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Here we are at the end of our wide ranging travels in Europe. Tomorrow we set off for NZ and winter. Goodbye to the amazing warm weather we have experienced since arriving in Florence two months ago, apart from a few days when we needed jackets.
Our final day in Copenhagen was spent wandering the city, down Stroget, the walking street where most of the shops are, to the high end area with Georg Jensen and the Royal Copenhagen shop. Interesting to have a browse. We came back via the Round Tower, one of the first observatories, and the food market at Norreport.
Saturday and Sunday were full on days. We didn’t intend to come to Copenhagen for the art but now we are here Ian found these two extensive modern art galleries, one north of the city and the other south.
The Louisiana is 35 kms north and involved the same route we took to Helsingor. This time we had it sussed. Train, bus, walk. My question was, why would a modern art gallery in Denmark be called Louisiana. Easy. The original owner had three wives, all called Louise! The setting on a small cliff on the
coast was picture perfect and the day was glorious. We could see people swimming in the sea down below us.
The galleries are purpose built leading out from an old villa and curve through a beautiful park filled with bronze sculptures, a number of them Henry Moore’s. The wings curve around in a pincer type shape, often underground, and meet at the cafe with its stunning view and Alexander Calder sculptures on the grass. I’m not sure that the photos do it justice but you will get the idea.
One highlight was a curved gallery of portraits of women ferry pilots in WWII. One, Officer Lettice Curtis, delivered 222 Halifaxes, 28 Lancaster’s, 109 Stirlings, 14 Liberators, 1 B 17, 125 Mosquitos, and 162 Spitfires! I put up a photo of the classes of aircraft they were divided into and also a note on how they got intructions on how to fly these, often newly developed, planes. One, Senior Commander Pauline Gower, was particularly tragic. She survived the war only to die in childbirth after it ended.
We got back to Copenhagen about 5pm so hopped over the road from the station to the Tivoli Gardens as we
had driven past in the bus a number of times. The founder, Georg Carstensen, told the King in 1843 that “when the people are amusing themselves they do not think of Politics”. Hence he was granted a five year licence to set it up. The ride we could see, and hear cries of terror and delight, from the station was The Mountain Coaster. Built in 1914 it is the oldest wooden roller coaster still operating. We had a great time wandering around, watching the various rides, enjoying the gardens and the atmosphere. It was packed and I’m sure no-one was thinking of politics!
One roller coaster we were fascinated with was the Demon which contains an Immelmann loop - a vertical loop and a zero-G roll all during the ride of 1 minute 46 seconds. I looked it up on Wikipedia! There are numerous restaurants of every variety so we stayed for dinner hoping that a concert we had seen being set up would start by the time we had finished. Aaah no! Didn’t start till dark Was well after 8.30pm. As we had set off at 9am we were a bit weary. Got home about 10pm and fell
into bed.
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