Probably the best Carlsberg in the world

Published on Mon 30 Jan 2012

We were in Copenhagen last week and having checked my bank balance I can happily report that it's even more effing expensive than I thought at the time. 8.5 kroner to the pound is quite different to the 9.1 I thought I was spending.

It was one of the easier journeys I've made - the flight is only an hour and a bit from Stansted and the airport about 20 minutes on the metro from the centre. I dunno why but I find metro systems much less stressful than the buses you often get at the airports that budget airlines use. Probably because it's obvious where to get off. The whole city centre is only served by about 5 stations though which means there is a good 20-25 minute walk between them, making it less useful than it could be.

The first night we got an expensive but nice burger in a place with slow and surly service and checked out Danish TV. Half of which is American, so that was good. There is one channel which at night has footage of various life sized monster puppets snoring, occasionally cutting to children snoring. Not sure what that's about.

The next day we went for a long (cold) wander around the Longest Shopping Street in all of Scandinavia (why is everything in Scandinavia the biggest/only something in all of Scandinavia? Maybe I exaggerate). It's a really relaxing city, all trendily industrial looking coffee shops and galleries but spotless streets. And a roaming marching band that people were treating like a slow moving tractor on an A road rather than any kind of spectacle.

January may not be the best time to see it though as it was too cold to do any outdoor activities really. The only cultural things we managed (despite the national museum being next door to the hotel and free), having been warned that the Little Mermaid statue is boring and hard to get to, were the Carlsberg Brewery, getting a McDonald's in a new country and a very short expedition to Freetown Christiania.

The brewery was very cool - like Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory but with beer - all minarets and concrete elephants with swastikas on (it was the company logo until they had to change it sharpish in the 1940s), novelty cars and giant beerstoppers.

 

They also have the largest bottle collection in All of The World (only 20,000 - I reckon I could beat it with a bit of determination) and an exhibition about the history of the company, which is more interesting than you would think.

The entry includes 2 free beers and at 7 kr wasn't much more expensive than that beer would've been in a bar. I wasn't as impressed by the taste of it as I was by Carlsberg in Sweden or by other beers I've had at breweries (Steam Whistle straight off the production line in Toronto was gorgeous) but it was much nicer than here. Oh there were horses too.

Freetown Christiania was weird - a squat that declared itself to be outside society in the 70s - read the history on Wikipedia it's quite interesting and I suspect I'll get it wrong. I'd only really heard of it from a zombie shoot 'em up I played once. There was a lot of graffiti and a street where you could buy (elsewhere) illegal substances as if they were different flavours of fudge. We didn't stay long. You weren't allowed to take photos.

Did some playing too. With varying amounts of noise, but exactly the same amount of attention from the audience every time. Night 1 setlist: The Ghost of Paddy's Night Past, Watertight, Muscle Memory, So Finally a Love Song, Edinburgh, Soaked to the Skin Night 2 setlist: Edinburgh, The Ghost of Paddy's Night Past, Watertight, The Easy Way Out (first time in years! I had to look up the words on the internet. I was surprised they were there) Night 3 setlist: Edinburgh, The Ghost of Paddy's Night Past, So Finally a Love Song, Watertight, Muscle Memory.

Oh,there's also a Lego shop, which was pretty exciting. It's always been a dream of mine to go to Legoland, but it was too far away to justify time getting there. One day. To compensate we took advantage of their build 3 of your own Lego men for 5 Kr offer. I made a scared architect. I'm both surprised and impressed that they make Lego theodolites.

So what have I learnt about Denmark? They like candles a lot. Really a lot. January is cold there. There's a lot of free wifi. McDonald's is not up to more central European standards. On one late night tasting. Metro stations are further apart than you really want. Buses run very often but cost a lot. Nazi memorabilia is still acceptable and readily available. They only seem to eat burgers. Food, booze and taxis are very expensive. Clothes and the cinema not quite so much. Not mentioning my surname at any point during gigs is probably counterproductive. Their forks only have 3 prongs, which looks weird. More people than you would think bring ice skates to the bar. Service does not come with a smile. I really like it there. Foreign languages will always be funny.