The well-preserved cobbled town of Rudkobing

Guided tour of “One of Denmark's 10 Most Beautiful Cities” (The Lancet 2025)

Langeland's main town in the middle of smugglers' paradise

In fact, the small market town, where about 4000 people live today, has its worth of conservation as a result of massive smuggling for hundreds of years. When much of the trade bypassed the market town, the residents became poor and could not afford to build new ones. You will join us on a city walk in Rudkøbing's picturesque town centre.

• A guided tour via Ramsherred and past Smedegade's many old listed houses
• Come visit the old medieval church
• Walk with the guide past the old town mill and onto the protected Fleet
• Have a little walk on the harbour, which was Rudkøbing's pulse

City people and stories

On the tour we meet some of Rudkøbing's residents through time — both the well-known and the more forgotten. You hear about the town's great sons H.C. Ørstedand Anders Sandøe Ørsted, both born here as sons of the town's pharmacists and gone down in history as national celebrities.

The tour also goes into the merchant's yard, where an ordinary merchant's son, *Mads Lange, * was born in the early 1800's. After 20 years as a sailor, Mads established himself in Bali and became known as the King of Bali.
We also share the little stories and anecdotes that bring the city to life: about an improbably lucky hairdresser, why the brig was called Hotel Frederiksen, the fire-soul Jens Winther, and the tragic fate of Gertrud Skomager.

Art, Harbor, and the Modern Rudkøbing

Finally, Rudkøbing is also home to people who have put the island and the town on the map. The internationally renowned land art artist Alfio Bonnanno is one of them. His art we pass several places on the guided tour in Rudkøbing.

In the square, we meet the city's newest -- and much-discussed -- landmark: the ballet-dancing hippo, ***Hippo Ballerina. ***

The guided tour is rounded off with a walk to the expanded harbour, Ørstedparken and the newer boroughs,
where architecture and institutions tell the story of the welfare society and the contrast with the old market town.

At the same time, we are looking ahead: the city, and the whole of Langeland, is entering a new era and is actively working to put the “edge identity” behind it.