marshmallow out of aquafaba- and it was delicious! I have had a traditional flødeboller, but the texture and flavor of these were so much better. We tried a salted caramel mocha, coconut, and a special-edition orange flavor. They were amazingly good but very sweet, so we had to walk them off.
Then we headed to the round tower, a tall building in the middle of the city that offers great views. It is cool because it was designed for horses to be able to pull people up, so it is a ramp instead of stairs until the final small section. We walked all the way to the top and enjoyed panoramic views of the city.
My mom struggles with heights but I had climbed it before and thought that she would be okay at the top because the platform is really big so you don’t have to stand near the edge. She climbed it and felt good at the top, so we took pictures to remember that she did it!
We walked down, and did some shopping around the city center. We stopped in a store selling home and kitchen decor. They had a full kitchen setup inside and they were making sample size spinach waffles with salmon to show off some of the kitchenware they were selling. My dad tried one and said it was delicious.
We kept shopping and saw they had little plastic characters on springs that were really cute. They had them in all different colors and some were easter themed. My mom and I picked out a bunny and a sheep for easter. Outside, they had a huge statue of one and my mom loved it.
We continued shopping, walked by my academic buildings, and then headed back to their hotel to regroup before dinner. Then we headed back out again and went to a bar called DECO for drinks. They had ice cubes branded with their name, and their drink names were all related to songs or artists.
After a couple drinks we headed to our dinner reservation at Cocks & Cows, a burger and cocktail restaurant. It was really good and they had a big selection of burgers and veggie burgers to choose from.
After dinner we stopped by Bastard Cafe, a really popular board game cafe. My friends and I love to go there to get a drink and have a relaxed night playing new board games, but on weekends it is super hard to get a table. The place is huge and has so many rooms and tables, but it gets insanely busy. That was the case this night, so we just took a quick look around.
The next morning we woke up, headed back to Grød, and then met up with a bike tour group. It was a three hour tour with a small group and a tour guide, where we stopped at the most important spots around the city. Biking is by far the best way to see the city, so I was glad we did it. The tour guide was great and very funny when telling the history of the city, and it was interesting to learn new things about Copenhagen after living here for three months.
We stopped in Freetown Christiania, biked over iconic pedestrian bridges, saw the changing of the guards at Amalienborg palace, visited the Little Mermaid statue, and saw the royal horses training at Christiansborg Palace.
After the bike tour, we headed to Cantina for lunch. I had gnocchetti with artichoke, tomato, oregano & parmesan, my mom had pumpkin ravioli with goat cheese, walnuts, sage & pecorino, and my dad got pizza with salami picante, honey, tomato & mozzarella.
After lunch we decided to get some crazy Danish pastries, so we stopped down the street at Buka Bakery. We got a nutella croissant and a lemon meringue croissant. We split them both into thirds but my dad sabotaged me and gave me the biggest pieces of them both. I also got the middle piece, so it was open on both sides and spilled all over the place! Nonetheless, they were delicious and a great stop.
We went back to the hotel and rested before dinner at a thai restaurant. We got a few appetizers including tofu spring rolls, and the chef brought us a special to try. They saw I ordered vegetarian food so they brought me an avocado-based one and my parents’ had fish. For main courses I had vegetable pad thai and my parents shared some chicken and fish dishes.
After dinner we went to a mini golf bar in the Meat Packing District called Camping. They had 16 holes throughout the bar, and two bars to stop at along the way. It was pretty busy since it was a Saturday night, but we had a great time playing, listening to music, and getting drinks.
The next morning we got breakfast at Mad & Kaffe, a really popular brunch spot with a few locations around the city. It has a cool concept where each person fills our a card to choose 5,7, or 9 things to be on your brunch board. I got a matcha latte, eggs, an acai bowl, yogurt, and a croissant. We liked the concept because you don’t have to commit to just one item for breakfast, but we all agreed the food didn’t taste as good as we expected or as it looked. I actually saw on Facebook a few days later that they decided to stop serving breakfast to focus on lunch and dinner.
After breakfast, we took the bus to Copenhill, a massive plant that burns trash into energy. It was created in 2018 and designed as a functional trash plant that would also provide a recreational space for the city. The exhaust that it emits is filtered so it is just water vapor. Its main attraction is its ski slope, but it also has a 275 foot rock climbing wall, a hiking/ walking/ running trail, a cafe, and a bar. We began by walking all the way to the top of it, which was pretty tiring.
We hiked back down and my mom and I decided to rent skis and try out the ski slopes. They had four levels: green, blue, red and black. We started with the green slope to get accustomed to it, and found that it was much more challenging than skiing on snow. The turf had no traction, so it was a lot like skiing on ice. After about five runs each down the green hill, we decided to try out blue. It was a lot longer because you ski down the blue and then the green section. It also had some steeper spots and it is pretty much impossible to stop yourself once you start moving. My mom ended up falling down and had to take her boot out of the ski to get back up since it was so slippery! We both only did the blue one time because we didn’t think it was very fun. We went down the green a couple more times each, and then decided to go tubing!
There were a bunch of tubes at the bottom of the hill, so we grabbed them and headed back up the hill. The tubing hill was parallel to the green spot but had a little ledge to keep you from going in front of the skiers. We had a lot more fun with tubing and wished that there were more hills for it.
We returned our ski rentals and took the bus back to the inner city. We went back to the glass market and my parents tried out some more smørrebørd flavors. I got my favorite salad bowl from Smag. And, of course, we stopped at Glean and got some more flødeboller.
Then we headed to the Glyptotek, an art museum in the city. I hadn’t been there before, but it was highly recommended. Copenhagen has so many museums, so I thought visiting one was an important part of their stay.
The architecture of the museum is really beautiful so my favorite part was looking around the different rooms. There was a huge room with tall ceilings, natural light, and so many plants. The exhibits had Greek and Egyptian sculptures. We spent an hour walking through it and reading about the history.
Then we headed back to chill before dinner. I fell asleep in the chair in their hotel room lol.
For dinner I made reservations at a sushi restaurant on the top floor of a hotel. It had amazing views of the city, great service, and delicious food and cocktails. It was called Sticks’n’Sushi, so they had sushi and skewers with tons of options. I got a vegetarian plate that had six different vegetarian nigiri including tofu with ginger, avocado, flame-grilled eggplant, grilled red pepper, and portobello mushroom.
After dinner we headed to meet my friends Gretchen and Sophie at Reffen, an outdoor street food market that had just opened for the season. It is a huge space overlooking the water with tons of vendors, an outdoor eating space with tons of picnic tables, and a skate park. Sophie and Gretchen ate dinner there and we all got drinks and waffles for dessert. My parents split a bubble waffle filled with ice cream and Sophie and I got waffles on a stick with sprinkles and chocolate. Even though it was freezing, it was a great last night with them here.
The next morning, I met my parents for coffee and breakfast at Espresso House before I went to class and they headed to Brussels. It was great being a tour guide for the weekend while also getting to try out some restaurants and experiences that I hadn’t done yet. They said they loved Copenhagen and really enjoyed seeing the city!
