On a prior trip to Germany, we enjoyed seeing some of the beautiful castles along the Rhine River. We didn’t have time to explore further, so we had hoped to come back to visit Munich and also to see some of the famous Ludwig II’s castles in Bavaria. And while in the area, why not […]
We recently got back from Germany where we rented a car to visit both Germany and Austria. Sounds easy right? It’s all the EU, so it must be ok, we thought. Well, here are a few things to consider and to prepare for.
We started our Bavarian castle road trip in Munich but basically landed and drove straight to Schwangau in the Bavarian Alps. Our plan was to return and spend three nights in Munich’s historic center exploring this on foot after returning our rental car.
Most know Saltzburg as the birthplace of Mozart. Others may remember the 1965 movie: “The Sound of Music” with Julia Andrews which was filmed in the region and based on local Maria von Trapp. To be honest, I never really knew the extent of how influential Austria once was until we saw a show depicting […]
On a few occasions we have had layovers at the Rome (Leonardo Da Vinci) airport as well as day stops with a cruise at the Port of Civitavecchia (also known as “Port of Rome”) giving us a few hours to spend in the area. With the city of Rome a good 1h+ drive from either […]
We got enticed by this Western Mediterranean 7-day cruise offered by MSC Cruises primarily because it visited a number of ports that we had not had the chance to visit before. The itinerary included Valencia and Ibiza in Spain, Cagliari in Sardinia, and Rome and Genoa in Italy. It would start and end in Marseille, […]
We found a cruise with an interesting Western Mediterranean itinerary which was doing a round trip from Marseille and pounced upon it. We had initially thought to board in Italy or Spain but found that it was actually easier and more economical to get a flight from Montreal to Paris. And from there simply take […]
We recently had a wonderful experience in France with their TGV (Très Grande Vitesse or Very High Speed) trains. We were planning a road trip from Paris encompassing Lyon, Avignon, and Carcassonne. It would be a 5-hour drive between Paris and Lyon, and almost 3 hours from Lyon to Avignon. Rental cars were also expensive, […]
We have done a number of trips to France such as Normandy and the Loire Valley, and we already suspect that we will be back again to see more of this beautiful country. There is much to see and it’s nice to be able to speak French too, even if they smile at our accent. […]
While we were quite happy to take the train for much of our recent trip through France’s Provence and Occitanie regions in the South of France, we opted to travel between Avignon and Carcassonne by car to see some of the historic sites along the way.