DIS Blog
A breath of fresh air in Fredensborg
Travel doesn’t always mean grand adventures and crossing borders — it can be as simple as spending a weekend in nature, away from the busy life of studying abroad.
Slow travel aims to make travel more sustainable, both for the planet, but also for the traveler. Joshua (he/him, Amherst College) wanted to travel in a way that could be restorative for his mental health. His journey took him just north of Copenhagen to the town of Fredensborg, where he enjoyed a slow pace to life, soaking in the nature and spending his days visiting museums.
Read Joshua’s perspectives on mental health and how a short train ride outside the city helped him slow down and explore Denmark outside of Copenhagen.
City life catches up to you quickly, even in a “slow-paced” city like Copenhagen.
The hustle and bustle of daily life quickly consumes you, and sometimes you need an escape.
Luckily for me, all it takes to escape busy Copenhagen for a weekend is a quick trip on S-train A to Hillerod, followed by an even shorter ride on the 780R bus line, until you end up in Fredensborg , a small railway town in North Zealand. The suburban atmosphere of Fredensborg allows you to slow down and breathe. With buses and trains running only once an hour, planning must be intentional, and waiting must become a part of the routine. The quiet aspects of life are honed in, and one is given a lot of room to think.
After dropping my bag off at my hotel, a small, cozy bed and breakfast in the town, I went to check out the Fredensborg castle and the surrounding forest.
I was enamored by how something so magnificent could exist just about an hour outside of the busy city of Copenhagen. I walked by the water, listening to the oceanic sounds before moving to the main grass area to admire the greenery of this beautiful place.
I followed my scenic walk with a twenty-minute walk to a burger place down the road called Factory Burger. The lack of people around me during this walk to acquire my dinner made me feel like I was back in my rural college town back in Massachusetts.
It’s funny how the strangest things can make you miss home.
Frederiksborg castle and Louisiana Museum of Modern Art
Now on to the key features of my weekend away from the city, my visit to Fredriksborg Castle and the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art. Each was about 30 minutes away from my hotel, but in completely opposite directions, so I took quite a journey through North Zealand.
I started my morning by taking the 780R to the town of Hillerød, home to Frederiksborg Castle.
This magnificent castle was once a home for Danish royals and today is a museum dedicated to Danish history. Inside, the castle was a maze of opulence and history. Portraits of Danish kings and queens lined the walls; each room told its own story of Denmark’s past.
The grandeur of the chapel, with its golden details and stained glass, was particularly breathtaking. I paused for a while there, letting the quiet sink in. Compared to the constant noise of city life, the hushed reverence inside the chapel felt almost sacred. It was a reminder of how spaces like these were built not just to impress but to inspire awe, to force visitors to reflect on their place in a long sequence of history.
After spending most of the morning immersed in royal history, I caught the local train toward Humlebæk to visit the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art. Known for its unique blend of modern art, nature, and architecture, the museum lived up to my every expectation. The journey there was peaceful; the train rolled past sleepy towns and coastal views, reinforcing my sense that I had left the frantic energy of urban life far behind.
The museum greeted me with sweeping views of the Øresund Sound, a backdrop nearly stealing the show from the art itself. Inside, the exhibits were equally captivating.
I found myself particularly drawn to an installation that explored themes of life and the ocean, which made me contemplate the literal and figurative oceans I had crossed to be in that moment. Journeying from New York to Massachusetts to Copenhagen, and now finding myself in this quiet corner of Denmark, I realized that art has a way of making the abstract feel personal. It grounds big, abstract ideas into somethin more tactile, expressing the essence of the human experience.
As the sun began to dip lower in the sky, I returned to my home base in Fredensborg. The journey back gave me time to reflect on what I’d experienced over the weekend. North Zealand had offered me something I didn’t realize I desperately needed: physical and mental space. Space to step away from my busy life and reconnect with a slower rhythm. In Copenhagen, even though it isn’t the largest city in Europe, there is an undercurrent of movement and productivity even on the calmest days. It is still a city after all. But here, away from it all, the slower pace felt natural, almost meditative.
Returning home
Returning to Copenhagen the next morning, I carried with me a renewed sense of balance. I was reminded that even amid the busyness of city life, it’s possible, maybe even necessary, to seek out moments of stillness. Whether it’s in a small railway town, a silent and grand castle, or a seaside museum, these pockets of calm offer more than just a break from routine. They offer a chance to reset, gain perspective, and return to daily life with a clearer mind and a lighter heart.
My weekend in Fredensborg and the surrounding towns of North Zealand wasn’t about crossing off major tourist attractions or packing my days with activities. It was about embracing the quiet, finding beauty in simplicity, and allowing myself to just be.
As I settle back into the rhythms of Copenhagen, I know that the calm I found there will stay with me, quietly shaping how I move through the rest of my time in Denmark.
