Travel

Innsbruck in Austria

…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

The Wilten Basilica, Innsbruck, Austria and the Bon Alpina Hotel

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

Lichtenstein is not what Frankenstein does with his tongue!

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

Loving Lake Lucerne (plus a great little shop in Picton)

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,

Ascending Mount Stanserhorn

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

Our landmark in Lucerne

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

Lucerne for a few nights

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

A quick photo opportunity at the Rhine Falls

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 –

Now for a walk in the Black Forest

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

Heidelberg in about one hour

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