This category includes all my articles about my Europe travel. Because I live in the Netherlands, I can travel in Europe quite easily, and as you see here, I’ve seen a lot of it. Generally I don’t write “ultimate list” or “everything you need to know” posts. Instead, I tend to focus on just one or a few sights or experiences from my specific point of view. Enjoy!
There’s something special about the medieval churches in the Val d’Aran, Spain. All are quite small, stone-built in Romanesque style, and date from the 11th to the 15th century. Disclosure: I went to the Val d’Aran as part of a discounted package provided by Pyrenees Experience. I’ve already written about what to do in the Val…
Skiing in Spain? Yes! It’s possible in the Pyrenees in the Val d’Aran. Read here about the ski resort and other things to do there!
Our tour guide from Italian Days Food and Wine Tours was far too cheerful for such an early start. We had been picked up at seven in the morning—before sunrise in mid-January—and denied even a cup of coffee before leaving. Our hotel’s breakfast only started at seven, so we had run downstairs and grabbed a…
I wasn’t even going to write a review of our hotel, the Hotel El Ciervo, here in Vielha, Spain. It was just a place to stay while we explored the Val d’Aran in the Pyrennees and its ski resort, Baqueira Beret. Or rather, while I explored and my husband and son skied. I’m not being sponsored…
Pictures of some very creative pub signs I spotted on a short trip to London.
On my recent trip to Bologna, my friend Shobha (of Just Go Places) and I were fortunate enough to be hosted by Hotel Touring, which I reviewed in an earlier post. The hotel also arranged for us to eat one evening at a nearby restaurant, Osteria dè Poeti (site in Italian only). This was particularly…
For centuries, in the city of Bologna, Italy, a byzantine image of the Madonna and Child was carried ceremoniously from the Sanctuary of the Madonna of San Luca every year during Ascension week down to the Cathedral of San Pietro in the city center. It stayed there overnight, then was carried back up. The problem…
Most visitors focus on the canal district, but Amsterdam North offers a very different experience: artistic and hip and edgy.
When I met Manuela Stagni at the World Travel Market in London and saw her enthusiasm in describing her hotel, the Hotel Touring in Bologna, Italy, I made a note to keep her in mind if I ever traveled in Italy again. A couple of months later, when she mailed me an offer to stay…
Huis Marseille Photography Museum in Amsterdam, in two 17th-century canal houses, shows rotating exhibitions by compelling photographers.
The Dutch Resistance Museum in Amsterdam looks at how the Dutch coped with the Nazis before and during the war: collaborate, resist, or just try to get by. Which would you have done?
WinterWelVaart is Groningen’s annual Christmas market, with an unusual maritime twist that makes it extra special!
Last spring in Guadeloupe I visited an archeological park where I got to sample the pulp from a fresh-picked cacao pod. I heard more about chocolate cultivation at two coffee plantations. Given my obsession with chocolate, I decided to take the process a step further on my short visit to the Costa Blanca in Spain,…
Red Light Secrets Museum of Prostitution in Amsterdam presents a measured, pragmatic view of an institution usually looked at with derision and disapproval.
After a gorgeous, winding drive through the mountains from where I was staying in the Costa Blanca, finding the Refugio de Cervantes Bomb Shelter Museum in Alcoy took me another hour or so. The delay was due to its humble signposting, and by “humble” I mean a simple sign on a gate next to a…
If you’re ever in the Costa Blanca in Spain, here’s what I’d recommend: get away from the coast! Yes, you can enjoy the beaches and party till the wee hours in the coastal towns, but there’s far more to see inland. The drive I did the other day, for example, was absolutely lovely. Leaving from…
It’s not surprising that Amsterdam is home to a museum of Hash, Marijuana and Hemp, given its generally tolerant policy toward soft drugs.
The Museum of Bags and Purses in Amsterdam might be worth a look, if you like handbags or if you enjoy the absurdity of a museum devoted to purses. [This museum is now closed.]
At Body Worlds Amsterdam we are viewing actual dead bodies, called plastinates. Is this entertainment? Education? Or just a freak show? A critical review.
As you know, I attended the TBEX travel bloggers’ conference in Lloret del Mar recently. While I was there, I was fortunate to be able to take a walking tour of Gothic Barcelona offered by Context Travel. They operate walking tours in more than 36 cities, “the world’s cultural capitals,” around the world. Context Travel’s unique selling…
If you like Salvador Dalí’s art—even if you’re not such a fan of his work—the Gala Dali Castle in Púbol, Spain, is something you should not miss. This is not a Dalí museum. Dalí bought the building, a medieval castle, as a gift for his wife and muse, Elena Ivanovna Diakonova, who was called simply Gala….
If you’re on a budget in New York City and want to visit historic homes, the Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace Museum is an obvious choice. After that visit, I ended up also checking out the Merchant’s House Museum. These two historic homes in New York City both lend some insight into the lives of the 19th…
(Nederlands versie beneden!) When I told people I was going to Lloret de Mar for the last week of my one-month solo trip (Guadeloupe, Martinique, New York, Lloret de Mar), the usual reaction was something along the line of “Lloret de Mar? But why?” Lloret de Mar has a reputation as a party city, along…
You know how sometimes you get so used to what you see every day that you stop noticing it? I’ve walked by the Starbucks in the Groningen central train station hundreds of times in the course of commuting to and from my job up in Leeuwarden. I just didn’t pay much attention to it until…
The other day I tweeted “Guernsey is so very English.” Well, I stand corrected. It isn’t English. I learned this when I asked a completely unrelated question in a shop. There were candies in jars behind the counter marked “£1 a quarter.” I asked the shopkeeper “One pound a quarter what?” “A quarter pound,” she…
The Rembrandt House Museum gives a realistic idea of what a new 17th century Amsterdam house looked like. It’s a bit too new: it lacks atmosphere.
The Van Loon Museum’s rooms give an impression of how wealthy residents of Amsterdam’s canal houses lived and, to a lesser extent, how their servants lived.
Grachtenhuis means “canal house,” so it’s not surprising that the Canal House Museum is housed in a charming Golden Age row house on a canal in Amsterdam.
Ons Lieve Heer op Solder museum is a great choice for a quick taste of the Golden Age of Amsterdam; it was a secret church built into a canal house attic!
Yes, it is possible to see the Rijksmuseum in just two hours. Read this article to find out how I saw the best of the Rijksmuseum in 2 hours.
It was just my luck that the day I’d signed up to take a walking tour in Athens, there was torrential rain. Nevertheless, this tour – covering religious Athens under Ottoman rule – was fascinating. Disclosure: I received this tour for free, but all opinions are my own. It never occurred to me, to be honest,…
Today is St Maartens Day here in Groningen, a children’s tradition that is relatively unique to this area. On the 11th of November, once the sun goes down, children go door-to-door begging for sweets. Instead of threatening “trick or treat” like on Halloween, the deal here is that they sing a song, and in return,…
