Tuesday, November 7, 2017

Prague

In August, I took a trip to Prague. Though most of my travels are with the family, this time I went by myself. Though the weather was quite warm (and I am not a fan of the sun) I had four glorious days wandering around the city and exploring at my leisure. Eating and walking, walking and eating, checking out the architecture and the people. That's my favorite way to explore a city.











And of course, a trip to a farmer's market!




I took in two museums: The Narodni Gallerie to see their Gerhard Richter exhibition, and the Mucha museum.





and lots more walking and exploring. (I think Prague is one of the most beautiful cities I have ever been to.)























Copenhagen with the kids

Realizing that I never finished posting about our trip to Denmark (and that it was the part of our trip specifically for me that I had left out) I revisit our weekend in Copenhagen.

We rented a very cool 2 bedroom apartment on airbnb. It was quite central, so we could easily walk all over the city. The kids were very impressed with the graffiti on the outside of the building and the skatepark across the road. (What I loved most about being across from the skatepark was the amount of light that was allowed into the apartment because there was no building across the road.)







I have always heard that Copenhagen is a very expensive city, but maybe that is from people who live somewhere other than Dublin. We didn't find it too bad. That said, because we were traveling as a family, we usually had breakfast and dinner in the rented apartment and only really needed to buy lunch on the go.

We had a great, relaxing city break and loved exploring the city on foot. We found it really easy to navigate! We visited the farmers market, playgrounds, the botanical gardens and of course the graves of Hans Christian Andersen and Kierkegaard.










On our second day, we visited the Aquarium.








On our last day, we visited the magical Tivoli Gardens. If you have kids (and even if you don't), its worth a trip to Copenhagen to see the Tivoli Gardens. Apparently, Tivoli Gardens is what inspired Walt Disney to create Disneyland. I am generally not a fan of theme parks, but Tivoli Gardens is something very special (and I unfortunately don't have good photos.)












And of course, no trip to Copenhagen would be complete without visiting The Little Mermaid!



Wednesday, September 14, 2016

Denmark - Egeskov castle

With the first half of our holiday behind us, we set off in our rental car for Copenhagen. We decide to make a stop along the way at Egeskov castle, as its about halfway between Billund and Copenhagen.



We had perfect weather, as seems to be the norm on this trip!

Egeskov is famous for being the best preserved moat castle in Europe. Before heading inside, though, we had a wonderful time exploring the grounds and gardens.









There were even extensive hidden playgrounds and treetop bridges.



a quick trip to the loo before heading inside (check out the sign!)....


Then a quick peek at an exhibition of shoes and clothes before heading into the actual castle itself...




and then of course, a look inside the castle (complete with 500 year old mannequins and all, JK)...








a massive dollhouse with all the contents...


and a toy museum in the attic.


A lovely pitstop en route to Copenhagen, but alas its time to move on. So long Egeskov.


Next up, Copenhagen!