Cruising From Copenhagen

If you truly want to experience Copenhagen, skip the Danish and go for the hot dog.

After all, every Dane loves a good dog, so not only will you be doing something quintessentially Danish, but on your quest for the perfect hot dog, you also will visit the key attractions in the Danish capital.

Following my advice, you’re going to get a taste of Copenhagen — and a hot dog — that you’re not likely to soon forget.

Your quest begins at the time-honored D’Angleterre, one of the world’s oldest hotels, situated in the heart of Copenhagen. You can’t beat the location, on Kongens Nytorv (the King’s New Square). For a full review of D’Angleterre, visit The Avid Cruiser’s Copenhagen Hotel Guide.

D’Angleterre is the choice hotel for heads of state and celebrities. On the plagues adjacent to the hotel reception area, peruse the impressive roster of those who have stayed at Copenhagen’s grande dame. There’s the late Michael Jackson. The pop king reportedly was insulted when his offer to buy the King Arthur statue that adorns one of the stairways was refused. Jackson was said to quip, “Well, can I just buy the whole hotel then?”

You’re not buying the whole hotel, of course, but you are ponying up a pretty penny for one of the suites. The Royal Suite is a little too rich, so you settled on one of two other suites.

You considered the Victor Borge Suite, at one end on the first floor (111) because the thought of Borge, “The Great Dane,” makes you smile. The Danish musical prodigy was as quick with a joke as he was talented at tickling the ivory.

You decide instead to pitch camp in the Karen Blixen Suite, room number 201. Pitching camp is an appropriate phrase, because this suite makes you feel as though you were with Blixen on the plains of Africa.

Blixen, whose real name was Isak Dinesen, was the Danish writer who spent a good part of her life in Africa and her later years in her family home 30 minutes north of Copenhagen. If you get the chance, the Karen Blixen Museum, situated in Rungsted, where Blixen was born and where she died, is a worthwhile half-day excursion from the city center.

D’Angleterre’s Karen Blixen Suite features an African motif, with photos of Blixen throughout. In one photo, Blixen kneels triumphantly over a lion that she shot on the plains of Africa.

The high ceilings in this room, the period furniture, and leopard skin lampshades and rugs, all give an air of the Dark Continent. The furniture too is fitting for a suite named for a woman whose claim to fame was the novel “Out of Africa.”

Many of the rooms at D’Angleterre are remarkable in that they face Kongens Nytorv, or the King’s New Square. Winters, kids and adults ice skate in the square. Summers, the square is filled with pedestrians making their way from beautiful Nyhavn, the lovely harbor lined with colorful buildings that you can see from your suite, to the pedestrian shopping street, Strøget.

Enough digression. It’s time to get moving. There’s a hot dog waiting.

First in a series of Two Perfect Days Copenhagen articles.

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For a Flickr slideshow of gourmet hot dogs and more, click on The Nimb.

For a Flickr slideshow of D’Angleterre, click on Hotel D’Angleterre.