COPENHAGEN — We’ve fallen behind in our writing, having so stuffed our days with museums and food and walking that we’ve had no energy when we’ve returned home to the Hotel D’Angleterre.

Roskilde, the ancient village that was at the center of the Viking era and remains one of the holiest, most important sites in Denmark, is less than thirty minutes from downtown Copenhagen. It is a quiet, pretty little town, with a stunning cathedral that sits on a rise in the center of Roskilde. Inside, below the soaring ceilings, lie the ornate caskets of all of Danish royalty.

Outside the cathedral, through the old trees and quaint houses, you can see streaks of blue, the first glimpses of the protected harbor that was so important to the Vikings. We walked down the hill to lunch at the edge of the harbor, and then on to the Viking Ship Museum, where they have the remarkable remains of six original Viking ships. The Vikings apparently had deliberately scuttled these ships in an effort to block one of the access points to the harbor, and keep invaders out. The Viking Ship Museum is in an uninspiring concrete bunker,but the restored ships, with their scarred wood, were amazing. Outside the museum was a row of seagoing replica ships, built to the actual dimensions of the originals, constructed all by hand, just like the Vikings. A crew had sailed the largest of the ships, a long narrow battleship, all the way to Ireland. On our visit, that ship was up on blocks in the winter grass, a lone man sanding on its stern.

A day later we were wandering through the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, an international attraction and one of Denmark’s most popular museums. It sits about forty minutes north of Copenhagen, looking out over the Oresund, the sound, towards Sweden. The setting is beautiful, with a sculpture garden that sits on the bluff overlooking the water. The exhibits and the museum were intentionally disorienting, with a collection of “Optic” art that plays tricks on your eyes and brain, and a “Fire and Snow” exhibit that included strangely moving videos, including one of a young girl, Ruth, trying to copy a Picasso. (You had to be there.)

Last night we had one of our most memorable dinners ever, traveling twenty minutes or so north of Copenhagen to Den Rode Cottage, a tiny restaurant of eight tables or so situated in a dark forest of trees. We were there almost three hours, eating small, perfectly prepared dishes and watching the lights of fishing boats move slowly across the sound.