Roaming across Europe

Well, a little bit of it, anyway.

Five of us - three adults and two children - have stuffed our gear into a VW wagon and made our way from France to Germany, via Italy and Austria.

The highway system that links these countries is consistently excellent, though expensive in places.

At one of the toll stops, where we had pulled over to assemble the correct change for the booth, another car pulled up behind us and the driver got out to tap on our window.

He told our driver (who shall remain anonymous) that they had been wandering too close to the middle of the road, and perhaps we would all die in a fireball if this continued.

He politely made his point and went back to his vehicle. A far cry from the extended middle finger and cry of "get off the road ya fuckwit!" that I'd expect from Australians in similar circumstances.

Along the coast, Italy is mountainous and beautiful. There are endless villages strung out along the mountain ridges, with farms perched precariously on the slopes and huge greenhouses on every flat surface.

Then we turned inland, where it becomes rather monotonous. Flat and full of corn.

Our overnight stop was at the Garda Lake, which happens to be next to Italy's answer to Disneyland - Gardaland.

We didn't go there, but our hotel was clearly set up to cater for families that do. It had a massive buffet and some language-free entertainment for kids (magic and mime) after dinner.

The next day we continued towards Germany. The landscape became gorgeously mountainous again as we drifted through Austria.

{ Read More }

Viva la di'France

A French road and a French footpath are more or less the same thing.

One has mainly cars and the other mainly pedestrians, but that's mostly a matter of convenience and relative sizes.

After less than a week here, it's no longer a surprise when a Vespa jumps the curb beside me to overtake some jammed cars. And cars will also use the footpaths with aplomb, should the driver need to pick up some dry cleaning, or just stop for a chat about the cigar stink that clings to his jackets.

(This is true: today I watched the local dry cleaner enjoying a stogie in his doorway, smoke drifting back to hang around inside his shop.)

{ Read More }

Hobart to Nice

I'm on holiday. A long break overseas - landing in France, driving into Germany, then flying home via Thailand.

Getting here meant 30 hours in transit with a three year old. He did pretty well, though there's a certain level of exhausting paranoia necessary when you take an adventurous child through an international airport.

We spent a few hours in Dubai airport, which appears to be a massive duty free shop designed by someone with far too much money. 

This is a stone waterfall / fountain, next to the main elevator bank in the 'A' terminal. You can see the curving roof overhead - from outside, the whole building appears to be a tube lying in its side.

And outside it's over 40 degrees and muggy as hell. The minute it took to climb from the bus into the plane convinced me that I really didn't want to live there.

But we finally landed in Nice, which is a gorgeous French seaside city.

Nice used to be Italian and it still has that shabby-chic Italian feel to it. The buildings are all beautiful, painted in lovely colours, but perhaps they're about due for a new coat?

{ Read More }