Fish Dinner

During our day of wandering around Copenhagen we stumbled across Toldboden, a really cool seafood restaurant.  There were a bunch of Danes eating there which made it seem promising, but really it was 6pm and there wasn't much else around so what were we going to do.

Anyway, it was awesome.  And we really did it right.  First, we seated the kids at their own table.

Meanwhile, we got to sit by ourselves with our excellent wine and look out the windows.  Notice how there are no children in the vicinity to climb on us.

Then, we ordered an enormous platter of fresh seafood which somehow neither of us managed to photograph.  Imagine a giant tray of ice covered in shellfish.

Then, we somehow convinced our 4 and 6 year olds that shellfish are awesome and let's pick these things apart and eat them.

yay shellfish!

yum!

And the craziest part was Eva decided she loved eating the eyeballs.  I don't even know what to say about that, I was really too squeamish to watch closely. But she must have eaten 20 tiny crayfish eyeballs by the end of the evening.

mmmm, eyeballs!

Yay for new cultural experiences!  

(of course there is no guarantee they would ever do this again, we'll see if they are so adventurous with New England seafood next summer).

waiting for the harbor bus

We sampled several modes of public transportation while in Copenhagen, including the bus, the train, and the harbor bus.  I really like taking public transportation in other countries, once you figure it out (thanks google maps app) it enables you to get a feel for the real place.  

At any rate, the harbor bus was great fun but we had to wait a few minutes for it to arrive.  We killed time by jumping and posing for silly photographs.

(by the way, that dome is an experimental building (with a bar inside) and the shiny black building is the royal library)

Den Blå Planet

One day in Copenhagen it rained so we went to the national aquarium, Den Blå Planet.  The aquarium was amazing but rather difficult to photograph.  Here are a few... 

Daddy look at all those fish!!

SHARK!!

EEL!!! 

And if that wasn't exciting enough, on the way back downtown we took the train and Eva and Noah got to sit right up front and pretend they were driving a rollercoaster.

Tivoli

We spent one day at Tivoli Gardens, which was the most awesome family amusement park experience I could imagine.  It was beautiful and lovely to walk around, the rides were really fun for all of us (Eva could go on almost all of them), and there were no lines.  There wasn't even space for long lines, there was room for enough people to wait ~ 10 minutes but that was it.  Usually we waited only a few.

I didn't do a great job of photographing this one either, I didn't even bring my big camera.  Just take my word for it, it was great.

More Copenhagen

So what else did we do in Copenhagen?   Well, the kids ran along the canal boardwalks... 

And along the elevated gardens between our hotel and the surrounding buildings....

We walked around a lot and found an anchor

And a crane...

And statues all over

Our hotel had an outdoor playground so Eva practiced her acrobatics routine (stage name = "Laser Girl")

We took a tour boat around the city

And saw more awesome buildings

Ate in some very old buildings... 

Look Auntie D!  We had to wait for our food but luckily had our MAX pencil packs!!

We had a very unfortunate situation where we forced the kids to eat dinner resulting in our getting to the Lego store after it closed... 

Are you kidding me?  You brought me to the LEGO world headquarters only after closing time?

But somehow even that wasn't enough to dampen the day... 

Mostly it's just fun to be out and experiencing a new place, and this one was especially pretty and fun to walk through.

More Sweden

In addition to the Moose, we also enjoyed some awesome playgrounds in Varnamo

And also enjoyed the public art

And also enjoyed playing fetch with Tellus and running through the main square and eating Venison with Auntie D and Daniel in the covered patio of our hotel at the end of a rainstorm.  None of which I managed to photograph, but thank you for the wonderful visit anyway.  :)

Rescue

It's a rescue helicopter saving people from the ocean under a rainbow

And I guess the topic is crazy enough, but did you notice the people are sitting on platforms and holding onto the rope?

Sweden: Moose!!

Shortly after arriving in Denmark we left again to visit Auntie D in Sweden.  And apparently did a terrible job of it, since I realize now I don't have a single photograph of her with the kids, or us with Daniel and Tellus.  I guess we were too busy enjoying ourselves to photograph it, but it is disappointing.

What I did manage to photograph, however, was the moosepark.  Auntie D gets the aunt of the century award for surviving the trip there with a carsick Noah.   It was really a disaster.  But eventually we arrived and sent Auntie D and the kids to the playground so we could clean out the car.  And that's when it started to rain.  And the kids' jackets were both, let's say, contaminated.

But we soldiered on, because after all that, goddamnit, I was going to see a moose.

And we did!!

Some adults, some calves, and also some teenagers

And also some horns

It was great. :)

Copenhagen

So after leaving London we hit the road and went on vacation to Copenhagen.

Which was fun and awesome and pretty much summed up with this picture

Where the kids are eating ice cream sundaes while Chad and I are enjoying a beer at a lovely cafe along Nyhavn.  This was our view:

I know, can you believe it?  The view in the other direction was more ships and old buildings

We had a pretty good time. :)