I wanted to tour the four capital cities of Scandinavia: Copenhagen, Oslo, Stockholm, and Helsinki. I signed up for the Trafalgar "Capitals of Scandinavia" tour, which with the extras, was about $4,000 plus my air fare. If I am ever going to tour these cities, I will have to go back. Over nine days we spent approximately 10 hours in a tour bus with tour guide commentary.
Copenhagen is a good example. We boarded the bus at the hotel at 8:00 A.M. and drove around with two photo stops, one for the Little Mermaid statue and one for the Christiansburg Slot. We were back at the hotel at 10:00 A.M. and the tour guide said: "we are giving you the rest of the day to explore Copenhagen on your own." This is hardly a gift as all the museums are closed on Mondays, which the tour guide (Ulf) said he didn't know.
What was absolutely insulting is when they make a big, big deal about how impressive the museums are as we drove by--the "fabulous" Glyptotec, and the "amazing" historic museum when they full flat know they are not taking us to them, and that we cannot go them on our own because they are closed and because we are leaving the next morning.
So for Copenhagen as a whole--I didn't explore it, I really didn't see it. I glanced at it through a bus window for two hours.
But there are two excursions available at extra charge of which only one is listed in the itinerary. I took that one, which was to Frederiksburg Castle. So it is an hour to get there, taking the long way which is just a view of the ocean and going through residential neighborhoods, and then a 10 minute photo opportunity to take pictures of the beach. We get to the castle and are rushed through in 45 minutes. Some rooms we skip, e.g., a room with a huge celestial globe which "we don't have time for" and some rooms we rush through without explanation. One room had what appeared to be a throne. I caught up with the guide one room later and asked "was that the throne room?" Answer: "yes." I asked the guide "why are you rushing us?" Answer "The company only gives me a limited period of time and then we have to go."
But still the castle wasn't a part of Copenhagen. The next day, we waste the entire day traveling by bus to Oslo. The guide said, "some people like to look at the scenery." But that was farms and forests, no mountains, fjords, or anything else in particular. In Oslo, the guide slipped and said a ship coming into the harbor was the overnight ferry from Copenhagen. So they could have easily put us on that and given us that full day in Copenhagen. read more
