71Nyhavn Hotel

Just a few words about our hotel in Copenhagen - 71Nyhavn.

First of all, I misread my confirmation when I booked the hotel on their website. I read CHF600/USD 582 per night, and that turned out to be the cost for our entire stay - two nights. So, while still expensive for what it was, the hotel ended up costing half the price I had originally thought it would cost. So, that was good news.

The hotel is decent, but it's not fancy by any means. I guess the best thing about it is that it's in a great location right in Nyhavn. However, if you ever plan on staying at this hotel, I have one big tip: REQUEST A ROOM IN THE NEWER PART OF THE HOTEL!!!

The old part (pictured here), is the part that faces the canal. While the view is much better, the rooms absolutely suck. They are small, and the bathrooms are tiny. In fact, the shower is just a shower head coming out of the corner with a shower curtain that hangs from the ceiling. The shower floor is pretty much the bathroom floor with a drain. If I had had to shower in there, I would have been standing there with a shower curtain stuck to my body with water pouring down on my head. Not good!

Mrs. TBF took one look at the room, said "NO WAY!", and then went down to the front desk to POLITELY voice her complaints. We ended up being switched to a room in the newer wing. Although it had a view of the street instead of the canal, the room was much better. Also, the bathroom was a real bathroom with a bathtub shower combo.

What I find interesting is that the man at the front desk told Mrs. TBF that a lot of people complain about the old wing, however "....we are not allowed to make any changes because the building is protected," which I take to mean that it has protected landmark status.

That would be fine except for the fact that the restaurant we ate at on Saturday night is in the oldest building in Copenhagen, which I'm assuming must also be protected, AND... THEY HAVE A GLEAMING, MODERN KITCHEN.

What's up with that?!?!?

Copenhagen 2009 Recap

Last weekend's visit to Copenhagen, our first in eight years, was a triumphant success!

Our friend, Dr. Andy, who lives here in Basel, actually works for a Danish company and has a studio apartment in Copenhagen where he occasionally sleeps when he's not living here in Basel OR circumnavigating the globe on one of his many business trips.

Got that? Good!

Here are a few bullet points from the trip:

Copenhagen is a really nice city, and I could definitely live there. The locals seem happy and worry-free, they probably speak the best English of any non-native English speaking country in Europe, the shopping is good, the restaurants are good, and the quality of life seems exceptional. Zürich and Geneva usually rank higher than Copenhagen on the "most livable cities" list, but I personally would probably choose Copenhagen.

Copenhagen is very expensive. We stayed at a place called 71Nyhavn Hotel which was a five minute walk from Dr. Andy's apartment. It was nice, but it wasn't fancy or luxurious, AND it cost about CHF 300/USD 290 per night - NO breakfast included. The VAT is something like 25%.

Liquor is expensive. A 50 cl/16 oz beer costs about CHF 10/USD 9.70. A glass of wine at dinner cost something like CHF 30/USD 29 PER GLASS!!

We went to Christiania (you can read about it here) on what just happened to be its 38th birthday. Lots of hippies, flea markets, people openly smoking pot, dogs roaming around without collars - cool place!

The World Cup of Archery just happened to be taking place right by our hotel. A Venezuelan woman won, and a Danish woman came in second (awwww!). We sat and watched the exciting competition, mesmerized for hours with tens of thousands of archery fans. Ok... there were only a few hundred people watching... we watched for a few minutes, and... well... archery pretty much sucks as a spectator sport.

Tuborg is better than Carlsberg!

We had a great dinner at Kong Hans Kælder. Top-notch/friendly service, the food was great (other than the minor issue of Dr. Andy biting down on buckshot while eating his wild mallard course), and we happily wined and dined for 4+ hours in the oldest building in Copenhagen!

Click HERE if you'd like to see all of the pictures from Copenhagen.

Friday Flashback: Back To Copenhagen...

We're off to Copenhagen this weekend. It'll be our first time back in a little over eight years.

What makes Copenhagen special for us is that it was our first "real" trip after moving to Switzerland in October 2000. For the first ten months, we pretty much just stuck to traveling around Switzerland by car or train, or we'd drive into the Alsace or the Black Forest (which I despised!). Having found a good kennel for Dominique, and a couple of neighbors who were willing to stop by and throw some food down for King, we decided that it was time to actually jump on a plane for a weekend getaway outside of the clean and safe confines of Switzerland and our immediate neighbors. I looked online, booked a last-minute trip, and off we went.

The highlight of that trip eight years ago was probably the canal boat cruise where I took this self-portrait. The weather was hot and sunny, a waitress served ice cold beer on the boat, and we just relaxed and watched the Danish scenery pass us by. We also visited Tivoli Garden, and enjoyed a couple of really nice meals in Nyhavn.

This time, we're going with friends who used to live in Copenhagen. Not much is planned (other than dinner at a nice restaurant on Saturday evening), but I have no problem with that.

What will we do?

You'll just have to check back next week to find out.