Copenhagen

Today we flew to Copenhagen for the weekend. Kara has a friend from Denmark and has always wanted to visit a Scandanavian country, and thanks to EasyJet it's very cheap to fly there.

Of course flying an ultra-low cost airline like EasyJet means every possible thing that they can cut out is cut out. So the seats are cramped, you can only carry on one piece of luggage (and that's very strict, a purse counts as a second piece of luggage and isn't allowed), you have to print out your tickets beforehand, checked luggage is $50 one-way, and to get water in flight is 2.50 euro. But the flight is $100 cheaper than the next closest airline so for the giant hassle you can get some good deals.

The Paris airport also has a really terrifying chime it plays before public announcements. It literally sounds like a ghost is about to scare you and is even worse because it starts with no warning.

Once we got to Copenhagen, we had our standard 24-hours of bad travel by getting lost and getting off at the wrong train station. But we figured it out after studying the metro map a while, and finally got to the correct one to walk to our hotel. After dropping off the luggage we went exploring and found our first European Christmas market in the center of Copenhagen!!

This is something I'm really surprised doesn't exist in the US as they're pretty awesome. They sell mulled wine, sausages, warm hats, and all sorts of cool things. It's really really pretty and Christmasy, and it was really fun to visit.

We also visited the interesting area known as Christiana, which is kind of an autonomous region of Copenhagen/Denmark that runs by its own rules. It started out as a squatter community at an abandonded military base in the 1970's, and is basically a giant hippy commune. There's also tons of stands selling weed openly even though it's illegal in Denmark, which is why they don't allow any photos inside the area. It's a very unique and odd place.

The one bad thing about Copenhagen is that it's on its own currency, and the exchange rate is really bad. A bottle of coke in 7-11 (yeah, those are everywhere there which was surprising) is $6, a cinnamon roll (while incredibly delicious) is $8, and street food sausage and beer is almost $18. It was by far the most expensive city I've ever visited, and I just tried to forget how much everything was costing me.

On the other hand Denmark is rated as the happiest countries in the world and while it may have been cold (highs around 38F) they have an amazing social system and I could see how it would be a nice relief to not worry about healthcare.