Countryside Day Trip from Copenhagen

My favorite trip outside of Copenhagen was Hillerod, with the Fredriksborg Slot (castle). In addition the impressive castle, the town was very nice.

Many other people's favorite trip outside the city is to Louisiana, the modern art museum with lovely grounds right on the water. I wasn't as taken with the art in the museum as some others, but the location is lovely, and sounds like it would be what you are looking for.

The town of Helsingor with "Hamlet's Castle" was not as nice as these other two, but may still be of interest. I didn't see other places in the area, such as Roskilde, which many also like.

All of these are in the Copenhagen metro area, and transit and most admissions are covered by the Copenhagen Card. For Louisiana, you take a local train then a bus; for the others, local trains go right there.

For a village experience (almost) right in Copenhagen consider Dragoer (Dragør) on the other side of the airport. You can go there with a bus 350S from Noerreport (Nørreport) Station.

Or you can go to Hillerød and take the local train to Gilleleje on the north coast.

Thank you for these suggestions. They all have merit, and we'll research all three.

Three day trips come to mind from Copenhagen, transportation for all of these are free with a Copenhagen card.

One already mentioned was taking a train to Hillerod for Fredericksborg castle. It may be the nicest of the castles in the area. Unfortunately we missed it because they were doing track maintenance and the alternative route was indirect and inconvenient.

Another is taking a train to Helsingor to see Kronborg castle (a previous version of this castle is what Shakespeare based Castle Elsinore on). The castle is great, the short tour was nice. Be sure to bring (or buy from the vending machine) a small flashlight for the casemates, there are lots of messages painted on the walls in reflective paint that only become visible when you shine your flashlight on them. As part of our day we then took a "private train" further north to spend time on the beach at Hornbaek (also free with Copenhagen card but "private" because the rail is adjacent to the train station rather than in it).

A third day trip is to train to Roskilde. The Cathedral, with lots of tombs of Danish royalty, is a great stop; the oldest I saw was Harald Bluetooth, from the 900's, built into a wall. Of course the tombs get bigger and more ornate as time goes on. Roskilde also has the Viking Ship Museum. After touring the museum there is an open air traditional boat building area. As I recall, all of this was free with the Copenhagen card.

The Viking Ship Museum in Roskilde is not covered by the Copenhagen Card.The card does have a discount on the ferry from Helsingor to Helsingborg

I personally loved Helsingor. And a stop at Louisiana on the way or return is easy. You can take a bus from Helsingor to Louisiana and it goes along the coast - very pretty.

Roskilde as a town was rather dull to me. But the cathedral and Viking Ship Museum are both outstanding.

I am actually in Copenhagen now and have done a few of the side trips that were mentioned. Today we took the train to Odense to visit the Hands Christian Andersen house and museum as well as the town of odense. We both really enjoyed that. We did not spend much time where the Haley castle is but you could choose to take the ferry across the water to helsinborg, Sweden. Tomorrow we are taking the train to go to Malmo, Sweden for t by err day. The Viking museum in roskilde was interesting as was the castle in hillerod.