Copenhagen is built right on the edge of the sea and our hotel was located in the old Nyhavn part of town. Right around the corner were streets filled with restaurants and sidewalk cafes, intersected by many canals and draw bridges. We were fortunate enough to have wonderful hosts to show us all the sights - old friends that one of has known for well over 15 years, Lars and Birte.

Lars took us to the top of one of major landmarks - the Vors Frelsers Kirke, built in the 17th century. It takes 400 steps to get to the top, the last part of the ascent winds around the outside of the church tower. The view from the top of the curch is quite breath-taking (the hotel where we were staying is marked by a red arrow in the second picture). No visit to Copenhagen would be complete without a stop at Christiania, a sovereign country in the middle of the city where the laws of the Europian Union don't apply and drugs are sold openly at countless booths on "Pusher's Street".

The Copenhagen subway opened recently and it's fully automated, no human drives are employed - it's quite an experience to sit at the very front of the train and hurtle into the darkness with only a glass in front of you.

Here is the residence of the Danish Queen.

The cruise around the cannals and the harbor is a requirement, you get to see many things from the water you'd otherwise miss (such as the smart flats in the second picture below, which go for well north of $1M). Some folks also become even closer friends when on a boat (and after a few beers). The most famous landmark of Copengagen, the Little Mermaid, was dynamited by some nut the night we landed in Denmark so all we got to see was the stump where the statue used to be (this is not the first time the poor thing was vandalized and it's back in its place as this is being written).

We had to visit the famous amusement park of Tivoli, where we encountered many fascinating performances - things we wish we'd never seen, in fact. Please don't ask, we're still trying to forget ...

Don't have any idea what the following sign means but you better stop, blink laws are strictly enforced in Denmark.

Later we had an opportunity to sample the wonderful local ice cream and visit Lars and Birte at their home in the suburbs. Early the next morning one of us spied a man in front of a booth on wheels stopped at a traffic light, and only when the light turned green did it become clear that the booth has its own power and the "driver" walks in front and steers it to the its location.

We took a train over several bridges to the island of Funen and the city of Odense, the birthplace of Hans Christian Andersen. Refreshments at the cafeteria next to the Hans Christian Andersen Hus. Bikes are an extremely popular form of transportation in Copenhagen, the following picture shows only a fraction of the bikes parked at the main train station.

The next day we took a car that Lars and Birte kindly rented for the day (not owning an automobile themselves) and headed over the Oresund bridge to Sweden - the longest bridge / tunnel combination in the world (16 km / 10 miles). Our first stop in Sweden was the old college town of Lund, where we found that Czech beer was available on tap - cheers to that! We returned to Denmark on the ferry that links Sweden to Elsinore on the Danish side - it's a short hop, barely enough time to down a few beers. Soon we caught view of Kronborg Slot, made famous as Hamlet's Castle. We toured the inside of the castle, including the (often pitch dark) catacombs underneath. The morning of our departure for London the British Airways business lounge was deserted so we took advantage of it to relax a bit before the next leg of our trip.