We’re in the middle of winter, the coronavirus is at its peak and none of us can travel. But I am dreaming of Danish summer houses and hope this provides some inspiration for your Danish travels, when they can resume.
Summer house getaways are a thing in Denmark. Many Danes own a summer house, which they retreat to during holidays or for long weekends, all year around but particularly in the summer. In fact you won’t find many locals in Copenhagen during the month of July, as that’s when most will escape their apartments and head to a summer house.
In May, we booked a summer house stay in Rågeleje, just north of Copenhagen. It’s an area we wanted to explore but needs the use of a car, so we saved it for a special trip to celebrate our daughter’s second birthday. Copenhagen’s public transport is brilliant but if you want to explore a bit further out of the city, it is much easier and quicker to hire a car. You won’t be disappointed by venturing to north Zealand, as there are stunning beaches, it’s great for walking and has a huge range of summer houses you can book. If we’d have had time, we would have added in a trip to Fredensborg Castle and Frederiksborg Castle and the beach town Hornbæk – all places that come highly recommended.
So Rågeleje is a charming little seaside town at the top of Zealand with a beautiful beach and heather hills. It took around 45 minutes to drive there from Østerbro, Copenhagen.
The timing of this holiday could not have fallen more perfectly. We had just come out of Denmark’s first lockdown from the coronavirus. We had spent the last eight weeks at home, not having much social contact and looking after the girls while juggling work.
Just driving in a car out of Copenhagen feels like a holiday when you don’t usually travel that way, but to do so after a lockdown felt like freedom!
We booked this getaway with some close expat friends who have two children at similar ages to ours and the joy it brought us all, to be together after so long apart, was just amazing. At that point in the restrictions, you could socialise in groups of no more than ten and summer house stays were allowed.
The afternoon we first arrived, we all breathed out as we sat in the Spring sun, drinking beer while the children played in the garden. 
In the evening, we sat in front of the log fire and chatted about the crazy two months we’d just had and congratulated ourselves for getting through it. It felt so good.
On the Saturday, we spent most of the day at the beach, which we could walk and cycle to from our summer house. Our 4 year-old braved the cold sea and loved it! We finished the day with a birthday barbecue in the garden.
We were only there for two days and two nights so we didn’t do a lot of exploring but just being out of the city and in a summer house was enough.
As you can see, it was a beautiful house.
As I write this, both Denmark and England are in the middle of another lockdown. But there is light at the end of the tunnel. We will definitely have days like this again and I can.not.wait.
