The so-called pedestrian street known as Strøget is your destination on the first of your two perfect days in Copenhagen. Remember, your quest is to find that perfect hot dog that I wrote about earlier. Of course, if you’re in the Danish capital for a day, you’ll need to modify the plan a bit.

On the first of your two days in Copenhagen, you’ll walk along Strøget all the way to Tivoli, Europe’s oldest amusement park.

A word about Tivoli: Don’t expect Disney or Six Flags. Tivoli doesn’t occupy hundreds of acres; rather, it occupies only one city block.

Disappointed? Don’t be. After all, it’s a big city block. Even so, Tivoli is nothing like the big amusement parks you may be accustomed to visiting in the United States.

In Denmark, you need to shift your thinking. Think charming. Think small. Think fairy tales and storybooks.

Most things in Denmark, in fact, are on a smaller scale than in other places. For starters, Denmark is the smallest country in Scandinavia, only twice the size of Massachusetts and with only 5.5 million people. With adequate wealth, a strong social welfare system and the good life for all who live there, Denmark is more of a country club than a country. I only wish I could join.

Basically, what you have is the makings of a fairy-tale nation. Bah humbug, a Dane would respond (or they would utter something unintelligible in Danish.) Challenge a Dane, however, to deny that he or she does in fact live in a fairy-tale place.

Consider:

• One of Copenhagen’s main streets is called Hans Christian Andersen Boulevard, named for the Danish fairy-tale writer, the father, in fact, of fairy tales.
• Citizens of the world’s oldest constitutional monarchy, the Danes still have a Royal family and a daily changing of the guard at the Royal Palace and the requisite parades and fairy-tale-like ceremonies.
• The country is officially known as the Kingdom of Denmark, with castles and royalty.
• There there’s Tivoli, the world’s oldest amusement park. Heck, Copenhagen doesn’t need Tivoli; the whole city is like an amusement park.
• Of course, as in fairy tales, everyone in Denmark lives happily ever after. Denmark is home to the world’s happiest people, according to two university studies.

Okay, I know there’s a Dane reading these words with disdain (hah!), still in denial that he or she lives in a fairy-tale nation. So, Mr. and Mrs. Dane, I ask, “What is your national symbol?” Sure, the Dane will think of plenty of symbols: the national flag, the national song, the Royal family, to name a few. But Denmark’s true national symbol, and the whole nation of Denmark knows this, is, drumroll please, the Little Mermaid.

See, a fairy-tale nation.

Remember I told you that everything in Denmark is on a much smaller scale than in other nations? The Little Mermaid is appropriately named. She is tiny. “She’s just a little girl sitting on a rock,” one Dane told me. “You’d walk right past her if she were in the city center.”

Still, hundreds of thousands of tourists, make the pilgrimage to see her. Or to try to see her. Most actually walk past her, looking for something larger and more substantial.

Speaking of substantial, we need to steer ourselves back on course. I can smell a hot dog. Can’t you?

Second in a series of Two Perfect Days Copenhagen articles.

Before setting you loose to explore Copenhagen on your own, I need to let you in on a secret: A lot of the people you’ll be meeting today aren’t Danes. They’re Swedes.

Each day, they come across the Oresund Bridge, which opened in 2000, from Malmo, Sweden’s third’s largest city. Such is the number of Swedes who commute back and forth between the two that some people joke that Malmo is West Copenhagen. I once met a Swede who worked at the airport but had never bothered to make the 10-minute trip into Copenhagen’s city center. Swedes come to Copenhagen because they earn higher wages (and pay less in taxes) than in Sweden.

Here’s a hint to help you tell the Danes from the Swedes. If you hear Copenhagen referred to as something that sounds vaguely like “Shopping Ham,” you’ve met a Swede. The “K” in København, which is how “Merchant’s Harbor” is spelled in Danish, is pronounced as an “sh” in Swedish and is spelled in Swedish as “Köpenhamn.”

The Danes swallow consonants. Nyhavn, which you and I would pronounce phonetically as “Knee haven” is pronounced in Danish as “New Hound,” swallowing the D at the end.

Strøget, the walking street that you’re eventually headed to, is pronounced “Stro Et.” And even that is not phonetically correct. Those of us outside of Scandinavia can’t pronounce any Danish words with phonetic accuracy. Our tongues are not genetically engineered to handle the complexity of the vowel/consonant combinations.

The point of all this is to keep you from making a fool of yourself. But if you really want to avoid doing that, here’s a tip: Don’t even pretend you can speak the language. Not to worry: The Danes can speak English with perfection.

Here’s something else you should know about the Danes.

Arguably, one of the reasons for the Danes being named by two university studies as the world’s happiest nation can be attributed to a concept known as Janteloven, or Jante Law.

Basically, the concept asserts that no one is better than anyone else and that you should never brag too much. The local beer brewer even makes the claim that Carlsberg is “probably” the world’s best beer. Click to learn more about Janteloven.

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.

Room With A View: Scandic Palace Room 301, originally uploaded by Ralph Grizzle.

Room 301 at the legendary Palace Hotel boasts one of Copenhagen’s best views. French doors open onto a balcony overlooking the bustle below and beyond at City Hall Square.

Acquired by the Scandic chain and re-opened in April 2009, the long-established landmark Palace Hotel, built in 1910, got a complete make-over to its 170 rooms, restaurant, bar and lobby area.

I found Room 301 to be extremely comfortable — and spacious, with a walk-in closet, a large workspace, giant flat-screen television, a sitting area and spacious bathroom. But my favorite feature was the balcony.

With its location at City Hall Square, near Strøget, the shopping street, and opposite the amusement park Tivoli, the Palace Hotel is as central as it gets in the Danish capital.

Room 301 is certainly a room with a view.

Watch a video review of room 301.

Click on any of the thumbnails below to view photos of the Palace Hotel.

I first visited Denmark in 2003, when assigned to write about Northern Europe’s cruise capital, Copenhagen. Like many others who have visited Denmark’s cosmopolitan capital, I found myself immediately intrigued and eventually smitten. I’ve seldom visited a place where the people were so welcoming, the lifestyle so easy, and the endless summer sunlight, so energizing.

I moved to Copenhagen because I wanted to see what it was like to live one year of my life in such a happy, foreign place. And my timing could not have been better. In the fall of 2007, a high-profile cruise executive proclaimed Europe to be cruising’s “new center of gravity.” And because I make my living writing about cruises, I wanted to put myself in the center of all that gravity. With more than 300 cruise ship calls, Copenhagen seemed a good place to be — both professionally and personally.

While here, I hope to learn about Copenhagen in ways that will help visitors, like me, get the most from their time in the Danish capital. 

For starters, how can visitors survive in a city where consumers pay 39 percent more than the European Union average for goods and services? According to Statistics Denmark, Copenhagen is Europe’s most expensive city for food, transport, restaurant and hotel prices.

Indeed, Copenhagen can be brutally expensive. In a restaurant recently, I noted that the children’s menu was DKK 150 (Denmark’s official currency is the Danish krone). That’s US$32. For the kids!

On the day that I wrote these words, I paid the equivalent of US$15 for a hot dog, candy bar and Coke at a convenience store. You can easily pay more US$7 for a cappucino and nearly US$10 for a beer. 

Over time, however, I’ve ferreted out some of Copenhagen’s best dining values. Dinner at my favorite restaurant, for example, about US$26. I’ll tell you more about Peder Oxe and other restaurants in future posts. 

My aim with this blog is to create a “survival guide” of sorts. Yes, Copenhagen is expensive, but during the last few months, I’ve earned how to live a good life in Copenhagen for perhaps less than I would have spent in an equivalent city in America.

More importantly, however, I want to be nowhere other than Copenhagen and its environs. I have more moments of euphoria living in the spirited Danish capital than I have had living in any other place. Why should I be surprised? Denmark is the world’s happiest nation, and I am happy being here. 

If you live in or near Copenhagen, I invite you to contribute to this blog in the form of comments or e-mail. If you make your home abroad, submit your e-mail address in the form on this page to be notified each time I post a new item. Or subscribe to the RSS feed.

I invite you to experience Copenhagen with me through the articles, videos and photos I will post. I’ll begin with weekly updates, and if the blog gains reaction and readers, I will increase the frequency of the updates.

Thank you for stopping to visit. And please let me know if like me, you too are coming to Copenhagen. I’d enjoy meeting you and orienting you to the capital city of the world’s happiest nation.