When you think of the Netherlands and gardens and flowers, what comes immediately to mind? I assume your answer is “tulips.” Tulips are cultivated here in huge quantity and they or the bulbs are exported all over the world. Keukenhof and Giethoorn One of the biggest attractions for tourists in the Netherlands is Keukenhof, a tulip…
If you find yourself with a few hours to kill at Amsterdam Central train station, there’s plenty to do right nearby. First of all, if you have shopping bags or luggage with you, don’t schlep them with you. Inside Amsterdam Central, on the right side of the building if you are looking at it from…
The first thing you see on entering the Sex Museum Amsterdam is a life size statue of Priapus, the Greek god of fertility, and he’s … well, let’s say he’s pretty turned on, and well-endowed. Review of the Sex Museum Amsterdam The rest of the museum goes downhill from there. Unfortunately, if I want to keep…
Disclosure: The following is a sponsored post in that I received a free SIM card with credit from Tellink in return for reviewing it. All opinions are, as always, my own. Those of us who travel frequently, and especially those of us who travel for work or who blog about travel, often struggle with telephone…
The following post is sponsored content. It was originally published on IHG’s blog on May 9, 2016. Planning a visit to London? After booking your flight and picking the perfect London hotel, the next item on the list is figuring out where to dine in this British metropolis. London is packed with everything from expensive, swanky…
When I first arrived in the Netherlands back in 1997, one of the first bits of sightseeing I did, besides exploring my new hometown of Groningen itself, was to go on a driving tour of village churches in Groningen province. The idea came from my favorite guidebook: the Michelin green guide to the Netherlands. The…
A Grimm Fairy Tale Once upon a time, a rooster, a dog, a donkey and a cat, realizing they’d outlived their usefulness and under threat of being eaten or killed, set out toward Bremen. Their plan was to make a living as musicians: the Town Musicians of Bremen. On the way, they passed a cottage…
My husband and I recently spent a weekend in Bremen, which is about a two-hour trip from home. We didn’t choose Bremen because of anything in particular except that we wanted a weekend away, and we also felt we needed to be close enough to get home quickly if anything went wrong with the three…
If you visit the center of the German city of Bremen, you can’t possibly miss seeing St Petri Dom, the huge church whose massive, chunky twin spires dominate the central squares. St Petri Dom doesn’t have the beauty or grace of, for example, Notre Dame in Paris. As a matter of fact, my first comment…
While I didn’t do any shopping in Dubai, I did manage a quick walk around the Bastakiya District: also known as Old Dubai. Dubai was originally a small port that made its living from pearl diving, fishing and trade, especially with Iran. Besides the nomadic Bedouins, who lived in tents, the populations who settled here…
Shopping is A. Big. Deal. in Dubai. Whenever I asked people who live there what I should see and do, the answer usually included shopping. (Disclosure: This article contains affiliate links. That means that if you click on the link and buy tickets, I will get a small commission.) I am very much NOT a…
On my recent visit to Dubai on Emirates Airline, I was pleased to discover that I’d be flying on a plane I’d only seen from a distance before: the enormous Airbus A380. The A380 The A380 is a behemoth of a plane. Like Boeing’s 747, it just doesn’t look like it should be able to…
A couple of times a week, I commute to my part-time job in Leeuwarden, in Friesland province. Sometimes I drive, but as much as possible, I like to take the train. I start by bicycling to the train station in the center of Groningen, parking the bike and boarding the train. The train trip takes about 35…
About a year ago I wrote a post about Groningen, the small city where I live. I mapped out a route that started at the train station and wound its way through the city, ending at the landmark Martinitoren. The Martinitoren Today, for the first time in several years, I climbed the Martinitoren, and it…
Last fall I attended the World Travel Market in London, a three-day sensory overload of networking with travel industry and destination exhibitors (5000 stands and 50,000 visitors!). I stayed with a friend and fellow blogger, Shobha of Just Go Places, who lives in London. Each day we got in her car and drove across the…
Perched high on an escarpment overlooking Lake Malawi, Livingstonia was established by missionaries from the Free Church of Scotland back in 1894. The story goes that they tried several times to establish missions down on the shore of the lake, but kept losing missionaries to malaria until they moved up the escarpment to higher, less…
Nyika National Park is a lovely and little-known park in northern Malawi that looks like the Scottish highlands, but with zebras!
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…
Some years ago, on a short visit to London, I started noticing the signs on all the pubs I was passing as I explored the Covent Garden area. My knowledge of the British pub is mostly based on the Queen Vic of Walford in the BBC soap Eastenders. So many of them, though, have such creative signs…
While I was in Lagos for work, I took an extra day to visit Badagry, Nigeria. This town on the east side of Lagos was the “Point of No Return” in the Nigerian slave trade for 400 years. It is now home to three museums about the Badagry slave trade and Badagry history. We were…
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…
I did a lot of driving on my recent visit to Lagos, Nigeria. Or rather, I did a lot of being driven. Lagos isn’t your usual tourist destination and, indeed, I didn’t go there as a tourist. I had agreed to lead a workshop at an International Baccalaureate school for two days. If I was…
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…
Once overlooked by travelers, the borough of Amsterdam Noord (Amsterdam North) has developed into a thriving artistic community, a spot for dance and music festivals, and an escape from Amsterdam’s chaotic and touristy center. This is – or, rather, was – a sponsored guest post, originally published by thehipmunk on Hipmunk’s Tailwind blog on December 10, 2015. The Hipmunk brand…
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…
I was very happy when my daughter, visiting from the US, wanted to spend the day in Amsterdam, sightseeing with me. I gave her a list of museums I’d like to visit for my series on Amsterdam museums and other sights, and told her to choose two. My daughter, a graphic designer, chose the Spectacles…
“That was pretty interesting” is high praise indeed, when it comes from my 17-year-old son after a visit to a museum. The Verzetsmuseum – the Dutch Resistance Museum – in Amsterdam is one of very few that have earned a “pretty interesting” from him. Documenting not just the resistance movement during World War II, but…
The classic destination for a big view of Tokyo is Tokyo Tower, which looks like a cross between a communication mast and the Eiffel Tower. What stopped me from visiting it was the cost: ¥1200 (€8 or $9) to go to its main deck at 150 meters (492 ft) and ¥2800 (€19 or $21) fee to reach…
While it may seem appealing to ditch the daily grind and live an adventurous life abroad, being an expat comes with its own trials and tribulations, and not all expat locations are created equal. This is – or, rather, was – a sponsored guest post, originally published by thehipmunk on Hipmunk’s Tailwind blog on December 13, 2015. The Hipmunk brand…