Day 6 of the visit.
This day was spent in Roskilde, and as I mentioned previously, I will let Collin blog about this at a later date.
Day 7 of the visit.
On Friday my mom and I went downtown by ourselves to explore a few more things my mom wanted to see and to have lunch before we painted some Royal Copenhagen plates to celebrate an early mother's day. In the meantime, Collin and my dad went to the movie theater down the block to watch Iron Man 3 (which I think they both enjoyed).
First my mom and I went to see the Little Mermaid statue. It's a little bit removed from the rest of the tourist attractions and, as such, requires a bit of walking. But we had only seen it so far from the water, and my mom wanted a closer look.
Hans Christian Andersen, as I am sure you all know, is Danish, and the creator of the "the little mermaid" or "
Den Lille Havfrue" as she is called in Danish. In 1909, Carl Jacobsen, founder of the Carlsberg brewery, commissioned the making of the statue by sculptor Edvard Eriksen, and it was unveiled in 1913. The statue has had its head sawed off a few times and has been defaced in many other ways. It's actually a lot smaller and more unassuming then people typically expect.
After viewing her, we headed south towards the Strøget where the Royal Copenhagen flagship store and our final destination is, stopping at a few sights along the way. First we came across the
Gefion Fountain. This fountain depicts the Norse goddess Gefjun. Gefjun was promised by the Swedish king that she could have whatever land she could plow in one night. So she turned her four sons into oxen and plowed out a bit of land that was then thrown into the sea. The hole that was left behind is what is now Lake Mälaren in Sweden, and the land thrown into the sea is what we now know as Zealand, the island where Copenhagen is.
We continued on to
Amelienborg Slot, the winter home of the royal family. The complex consists of four "townhouses". One of these is where the queen and her husband live. The other is where the Crown Prince and his family live. If flags are flying on the roofs it means the family is in residence. When we were there, the flag was on the Crown Prince's home, but not the queen's.
The homes are guarded by members of the Royal Life Guards. These are the same guards we saw marching towards Rosenborg Slot a few days prior.
Next to Amelienborg is the large Lutheran church called
Frederik's Church or Marmorkirken (Marble Church). This church has the largest dome in Scandinavia.
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| St. Ansgars |
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| Alexander Nevsky Church |
Down the block from the Marble Church is also the Roman Catholic cathedral (St. Ansgars Cathedral). And across the street from that is Alexander Nevsky Church, the only Russian Orthodox church in Copenhagen. This church was built in honor of Princess Dagmar of Denmark who married Alexander Alexandrovich, eventually becoming Tsar Alexander III and Tsaritsa Maria Feodorovna, parents to Tsar Nicholas II, and grandparents to poor Alexander Romanov, one of the most famous hemophiliacs. On a side note, after fleeing Russia when the monarchy was being overthrown in 1917, Maria traveled to London but eventually settled in her native Denmark living in her holiday house,
Hvidøre House, which happens to be the location of my department's next group outing in June. Stay tuned for more on that after I go there. But I digress...(I'm somewhat of a "fan" of Romanov history)
After viewing all the churches we continued on past Nyhavn to the
lllum Department Store on the Strøget for lunch on the rooftop.
After lunch we headed next door for our painting experience. We were directed up to the third floor (past the exciting "employees only" sign on the staircase) to a room set up with a long table covered in plain dinner plates that had pencil sketches on them, paintbrushes, paint, water -- specially bottled for "Royal Copenhagen" -- and aprons.
We were told (in Danish) that today was our lucky day. Normally you have to paint the Blue (or Black) Fluted Mega dinner plate, but today we got to choose between that, a cup, or the more complex Blue Elements dinner plate. I decided to stick with the Fluted Mega. My mom elected to paint the Blue Elements. One thing that amazed me is the size of the unglazed plates is so much bigger than the finished product. They shrink in the glazing process. Although I had asked prior to buying the tickets if it would be a problem that we didn't speak Danish, and was told it wouldn't be, it turns out our "teacher" couldn't really speak a word of English -- or didn't want to, I don't know. But that was a bit frustrating. My mom's neighbor was happy to translate for her, but hearing things directly from the instructor probably would have been more helpful. Nonetheless, we enjoyed ourselves, and I am looking forward to seeing the finished product in another week or so.
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| hard at work with her Blue Elements plate |
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| The finished Fluted Mega plate (pre-glazing) |
We returned home quite exhausted, and with a little bit of time to relax and recuperate before heading out to the Opera House for the symphony. The first thing my parents did back in September, after booking this trip, was to purchase tickets for the symphony while they were here. We heard the Royal Danish Orchestra play
Mahler's Symphony No. 6, the Tragic Symphony. This was my first symphony experience. It was in the
Royal Danish Opera House which just opened in 2005. To get there we had to take a "water bus" across the canal.
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| aboard the water bus |
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| view of Amelienborg and the Marble Church from outside the Opera House |
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| The Royal box (sadly no Royals were present) |
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| the near-empty stage as they were warming up |
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| walking back to the metro along Nyhavn |
And that ends Day 7.
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