In 2015 my family and I experienced a Trafalgar Costsaver Tour called the European Cavalcade. This series follows our adventures on that tour.
Today’s post is about how I planned the tour part of my family’s European trip and then the first half of the first day. Planning the tour In mid 2014 we (being my wife and I) agreed to the holiday half way around the planet (we live in Sydney, Australia). Thing was, we then had to turn a vague idea into something more solid, something more structured. So we had to establish our
The trip up through Belgium and the Netherlands was uneventful. The Trafalgar Tour coach was comfortable and the driver was obviously experienced. My daughter relieved the tedium of the trip by teasing me from the seat in front. But eventually our destination appeared ahead. Amsterdam’s name is quite descriptive, meaning a dam on the river Amstel. However it has come a long way since it’s origin 800 years ago as a
A brief note from me Before I describe my Rhine Cruise to you all, I will just say something briefly about the appalling events of this weekend: Beirut then Paris. I am not some genius. The ebbs and flows of human misery and joy in their totality are beyond my meagre ability to comprehend let alone offer much insight upon. So I will keep it simple, and this is purely
The Trafalgar Costsaver Tour entitled “European Cavalcade” is, as I have insinuated before, a kind of taster experience for Europe. During 18 days you can expect to do a lot of miles (or kilometres) by coach with a number of short stops. The real value is in the two night stopovers. Everything else is kind of nice, but rushed. Leaving our Rhine cruise behind us, we were whisked off to nearby
Today I continue sharing with you my Trafalgar Costsaver Tour “European Cavalcade” as we sweep briefly into Germany’s Black Forest. But before I do so, I want to take this opportunity to encourage you to visit the blog site of Dani. She is a 35 year old science nerd and I feel that a lot of you regulars here may relate to her. The post I have pointed you towards is
Imagine a place where in winter, every 10 seconds, water the equivalent to an Olympic size swimming pool rushes down a waterfall. Well, that place is the Rhine Falls near the town of Schaffhausen in northern Switzerland. These are reputedly the largest plain falls in Europe. The coach for our tour (Trafalgar’s Costsaver ‘European Cavalcade”) dropped us off here. (OK - it may seem that I’m giving them lots of free advertising,
I first visited Lucerne in 2001 on a Globus Tour. Prior to this I had little interest in Switzerland. I just saw it as some mountainous backwater of Europe where people stashed money in inaccessible banks. Pretty dumb, eh? Me, that is. The Globus Tour showed me a magnificent side of the country, particularly Lucerne where we stayed in a fantastic hotel in the centre of town overlooking the lake. I
One of my big rules when travelling is to always identify landmarks that I can use for navigating around town. In Lucerne we picked a big double-steepled church just up the road from our tour’s squishy hotel. Up until writing this post I had no idea what the place was (other than a church). So here is a photo taken from a roadway below it. To get from our hotel to
About two centuries before Christ was born people settled the Nidwalden valley. I’m guessing that they were Celts, the so-called Helvetians, based upon vague memories of some of my university studies done in the 1980s. One such place they settled became known as Stans, and I am guessing that from this settlement the mountain known as Stanserhorn got its name. Our tour guide got us out and into the coach
Hi all, Today’s post is two stories. The first is set today, during a little drive to a New South Wales’ town called Picton where I found a marvellous little “collectables” shop. Then back to Switzerland in September. Armour Collectables in Picton Obviously the name of this shop got my attention straight away. Two things that I love: armour and collectables. Alas I saw no armour in it. This said,
OK – stupid title for a travel post. But let’s face it, Lichtenstein is a tiny and boring place. At least it is on a Trafalgar Costsaver tour. Close your eyes so we can do a mental re-enactment with you as the protagonist. Hang on, can’t do that. You won’t be able to read my wonderfully evocative words with your eyes shut. So you are just going to have to
Today’s post is brief and back to telling you all about my amazing holiday :) The coach sped us away from Lichtenstein and towards Innsbruck in Austria. My trusty Google map below shows where Innsbruck is. The countryside along the way was a spectacular panorama of mountains and trees. I must admit that I often found it difficult taking high quality photos while the coach was on the move. The
…so we avoided the strange man in the Charlie Chaplin outfit and the squeaky voice… Oops. I’ve started the story midway. Must be because I am tired, confused and still recovering from the wild New Year’s Eve party three days ago. But by damn that was a great party. It was at a local club. The band played mostly 80s classics. There was a lot of dancing. And we had a
OK – long post today. I am way behind in processing my European photographs. Well, I do have around 6,000! But today I worked on it. If you follow me on Twitter (not that I post much) you will see that I am also tired from having swum a kilometre yesterday. I am really not up to that. So today I carry on with the adventure of a lifetime, my
Hi all, Firstly an apology for my neglect in recent weeks, especially the past fortnight or so. With my final date due to redundancy rapidly approaching (Friday 29 January) I find myself focusing on setting myself up for the future. Alas maintaining this blog or reading other blogs is way down at the bottom of my list of my current priorities. Sorry. :( Interestingly I had coffee today with a friend
And so the saga continues, albeit well behind schedule! This is how I summarised on Facebook our first full day in Venice: “If possible we are even more tired. Another early start to see glass blowing (Rhiannon enjoyed this ☺ ) and then entry into San Marco basilica where I unfortunately could not take photos. Then we had 8 hours free time in Venice. We wandered extensively including Santa Maria de
As part of the European Cavalcade Costsaver tour’s free time in Venice we partook of the Doge’s Palace. This place is so grand that this one post is only going to tell you about the courtyard. Huh? Yep. Tis true. Just the courtyard. OK. If you don’t know, the Doge’s Palace is at the heart of Venice, next to San Marco. The Doge’s Palace, just like so many older buildings
This is the next part of my (long overdue) series on my Trafalgar Costsaver European Cavalcade tour. In my last post I spoke about the courtyard of the Doge’s Palace. Now we are entering the building itself. The path from the courtyard and into the Doge’s Palace is via a spectacular sixteenth century staircase - Scala d’Oro (“golden staircase). You can see my daughter Rhiannon sitting on the steps smirking at silly
The Museum in the Doge’s Palace (itself a living museum!) is a tribute to the history of this city. It is not a massive museum, compared to the likes of the British Museum, but comparable to that you would find in many a castle in Europe. As you can tell from the following photos that I took, I was mostly enamored by the weaponry on display. The museum was the
This 2015 trip was our second visit to Rome. Our first had been in 2002 with Globus. Back then we had stayed in a hotel not far from the Colosseum. The room had been small and the hotel staff arrogant. We wondered how our Trafalgar Costsaver experience would differ. The question was quickly answered when we reached our hotel, the Ergife Palace Hotel, at around 4 pm. It was spectacular.
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