travel
Springtime in Utrecht
“How many bicycles are there in Utrecht?”
“More than people,” my Dutch friend assured me. Continue reading
71 things to see and do in Cape Town
Having played tour guide a couple of times to friends visiting Cape Town, I’ve become aware that there are plenty of ways to fill your time there. In case you are looking for some ideas, here are 71 things to see and do in Cape Town (in no particular order). Continue reading
Weekend as Popelka in Brno
Popelka is the Czech version of Cindarella, screened every year around Christmas time (she’s also quite popular in Germany and Russia, I’ve heard). Fairytales are popular in Czech Republic; they are on TV all the time. Continue reading
Top 10 posts of 2016 (in case you missed them!)
I’m always curious why some posts are read more often. Here were the most-read posts of 2016:
1. Namaqualand
2. Road tripping from Czech Republic to Slovenia and Croatia
3. Watersports and beaches at Müggelsee
4. Battle of the Seelow Heights and a walk near the Oder river
5. The wedding planning continues
6. Lakes of Berlin
7. Cross country skiing in the Harz mountains
8. The legend of Drachenfels
9. The complications of a multi-national wedding
10. Middle Europe Weekly small pleasures #20: Cambridge in spring
Enjoy! 🙂
There and back again – December to January
My last real blog post was just before we went away for Christmas holidays to South Africa via Namibia, and now it’s February already! I feel like I’m always behind these days. In between travelling I am overloaded with work, trying to meet all my many deadlines before the next trip. At the moment I’m away again, at a meeting in Switzerland. It should calm down a bit in February, but let’s see. Hopefully then I’ll have time to update on the places we’ve visited in December and January. Here is a sneak preview in the meanwhile. Continue reading
First snow: hiking in the Harz mountains
This weekend a friend organized a spontaneous trip to the Harz mountains when a colleague mentioned to her that it was snowing there. Although the highest peak, the Brocken, is only 1141m, the area has an alpine character with lots of fir trees and receives much more snow than the surrounding areas. It was amazing as we drove from autumnal forests full of orange and gold up to a snow-covered winter wonderland. We visited earlier this year in January or February when the snow was deep for cross country skiing. This year we did some hiking in the hills instead, another way to enjoy the beauty of the snowy trees. I can hardly wait to visit again. Continue reading
Middle Europe Weekly Small Pleasures #29 – chocolate, kriek and autumn forest
Well 2016 has certainly been a year of change worldwide. Terror attacks, Brexit, turbulent politics in South Africa and now Trump’s election. They say you always remember where you are when you hear dramatic news, and probably I will always remember that I was in Brussels at a meeting when Trump was elected. Because of my meeting, my husband and I spent the weekend in Belgium. We’ve been to Brussels several times before and have also visited Bruges, Ghent, Blankenberg, Spa, Lieges and Leuven, so this time we decided to take a day trip to Antwerp. I’ll write about our trip in a separate post, but Belgium is full of things to enjoy, and so this week my weekly small pleasures were Belgian ones. Check out the weekly small pleasures of others here at a New Life Wandering. Continue reading
Weekend in Tuscany
This year we extended our summer by an extra few days by spending a long weekend in the Tuscan sun at the beginning of October. I had a meeting in Siena so we started our long weekend trip in this beautiful medieval city, famed for its horse races, the Palio, which take place twice a year in July and August in the Piazza del Campo.
Canary Islands Travel Diaries – Gran Canaria
The last stop on our Canary islands visit was Gran Canaria, which is approximately in the middle of the archipelago. We had travelled first to Fuerteventura, then to Lanzarote, finding that each island had a different character, and finally arrived on Gran Canaria, which yet again had different scenery and a different atmosphere. On this island the mountains dominate, with the highest peak being 1956m. Before Europeans arrived, the island was populated from as early as 500BC by a people known as the Canarii. In their language, the island was called Tamarán. There is a museum about this interesting civilization on the island, but unfortunately we didn’t manage to get there on our short trip. Continue reading