Travels around the Continent
“... You have nothing to lose, but your chains.” (Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels) Day 6 – Monday 16th September 2024 – Leipzig to AugsburgWe were making an early start on this day and walked the short distance to Leipzig Hauptbahnhof in good time to catch the 07:48 train to Munich. The station was much quieter …
Continue reading "Europe Explored – Trip 14 – German Medley – Part Two: from Leipzig"
"Workers of the world, Unite! ..." (Friedrich Engels, Karl Marx) In recent years I have visited most of the major cities in Germany, most recently being a trip along the Baltic coast from Hamburg to Poland last October. My wife and I had a number of places in Germany we still wanted to go to …
Continue reading "Europe Explored – Trip 14 – German Medley – Part One: to Leipzig"
"Beautiful plumage" (Description of the Norwegian Blue parrot - Monty Python sketch.) Day 5 (continued) – Friday 7th June 2024 – KristiansandMy ferry from Hirtshals in Denmark docked in Kristiansand on time at 15:30. Disembarkation was relatively speedy - a connecting passageway was attached to the side of the ship almost as soon at it …
Continue reading "Europe Explored – Trip 13 – Denmark and Norway – Part Two: Norway"
"We are red. We are white.We are Danish dynamite!"(Chant of Danish football fans at the Euro 92 tournament -won by Denmark.) My only previous visits to Denmark and Norway had been two trips to their capitals, Copenhagen and Oslo in 2018 and 2019, not counting my return from Sweden via Copenhagen airport last September. So …
Continue reading "Europe Explored – Trip 13 – Denmark and Norway – Part One: Denmark"
"Mir wëlle bleiwe wat mir sinn" (We want to stay what we are) - Luxembourg motto Luxembourg is a country that I had never visited before, unless you count briefly passing through it on an overnight coach trip to Italy with my parents in 1970. Having got a taste for free travel with my Freedom …
"Between Scylla and Charybdis" After a three month gap since my previous excursion to Europe, I decided to head south on a short trip in the hope of catching some warmth. Day 1 - Tuesday 27th February 2024 - London to NaplesAs usual when I fly to my initial destination, I was going to depart …
Continue reading "Europe Explored – Trip 11 – Naples and Sicily"
“La France est un livre dont chaque chapitre est une découverte.” (France is a book in which every chapter is a discovery.) - Gustave Flaubert Having renewed my Carte Advantage Senior from the beginning of 2023, during one of SNCF's periodic half-price sales, I realised that I had not yet used it this year. So …
Continue reading "Europe Explored – Trip 10 – French Frustrations"
"From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an "Iron Curtain" has descended across the continent" (Winston Churchill) [Continuing the account of the trip made with my wife to visit a number of Hanseatic ports.] Day 7 – Tuesday 17th October 2023 – Stralsund to Szczecin via ŚwinoujścieThe Mecklenburg-Pomeranian day rover tickets that …
Continue reading "Europe Explored – Trip 9 – Hanseatic Holiday – Part Two: Poland"
"All power to the merchants" (Motto of the Hanseatic League) The Hanseatic League, or Hansa, was a loose confederation of city states mainly located along the Baltic coast, but with outposts as far afield as London, Bergen, Bruges and Novgorod. In its heyday in the Middles Ages it dominated maritime trade in the Baltic and …
Continue reading "Europe Explored – Trip 9 – Hanseatic Holiday – Part One: Germany"
"I'm the street you walkThe language you talkI am the city"ABBA Day 7 - Tuesday 19th September 2023 - StockholmHaving not done any exploring of Stockholm upon my arrival the previous evening, I got up early to go for a wander to familiarise myself with the layout of the city before the attractions I wished …
Continue reading "Europe Explored – Trip 8 – Finland and Sweden – Part Two: Sweden"
Europe Explored 