Category: Personal Travels

Two Days in Copenhagen: Sneaker Stores and 7/11’s

This won’t be a particularly long post since out of these two days, I spent half of one traveling over to Malmo in Sweden.

Copenhagen, Denmark was country #4 in my twelve-day travel bonanza this past December. It was a good destination to go since I’d have such easy access to Sweden and could experience a place I really knew nothing about.

Before arriving to Copenhagen I had booked this AWESOME hotel/hostel. The reason this place was so awesome was, well, #1 the cost and #2 all the good stuff it had in it. The hotel is named Steel House Copenhagen and it was probably the best part of the two days I was there. Before I landed in the country they had already e-mailed me notifying me to download their app so I wouldn’t have to go through any check-in process nor acquire a key – check in and the key are both accessible on the app. So going in and out was very straightforward since all I had to do was swipe my phone with the app open and boom, my room would let me enter. This hotel had a pool, a gym, a band area, a huge kitchen and it was located in the perfect place to roam around Copenhagen.

To get to downtown from Copenhagen airport was also really bless because the train ticket at their airport was straightforward to purchase, inexpensive and got you to the center very fast. Just watch out for the frigging landing at the airport because if you are someone who isn’t so good with flying? Coming in over the water in winter winds will definitely have you shook. The plane was palancing through the air as we landed. (safely)

After I got nice and cozy in my hotel I actually had no big plans for the night except I REALLY REALLY wanted to see Tivoli Gardens. And before you ask, no, this is not like the Tivoli Gardens in Kingston, Jamaica. Bet you didn’t know I was a mind reader.

Much to my dismay, Tivoli ended up being closed the day I arrived and the following day as well. So the only pictures I could get were from outside of their gates. It was so disappointing because if you actually had seen the place in person? It was really something to be immersed in. The light decorations were so beautiful and it made you feel like a kid looking at it. Shame.

I walked away with my disappointment and just wandered the streets of Copenhagen for the night. You’ll notice from the title of this post what I had seen the most of in this city. I swear to you, every three steps in Copenhagen there was a damn 7/11 or a sneaker store. There was SOOO many 7/11’s that in some areas they were like positioned directly across the street from each other. I didn’t even see this in America.

If you are a big sneaker head, definitely make time to visit Copenhagen. Their selection is massive, unique and there really is a sneaker store every couple of meters. Good place to go broke filling your shoe closet.

That is my recap of Copenhagen. I hope I didn’t disappoint.

  • Mirna

Two Days in Prague: Beer Spa’ing and Ballet Goals

I realize I am putting these out super slow, but the 12 days I spent in Europe had a lot of content and had/has even more pictures. So I’ll get to them all when I can OKAY?

Prague was part of country #6 (Czech Republic) out of the 8 I would visit during this whirlwind trip.

You know what’s great about Prague? After being in places like Switzerland and France – my Canadian dollars finally meant something. I went from spending $50/meal in Switzerland to barely spending $100 in two days in Prague. What a magical place.

January 3rd – I landed in Prague at about 10am and caught an Uber to the center, where my AirBnB was located. When I arrived the host was there to let me in just to drop my stuff, since check in wasn’t until like 1pm. This was fine with me because I didn’t care to actually hang out in the AirBnB, I just wanted to drop off my bags and go get some food and roam the streets like a real tourist.

The first thing I did was find food. Do you know how incredible it was to have a VERY heavy meal for only $8.00? It was a miracle after the super expensive countries I had just been in. This place had potato, cabbage and shredded duck. BIG WIN. The food was delicious and now I had my fuel for exploration.

I spent the first half of the day wandering in downtown Prague, trying to get myself acquainted with where certain things were located. I made it across the famous Charles Bridge, bought myself some magnets, ate a fancy ice cream and then went back to my AirBnB for a bit.

Definitely should mention, this AirBnB I had gotten was a ‘private room’ in an apartment and the room itself was larger than my entire apartment that I do have to myself in Toronto. I’ve been in hotel rooms that weren’t as big as this room that just had my bed and a closet in it. I loved this AirBnB so if you’re ever in Prague and want something cheap, big and with an awesome location? Click here.

At about 7pm I made my way to the incredible Christmas Market in Prague. I spent the first 30-minutes of this trek on WhatsApp video with my boyfriend and his work colleagues showing off the streets. They kept me virtual company, thanks guys! For as much as people rather do traveling to warm places during warm seasons (shit, me too) – I will say, traveling to see the Christmas Market in places like Prague is a heck of an experience. So beautiful. The food stands, the music, the crowds of people and did I mention, the food?

This lady was selling a warm apple drink with cinnamon and pear in it, fifty cents. I think I spent $4.00 just at her stand, that’s how amazing this drink was on a cold night. Also, I ended up purchasing an entire pork knuckle/knee/elbow? I can’t even remember which part of the pig I bought but it was massive and it came with spicy mustard, horseradish and bread. GOOD ENOUGH FOR ME. I stood in the cold ass weather and ate the pork body part and drank the delicious warm apple drink. You guys should have seeeeeen the faces people were making at me eating that pork alone, apparently usually a small group of people order that for themselves. Yikes. My long belly has no end, I guess.

Naturally, I followed up all this food with more food by getting the largest crepe filled with Nutella I’ve ever seen in my life. No complaints. Now that I had walked for three hours and eaten more than a small village, I returned back to my AirBnB to get some rest because the following day was going to be even busier.

January 4th – I woke up super late and loved every second of this phenomenon. Up to this point almost every morning I had been up either to catch an early flight or an early tour. Not this day, today I was going to take my time and enjoy being a lazy bum.

Made my way over to a breakfast place that was a three minute walk from the AirBnB, got some food in me, went back to bed. Not the most exciting vacation description I bet, right? But you know what, sometimes on vacation you also DO HAVE TO RELAX. I realize I don’t take my own advice, but even I get tired of just moving all the time.

I got back up at about 1:30pm (told you, SUPER LAZY) and made my way over to The Beer Spa which I had a 2pm reservation for made months ahead. Just in case you are wondering, yes, definitely make your reservation for your 1hr time slot as soon as you can. The day I went? Both of their location were booked up for every damn slot from open to close. They’re very popular.

For full disclosure – I actually don’t drink beer.

I wanted to do this because sitting in a tub of beer sounded really relaxing to me. I mean I’ve sat in all kinds of spas to this point, why not a beer one? Sure. When you get to the spa you are taken into your own room (whole room is yours) and the host lady will explain to you how much time you have and then she will mix the beer stuff into the tub for you. You get to see the whole process in front of you. Then she gives you like three massive empty jugs of beer and says, ‘you can have dark beer or light beer, drink all the beer you want for the hour.’ Basically you sit in a tub of beer, while drinking a bottomless amount of beer AND they give you beer bread. The bread was very good, FYI.

You can choose to go in the tub nekkid or not, I chose not to and was in my bikini instead because I wanted to get some good photos for the blog and IG on my tripod.

The woman left the room and there I was, sitting in my tub of beer, trying beer and eating beer bread. I feel like the beer was such a waste on someone like me who doesn’t enjoy it you know? I did try both the dark and light beer, I just didn’t like it. I really did try.

After your 30 minutes in the tub, the jets turn off and you have another 30 minutes of going to lay down in a straw bed, while continuing to drink your beer. Now the straw bed was….. interesting. I put down sheets on it and then covered myself with the blanket they gave me. For as weird as it was, it was oddly comfortable. As one of my Twitter followers noted, ‘if baby Jesus could lie in it, so can we.’ Can’t say I’ll be giving up my mattress for it just yet though.

The cost of the experience was about $100 Canadian. I’d recommend doing it once for the experience because the beer does make you feel super relaxed to sit in, but do you have to do it more than once? Probably not.

Also, while we are on the topic of substances, let’s talk about marijuana in Prague. Again, a total waste of an experience on me because I have never tried cannabis. I am pro the legalization of it, I love that in Ontario more people will have access to it now, it’s great. However, I don’t think I have EVER EVER EVER seen so much cannabis out in the open like I did in Prague. There was cannabis shampoo, cannabis toothpaste, cannabis vodka, cannabis food items and they even sold like ounces of kush next to the damn Twix. It was so out in the open that all I could think about was if Canada would let me import some chocolate for my friends. I didn’t risk it though, sorry guys, I’m not going to jail over a damn edible.

So I get home after my journey through the valley of beer and kush – it’s time to look nice. During this trip I had looked like a bum about 99% of the time. I traveled during winter with only a carry-on and I did laundry along the way. There wasn’t much space for ‘cute outfits’ and I brought very little makeup. Tonight I was going to experience something I had dreamed of since I was very small. I was going to see the ballet at the famous National Theater in Prague.

If you thought you had to buy tickets early for the Beer Spa? That shit has nothing on the ballet in Prague. I bought my ticket for this ballet back in August. AUGUST! It was now January. The day I purchased my ticket for this ballet, it was the last remaining one for the balcony seating. This is how early you need to try and get tickets for the fine arts in Prague. For the best seat ever, all I did was pay $50.00. I think in Toronto if I wanted nosebleed ballet tickets they might be $50? The price worked really well for me.

There isn’t much I can write about the actual experience because it’s truly indescribable. I saw the Nutcracker. The place was packed. They did have coat check. The dancers and the set design were breathtaking. That’s about it? If you have time to go experience this in Prague, 1000000% go.

You should go to Prague. It’s beautiful. It’s inexpensive. It has class and culture. It’s cannabis and alcohol-friendly. If you’re looking for a good, classy, turn up – this is definitely the place for you.

  • Mirna

Day Trip from Switzerland to Liechtenstein: Passport Stamp Chasing

This is going to be a very short post, probably about as short as my time in Liechtenstein. If you’re here for pictures though, I got you. The quick day trip from Zurich, Switzerland to Vaduz, Liechtenstein was strictly a ‘let me visit a next country real quick’ situation. This would be country #2 out of the eight I was going to visit during my 12-days of shenanigans through Europe.

The day trip I had booked on Viator would take me on a scenic tour through farmlands in Switzerland, to a one-hour visit in Liechtenstein and then finish it off with seeing Heidiland. You can find the tour here, if you’re ever interested in doing this adventure as well.

I started the morning with getting a pretzel that had cheese in the middle at the main station in Zurich. It was delicious, and it was cheap*. (*consider this an unusual phenomenon while in Zurich) After that I walked over to the parking lot area near the station to meet up with the tour group. There are a lot of buses in this area for various tours, so make sure you find the correct one that you signed up for.

Once you find your tour, they will most likely put a sticker with a specific colour/number on you so you can be identified for the duration of the trip among the rest of the tours. Then you’re off! The big bus starts moving and you have a tour guide explaining in 2-3 languages about what you’re seeing. I was lucky because our tour guide was awesome and had a great sense of humour so it wasn’t boring at all.

We drove through some pretty picturesque places on the way to Liechtenstein. On the one stop we were in a little town (Rapperswil) with cobblestone streets that had a medieval church overlooking the center of it. Looked as pretty as it did creepy at the time. But you know what the best part of this city was? There was this INCREDIBLE pasta place I ran into (Marco’s Pasta Bar) before the bus left for the next part of the journey. The owner/chef would actually prepare the pasta in the middle of the restaurant (I love seeing my food made) and the portion size? MASSIVE. If you ever do this tour or end up in Rapperswil, you must go eat at this restaurant.

From Rapperswil we made our way to Liechtenstein finally. The tour actually spent more time in the little city than it did in this country. There is no actual border when entering the place and most of the ride there our guide told us about how the tax breaks are so great in Liechtenstein and that is why many corporations have offices there. Great. I’m too broke for this shit anyways.

So because there is no border, how the hell are you supposed to get your passport stamp right? Well. When you enter the city there are a bunch of tourist offices and if you pay $3 Euros/Swiss Francs they’ll stamp your passport for you. I definitely did that and so did most of the people on the bus with me.

I don’t really have much else to tell you about Vaduz, Liechtenstein because…… I’ve seen high school campuses that are bigger than this country? I walked to the left. I walked to the right. There was a tree, there were very nice cars, a huge watch shop and some skating rink. Then we left. That was literally the time spent in Liechtenstein.

Another 30 minutes of scenic driving and we arrived at Heidiland. You may have heard of this place from stories where you were a kid about that blonde girl named Heidi living in the Swiss Alps. Well this place is named after her. We posed for some pictures, drank from a natural spring and kept it moving. It was literally a stop in a park.

The bus made it’s way back to Zurich after this and we lived happily ever aft…. kidding. Mans just headed home as the night fell, and trust me, night falls super early in Switzerland during winter.

That was it, that was how I found my way to Liechtenstein and paid for a passport stamp. Now I have been to the world’s smallest country (Vatican City) as well as the fourth smallest country, Liechtenstein. San Marino and Monaco, I’m coming for you next!

  • Mirna

Day Trip From Copenhagen to Malmo: In Search of Burek and Zlatan

On January 2nd I decided to venture from Copenhagen over to Malmo, Sweden for the day. Naturally, this had been planned WAY ahead and Sweden was going to be country #5 on my eight country tour this past December. But this was the day I was going to do it, I was going to visit Banja Luka Jr. Now if you’ve never heard of Banja Luka it is a city in Northern Bosnia where only tall, attractive women are born.

i.e. – Me. I was born there and so were many other tall, attractive women. YAY US!

The reason I call Malmo this name is because my mom told me that apparently after the war many Bosnians settled in Malmo, but specifically, many people from Banja Luka. My city. (well, what use to be ‘my’ city now it’s the de facto capital of…. nvm, let’s not do this right now.)

I woke up nice and early to have breakfast at some hipster spot named ‘Next Door Cafe’ in Copenhagen before heading over to the train terminal. I will say, probably the NICEST servers ever were in this cafe and their blueberry pancakes were delicious. Also, the dinosaur they have you hold as proof that you paid for your meal was especially awesome.

As I merrily made my way over to the terminal, this was the headline that read across my Twitter timeline:

Denmark Train Accident Kills Six on Bridge

Whoa.

Pardon? I’m in Denmark. I’m about to go over a bridge with a train. Whoa. Rest in peace to those who lost their lives that day and prayers to those who were injured. Super scary.

My train was on the opposite side of Denmark, going towards Sweden though. The train that the accident occurred on was going between Zealand and Funen. I made SURE to Whatsapp my mom at this moment because the last thing I needed was her seeing that headline and thinking the absolute worst.

I made it to my 11:27am train and left for Malmo finally.




At noon I make it to Malmo and the first thing I saw was pastries. I had a very difficult time this entire trip saying no to pastries so this time would be no different. The cinnamon roll I got was yummy, thanks.

I proceeded to just walk around the center of Malmo for a couple of hours, see what the feel of the city was. I found the shopping area to be quite busy and they had a very good variety of places to buy things, eat things and especially find sneakers. Between Copenhagen and Malmo, I don’t think I had ever seen so many sneaker stores. I also had found this super super cute set of trees that had gift boxes and hearts dangling from them. Took a million pictures trying to get both in one shot. Eventually I stumbled onto a place that sells cevapi. I had mentioned earlier than Malmo was supposed to be Banja Luka Jr so I definitely had to indulge in some delicious Bosnian food.

Malmos Cevapi was the name of the restaurant I had found. I really enjoyed walking into a restaurant and hearing my native language spoken, even though I was not in my native land. There’s something so warm and welcoming about that, it’s hard to fully articulate it. Just feels good you know?

HOWEVER.

I was a little disheartened when I went to order my food. I ordered some burek and the person behind the counter said ‘what kind?’ Sigh. So disappointing. I should have cancelled the burek order that second and just stuck to the cevapi.

For those of you who don’t know, burek is a phyllo pastry filled with meat. There are other variations of it WITH DIFFERENT NAMES like sirnica (with cheese), zeljanica (spinach) or krumpirusa (with potato). Therefore there can’t be ANY OTHER KIND of burek, as saying the word burek should automatically mean it is filled with meat. If you want to piss real Bosnians off, this would be a good way to go about it. We will argue to the death of us about how to use burek. Please see picture below for how serious we take it, it’s a running joke among people in the Balkans.

Croatia ‘Have you seen Bosnia?’ - Serbia ‘Hold on, I got this’ - Serbia yelling ‘Burek WITH CHEESE!’ - Bosnia yelling back ‘Burek is burek!, That’s not sirnica! Everything else is pita, but only burek is burek!’
Croatia ‘Have you seen Bosnia?’ – Serbia ‘Hold on, I got this’ – Serbia yelling ‘Burek WITH CHEESE!’ – Bosnia yelling back ‘Burek is burek!, That’s not sirnica! Everything else is pita, but only burek is burek!’

Yes, yes we take it that seriously.

So I get some burek and cevapi. As I predicted the burek was just OK, but the cevapi were very good. I liked those. My belly was nice and full now and it was time to make the trek over to what the main purpose of my trip to Malmo was.

Finding Zlatan Ibrahimovic.

I mean obviously I didn’t actually expect to find HIM, but there was a place called Zlatan Court built by Nike in Malmo to commemorate him in the neighbourhood he was raised in. I checked my Google Maps and it was about a 40 minute walk there from the location I was standing in, so I started my walk. Found some graffiti hailing Drake on the way too, yay Toronto!

After some confusion about where I was (yes, even with Google Maps) I finally found it. I had made it to Zlatan Court. I was just a little bit closer to that beautiful man, Zlatan. Rawr.

I took some pictures and posed in front of the court after setting up my tripod and praying that the strong wind wouldn’t knock it over. I was content. I got cevapi and I got to my fave soccer players court.

Made my way back to the central station and headed back to Copenhagen. Another 40 minute walk, but I guess between all the pastries and cevapi it served me well to get some steps in right?

Overall, I quite liked Malmo. It isn’t somewhere that’s particularly memorable out of all the places I’ve been to but it also does have charm to it. If you’re ever in Copenhagen and want to do a quick day trip, I’d definitely encourage you to take this quick train over the bridge and visit.

  • Mirna

A Layover in Iceland: The Blue Lagoon

Yesterday was the final day of my long Euro trip where I managed to go to eight countries in 12 days. The finishing touch to this awesome trip was going to Iceland and seeing the infamous Blue Lagoon. Iceland would be country #8 for this particular trip and was country #40 for my total count of places visited in my lifetime, so it was pretty monumental.

For this portion of my trip it wasn’t particularly hard to plan it out because Iceland and their main airlines (WowAir and Icelandair) encourage taking advantage of your layovers there to explore the country. I flew with Icelandair from Luton to Keflavik and then later in the day would have my flight from Keflavik back to Toronto.

My time of arrival in Keflavik was 11am and the departure was set at 5pm. Let’s say it would take about 30 minutes to get through customs etc. that would put me at 1130am and I’d have to be back at the airport at 3pm for pre-boarding stuff to fly home.

I knew that the MAIN thing I wanted to do in Iceland was see the Blue Lagoon. I looked at booking my slot for the visit there back in October because I had read through various blog pages to book as early as possible because they are very busy and these slots fill up quickly.

The nice thing is that you could book your roundtrip transfer from Keflavik airport to the Blue Lagoon while also booking your time slot.

They have two primary tiers for your visit:

1) Comfort: this includes your entrance, a mud mask, a towel and 1st drink of your choice. The cost of this option is ISK 6990 which amounts to $79.02 Canadian.

2) Premium: this includes your entrance, a mud mask, a towel, 1st drink of your choice, second mask of choice, slippers, use of bathrobe, table reservations at Lava Restaurant and wine included if you chose to make that reservation. The cost of this option is ISK 9900 which amounts to $111.92 Canadian.

I chose to go with the premium package because I was traveling with only a backpack so bringing a bathrobe and slippers with me was not going to be possible and I KNEW I’d be freezing the second I stepped out of the water. I also (obviously) chose to add the roundtrip transportation to and from the airport for an additional $61.00 Canadian. This would bring the total of my booking to about $173.00, which isn’t exactly a cheap layover activity you know?

Luckily, it totally ended up being worth every penny! I landed a little earlier than anticipated so the bus was able to take me to the Blue Lagoon for their 1130am departure, instead of the 1pm one I had booked. Sadly, they won’t actually let you into the Lagoon until your designated time slot but I was able to use my premium package and go have lunch at the Lava Restaurant there. Delicious. Absolutely delicious. They have three options for different two or three course meals, I went with the Icelandic option. Had the most amazing Atlantic char for a starter, lamb shoulder for my entree and some type of caramel ice cream as my dessert. So good, came to about $100 Canadian for it all. My belly was very happy and now I was fully prepared for my venture into the Lagoon.

When you are about to enter the Blue Lagoon the person at the front desk will give you a wristband and that is the MAIN thing you want to make sure not to lose. This is how you lock and unlock your personal locker and this is what any additional items you choose to purchase there (drinks etc.) will be logged into as well.

I was given my slippers, bath robe and towel at this moment as part of my premium package and then I was on my merry way to the change rooms. I will warn you, the change rooms are crazy busy. You will have all the women who are entering at the same time slot as you getting changed as well as all the women who are departing. You choose whichever locker you want because your wrist band will be programmed at that point to only lock and unlock the one you chose. I had a backpack and a laptop bag with me, along with a very large winter coat and boots – it ALL fit in their locker. Just in case you do have one of those really large checked-in luggage bags with you, there was a paid luggage storage building before you enter the Blue Lagoon where you could also put it. Within the Blue Lagoon the locker was included with your cost of entry.

After you get changed into your bathing suit, you HAVE TO take a shower naked. There are signs everywhere stating that anyone who wants to enter must first take a shower naked. So you put your bathing suit on, go enter the shower and take it off, shower, and then put it back on and head for the warmth of the Lagoon.

PRIOR to that warmth though, you will feel the wrath of the wind in Iceland while only having your bathing suit on. Listen, I had my bathrobe on and I still was well vexxed having to take it off and enter the water. I made that transition as quickly as possible.

Once you enter the water you feel soooooooo damn good though. I believe the temperature is 38 degrees Celsius in the water and it sends your body into an automatic relaxed mode. For my 2pm slot I didn’t find the waters particularly busy. For as hectic as the change room felt, the space in the water was pretty great. Didn’t feel crowded at all.

Make absolutely sure you bring your waterproof phone case with you when you go to into the Lagoon! I saw some people braving the waters with trying to keep their phone high above their heads and stuff, but between the splish splashing of some kids there and the steam radiating off the water – don’t risk it, just buy a cheap waterproof case from Amazon or something like I did. They do have them for purchase AT the Lagoon as well, but just come prepared and pay less OK?

As I mentioned, the damn splish splashing kids. Let’s talk about your hair for a second. I read MANY MANY posts about what the Lagoon water can do to your hair and how much it’ll suck after contact. I am tall enough to prevent my hair from touching the water while it was tied up. I knew I didn’t have time to condition it heavily, swim around and then have to wash it out after and blow dry it before my flight home. I was on a serious time constraint so I just chose to avoid Lagoon water touching my hair. I failed. The children that were at the Lagoon decided to swim around flapping all their limbs enough to splash everyone around them, which included me….. and my hair. So although I didn’t dunk my head into the water, it definitely got wet and I did not have the suggested conditioner in it before entering. Let me tell you, the current texture of the parts that did get wet? NOT AWESOME. NOT AWESOME AT ALL. So please if you aren’t on a time constraint like I was, ensure that you just do the damn conditioning before entering even if you don’t plan on dunking your head in.

I swam around for a little bit in the Lagoon, got some pictures, got my free drink (banana smoothie) and I indulged in their amazing mud mask. I should say, even though my hair feel like shit right now, my face feels incredible from that mask. WOW. They blob it onto your hand and you apply it to your face, leave it on for 10 minutes and then wash it off. Your skin is left feeling so soft. I guess because your pores are already surrounded by steam and warmth, adding this mask to it makes it that much better. Make sure you do it while there!

When I noticed it was about 240pm I hopped out and went to the change room so I could be on time for my 310pm bus back to the airport. I was glad I chose to not fully dunk my head in at this point as well because the long-haired-lasses had the blow dryers going and if I would have waited for them to finish to blow dry my hair? I definitely wouldn’t have even made it on time for my flight departure at 5pm.

This blog post ended up being way longer than I anticipated. Shit. Sorry guys, I just wanted you to know ALL the goods. I hope you go to the Blue Lagoon at some point as well, it’s worth the money and I would especially suggest doing it before your flight home because you’re so relaxed after the experience. It makes the long flight home just a bit less shitty you know? Also, make sure you put some money aside to buy the products at their gift shop. They aren’t cheap, but it’s hard to resist taking some amazing skin products from there. Because I was traveling with only a carry-on bag I took all the products out of their packaging and threw them in my ziploc bag to make sure it would be close to the liquid allowance. I got them into the plane and back to Canada, great success.

  • Mirna