Frederiksborg, Tivoli, and Grog (LLP?)

Otherwise titled:

My Wednesday Field-Trip with Ayla

Frederiksborg Castle, Hillerød

Also known as the Museum of National History

Located on three islands in Palace Lake

The castle was huge.

It took us quite awhile to figure out how to get inside (in our defense, there was a lot of construction going on).  We had brief visions of Rapunzel letting down her hair, and then got directions to the front entrance.  

Notice the knobby trees.  (No reason.)

A somewhat crooked view of this .... thing.

Alright, fine, an excessively crooked view.

It wasn't this sunny out.  I added that for effect.

The Chapel of Orders

(Yes, this room did make me want to prance around and pretend I was a nobleman.  Then I got really depressed thinking about how dark and cold and echoey everything was, and decided I'd rather be me.)

We spent an hour or two touring the castle under the guidance of an electronic narrator, but by the time we finally reached Room 46 (the halfway point, with two more floors to go), we decided it was high time to ditch the MP3 players and narrate for ourselves.  Things got funnier after that.  Minus the excessively droll bit about the Danish queen with the "female court midget" hanging from her arm.  

(?)

Surprisingly, my favorite thing inside the palace had to do with astronomy (I hated this subject in college).  Now (a whopping three days later), I remember nothing whatsoever about the thing (Tycho Brahe, maybe?), but I took pictures!  Constellations.  Colorful.  Shiny.  I'm out.

I was far more impressed with the exterior views.

The Baroque gardens made me think of Beauty and the Beast (always pleasant) ... And how I think someone should make a movie based on Robin McKinley's novel, starring Emily Blunt as Beauty and Gerard Butler as the Beast.  

(No offense, Gerard.)

Afterwards, we lunched in Hillerød and caught the train back to Copenhagen.

Where we went to Tivoli and saw their rendition of a Russian Christmas!

This also involved lots and lots of grog.  Yum.

This was by far the best Wednesday I've had in a long time.

(Thanks Ayla)

♥