Nimes - France

Nimes – France

Post published:13 May 2017
Post category:Europe France Western Europe

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The French Rome

It was the year 2011 when I first came to this city on my high school trip to France and Italy, and never returned. A very long time pending for a proper return to this beautiful city. Furthermore on this occasion visiting way much more than what our teachers and tour guide showed us, pretty much just the Arena and the Maison Carree and the walk in between. As of this occasion, I’ve planned a wider tour to include some of the most fascinating Roman remains not only in France but across the former Roman Empire with the Pont du Gard and the amphitheatre and theatre of Arles, among others scattered through both cities of Nimes and Arles, all of which listed by the UNESCO as World Heritage Sites.

A weekend in the city is a great decision when coming to overall timing, but only when including the Pont du Gard and the smaller city of Arles, both very near, otherwise both days for just the city and you will be overestimating. In the other hand, it comes us, who generally push it to the limits. We planned to do in one day what would normally be a program for an entire weekend, and spent the following day in the city of Montpellier. And why is that you might ask? Simple, we grabbed some bargain flights when having our inbound to Nimes and the outbound from Montpellier airport, then why not to take the chance and visit both now that we could?. After all, it worked really well as you can see in the following guides for Arles and Montpellier, with enough time to enjoy every sight.

When visiting the city, apart form its rich Roman history and remains, there is way much more to see than that. A very traditional French city, with beautiful boulevards and elegant Mediterranean style architecture everywhere. While the historic town core is small, entirely surrounded by tree-lines boulevards along what once were the city’s walls; outside this perimeter, in the newer 19th/20th centuries extensions especially west and south you will find some of the grandest residencies and mansions in the whole of Nimes.
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Mantua - Italy

Mantua and Sabbioneta – Italy

Post published:7 May 2017
Post category:Europe Italy Southern Europe

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Most important Renaissance city in Italy

Continuing with another great day in this very busy weekend visiting so many places in such a short time, we move towards both Mantua and Sabbioneta. One complimenting the other, and near each other, both inscribed by the UNESCO as World Heritage Sites for being exceptional testimonies to the urban, architectural and artistic realizations of the Renaissance, linked through the visions and actions of the ruling Gonzaga family. While Mantua is the extension and redesign of the pre-existing city, Sabbioneta highlights the creation of a new city following the most perfect lines of the Renaissance. In both, the large amount of historic churches, palaces and buildings lead to be the main artistic, cultural, and especially musical hubs of Northern Italy and the country as a whole.

Some further notes in history about famous people or facts, we can start with Mantua being the birthplace of Roman poet Virgil, where a square and statue honor his name, Piazza Virgiliana. Not only that composer Monteverdi premiered his opera L’Orfeo in mantua, it is overall, one of the most important centres in the history of opera. As last, for the Shakespeare’s lovers, Mantua is the city where Romeo banished in the play Romeo and Juliet.

Northern Italy, in the same way as is the south, offer countless cities and sights one after another, literally. Just a mere dozen of kilometres apart and you are in a different world. So as we landed in Verona as our perfect base, and enjoyed Vicenza and Padua the day before, one world famous for being pretty much the “birthplace” of neoclassical architecture, and the other containing the world’s first botanical garden dating from the 16th century; today we get to enjoy what arguably has been described as the birthplace of the Renaissance architecture and urbanism. And all of this not even an hour away from Verona’s downtown. (more…)

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Padua - Italy

Padua – Italy

Post published:6 May 2017
Post category:Europe Italy Southern Europe

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Home to the world’s first botanical gardens

On our second part of this day, after visiting the city of Vicenza, we complete it with Padua, really next door. It’s only 40 kilometres to the east of the former, just 17 minutes by train, a bit more by car or bus, but easy to manage without any rush in the same day. Vicenza is too small, and while Padua has a bigger historic town, it is also very compact and easy to navigate through in a nice sightseeing pace. Include here there is a sight that is not architecture nor monument; it’s a botanical garden. To be precise, the world’s first of its kind, and so beautiful and historic that it made its way to be listed an UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Padua is home to the second oldest university in Italy, founded in 1222, where Galileo Galilei was a lecturer in the 16th century. It’s also setting for most of Shakespeare’s play The Taming of the Shrew. And to complete with a further fact where this city has been showcased, there is the play by writer Oscar Wilde, The Duchess Of Padua. Much earlier in its history, the importance, development and power was such that during the 1st century BC it was the wealthiest city in the Italian peninsula only after Rome. Yet since the fall of the Roman Empire, the city succumbed to numerous invasions and rulings,periods of war, destruction and recovery. By when in 1866 it was annexed to Italy, it was the poorest region, only to be hit once again during WWI, WWII and through the fascist era.

So while you might expect from what was one of the important cities in Roman times some nice archaeological remains, scattered through the city, it’s not the case. A lot of of the classical and medieval fabric disappeared, however most of it has been rebuilt, together with the new fascist style buildings from the era; still, it’s an incredible beautiful and pleasant city to visit, and a strong tourist pole. After the fall of the fascist era, the city has boomed in every sense becoming once again one of the wealthiest in Italy. (more…)

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Vicenza - Italy

Vicenza – Italy

Post published:6 May 2017
Post category:Europe Italy Southern Europe

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The city of Palladio

Another return to Italy, and once again to the north just after few weeks since the last trip. Somehow, there is always somewhere else to go and visit, non-stop anywhere you go in Italy, and we are happy with every return. Also in few week’s time, there will be more Italian weekend trips to come! For now, let’s fly once again to Verona, but not for revisiting, instead for making it our base airport to reach Vicenza, Padua, Mantua and Sabbioneta. Sounds a lot for just 2 days, however, these are all small cities and visiting 2 each day worked perfectly.

Vicenza, same as all the other places we will visit this weekend, are inscribed by UNESCO as World Heritage Sites. No surprise! In the country with the most WHS in the world you are never far from one, and for people like us that on top of visiting as much of the world as we can, we are obsessed in being at the most WHS we can, this trips are tick after tick. I can hardly coop with creating the travel guides for every city and place we go yet I try my best, especially after receiving such a good feedback not only from my friends and colleges, but also from 3rd parties as hotels we stay, restaurants we go and other people we engage and we share it with.

Now back to the city, what’s the peculiarity then for being listed UNESCO, and ranking high among the tourists and tour operators who offer continuously day trips from Verona and Venice? Well, it really lies in the middle of both, barely 1 hour distance from any of them, but it’s architecture is the key. Do not expect here Roman ruins or impressive Venetian palaces, but instead, the finest neoclassical architecture of the whole of Italy. You can say such style was born here, and received a name, the Palladian architecture. Not because the resemblance to palaces and as such, palatial architecture; but for the name of its architect, Andrea Palladio. (more…)

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Crete - Greece

Crete – Greece

Post published:1 May 2017
Post category:Europe Greece Southern Europe

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Europe’s first advanced civilisation: The Minoan

Still with jet-lag after our trip to Ecuador, just 4 days after our return and here we go again on a plane, this time bound for another Greek island never been before: Crete. So long time wishing to come here but never found the perfect deal nor good flying times until now. And what’s best? It was a bank holiday on top, hence 3 full days to enjoy this beautiful island with countless to see and do. I’m still quite surprise about the great flight deal we got, being the way into Heraklion with British Airways. I strongly recommend you to keep checking from time to time to their offers, and if you are an executive club member and hold a good bunch of Avios, do not hesitate in using them to off-set the total cost of your flight. By doing this you will still ear Avios and tier points, and can reduce dramatically the cost as was in our case this time, much cheaper than a low-cost carrier.

It’s incredible how such a small piece of land, and island, to be home to the first advanced civilization of Europe, the Minoan, who lasted from 2700 to 1420 BC when they were taken over the Mycenaean civilization from mainland Greece. It’s with the Mycenaean that the oldest samples of writing in Greek language are found in the Knossos Palace. Then came the Archaic and Classical Period from the 6th century before Christ until the Roman rule. Thereafter is a constant period of war and continuous civilizations and rules taking over, from the double Byzantine periods, where in between Crete succumbed to the Arab rule form a century and a half, to the Venetians, the Ottoman, a state for few years before becoming a Greek province.

With such a long history and past, wherever you are in the island is full or archaeological remains, sights and historical sites. A weekend, or a long weekend as we had with 3 days in the island, was too short. Rarely we can say something like this especially when on an island, but this is the truth. We had to prioritise and crate a tour according to our time, scrapping on this occasion the whole east of the island. (more…)

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Sofia - Bulgaria

Sofia and Rila – Bulgaria

Post published:9 April 2017
Post category:Bulgaria Eastern Europe Europe

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Roman Ulpia Serdica, Greek Serdonpolis, Ottoman Sofya

Almost 6 years have passed since our first and only time in Sofia, and Bulgaria itself. A long time once again for a rather large and nice capital city, with a lot of changes for the better during this time in between. And of course, a great chance to revamp this once obsolete and not so detailed and descriptive guide for a proper up to date version. It’s interesting to see how little I was writing on the first guides when I started my travel blog, but I’m glad that I can also slowly rewrite them as we keep returning to many of these cities.

While Sofia could have been a very rich city in architecture, extremely elegant as Paris or Vienna, it suffered heavy destruction during WWII, and in 1977 further damages in the Vrancea earthquake (which epicentre was in Romania). Unfortunately, not everything was rebuilt as in other cities that suffered similar fates, however, many of these decaying buildings were not demolished, and as such becoming one of the key priorities in recent years restoring them, creating trendy areas and a good solid attractive for the tourism. Better and newer infrastructure, and definitely a great restoration and rebuilding program in the older parts of the city is the huge difference we can see now since the last time we’ve been.

The city itself is worth at least a 2 day visit. Planning any longer here might disappoint you as you will end up without anything further to do and see, and for heavy travellers used to city trips, a day is well enough. A weekend trip is the best decision; furthermore since the old town is very compact and not big, every sight is within walking distance to each other making of it an easy and not long walk without the need for taking any public transportation. There are just some sights on the outskirts as is the UNESCO World Heritage Site listed Boyana Church, where you will need to get onto a tram or a bus, but other than this the rest is great to enjoy on foot.

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Chisinau - Moldova

Chisinau and Tipova – Moldova

Post published:2 April 2017
Post category:Eastern Europe Europe Moldova

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Archaic Romanian chișla (source of water) and nouă (new)

Another new country in my list! 83 so far in total, and 46th out of 50 that form the European continent at the time of writing this guide. It’s always very exciting coming to places never been before especially if these are a different country, another culture to explore and looking forward to something new. Europe is getting too small and believe it or not, we are starting to run out of destinations. For sure on the main destinations there is pretty much nothing left not visited, but thankfully there are still way many other places… although again, with so many hundreds been, this is slowly becoming a challenge to find a flight or plan a reasonable route to reach these places.

Chisinau, the capital of Moldova is definitely by all means not the usual holiday destination to anyone. The country is one of these “forgotten” for the average traveller, one of the less visited with few venturing coming to discover. To us, however, it was a must in our list for quite some time now, yet not easy to reach until now with more flights available and more flexibility in the times. In any case, talking about flying times… we took off from London minutes before midnight to land in Chisinau right after 05.00am local time the following day, but well, not everything is going to be as easy as a cup of tea.

The country, to the surprise of anyone, is full with beautiful villages, medieval castles, monasteries and amazing nature. It might be small but it offers everything to whoever comes to visit, and won’t disappoint. But before I continue in here, let me tell you that this trip was not just for the sake of reaching its capital city and nothing else, but to also include 2 of the country’s highlights: the world’s largest wine cellar, Mileștii Mici; and the largest cave monastery in Eastern Europe, Tipova. Now with all this in mind, your trip will definitely be truly worth it!. (more…)

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Evora - Portugal

Evora – Portugal

Post published:26 March 2017
Post category:Europe Portugal Southern Europe

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Roman Liberalitas Julia

Our second objective for this weekend, the city of Evora after visiting the day before beautiful Elvas, the easternmost city along the border with Spain, and Badajoz right across the border, the first city in Spain. Now if we enjoyed a lot the experience and what we’ve visited the day before; here in Evora came as twice the surprise. Not only that both cities are off the beaten path of the minds of most of the tourists for what you get to enjoy these places to yourself; you get to see their nice people and traditions, inexpensive great food, history and art literally on every corner. Both cities are near each other, however very difference and oppose one to another. Elvas, a garrison frontier city with its immaculate network of fortresses, walls and bastions; Evora, home to some of the finest Roman monuments in the whole of Portugal, a monumental “museum city”. The only “minor” downside in our experience? well, quite an ugly grey and rainy day.

Its network of narrow streets, squares, palaces and buildings of many epoch and countless styles and the great level of preservation of the urban fabric all were a good reason why the UNESCO listed it as a World Heritage site. Moreover, since its foundation as a thriving city, to the many wars and posterior decline to then thrive again and so on, it is only recent its “rediscovery”, a city transforming and reinventing itself as an ever stronger tourist pole adding to the already long list of amazing cities to visit in Portugal.

Visiting every place and sight is straightforward because of a very compact urban core and overall reduced size. A day is well more than enough, giving you plenty of time to enjoy some coffee or beer time at any of the many bars and terraces, perhaps that delicious pastry and a great lunch all without any rush. Our time here was actually from the morning until late afternoon when we started to make our way back to Lisbon’s airport for our late departure back to London.
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