If you return to a travel destination that you loved the first time around, there’s a risk you may be disappointed the second time. It’s a travel dilemma we all deal with.

When I was in Denmark recently, I took the chance and returned to the coastal town of Dragør, 10 miles south of the country’s capital, Copenhagen. The last time I had visited was in December, but the second time it was late summer, so I thought I’d enjoy it a little more, and I was not wrong.

Dragør is a gorgeous little village with cobblestone streets and, above all, a thing for geese. They are everywhere. I took the #30 bus from Copenhagen, which takes about 40 minutes, and walked across a marsh with beautiful views and little bridges over dikes of water. The Øresund bridge, which links Denmark with Sweden, is in the distance.

It was not long before I saw my first Dragør goose. There were thousands of them, and I realized I was in part of the village that now is called the Goose Republic, a large, free area of chicken-wire fences and wooden barricades where geese can honk away to their hearts’ delight and scuttle after one another in long lines. In the village itself, geese can be seen as wooden carvings, as weather vanes, on an old packet of local salt I saw in its small museum, on shop signs and in garden ornaments. They far outnumber the humans.

The Dragør museum has a pleasant selection of artifacts relating to the village and its seafaring history and a twisted chimney that supposedly stopped snoopers sitting on the roof and listening in on confidential conversations when the building acted as the village’s city hall.

To one side of the village is a low fort by a beach. Humble yachts lined up inside a breakwater that also moats the battlements. It was built during World War I, together with four other Danish fortresses, which I will list just because I like their names—Flakfortet, Kongelundsfortet, Mosede and Taarbæk. Today, the fort has a restaurant inside it, and when I was there, a company called Humanic was putting on what looked like a crazy Olympics.


Helmeted contestants—and all were men—threw themselves along a greased runway as human bowling balls to knock down skittles; tied themselves into a human-size Fussball game, and dressed in padded costumes, which made them look like human hamburger rolls, in order to negotiate an obstacle course.

The old part of the town is a fishing port, although almost all activity has now ceased. Dragør first came to importance in the 14th century when the Hanseatic League of tradesmen gave it certain business rights in regards to salting fish (the salt came from Lübeck, Germany), which were a little easier to catch here than elsewhere in the region. The fisherfolk fished only between August and October, and Dragør fish soon became famous. Boxes of herring were marked with one, two or three rings, dependent on their quality.

It also is a fantastic place to visit if you have a couple of hours before you need to be at Copenhagen’s international airport, which is two miles away. Also, due to the usual direction of the wind over the Baltic Sea here, you cannot hear the planes taking off or landing. Get up early, come out to Dragør and maximize your travel experience. I definitely encourage you to visit Dragør if your travels will take you to the Copenhagen area. Does anyone have any other European small-town recommendations?