21 February 2023 | Author/Destination: European Union / Europäische Union | Rubric: General , Palaces, Castles, Manors, Parks
Reading Time: 8 minutes
© Matthias Zepper/cc-by-sa-3.0
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The Royal Palace of Brussels is the official palace of the
King and Queen of the Belgians in the centre of the nation’s capital,
Brussels . However, it is not used as a royal residence, as the king and his family live in the
Royal Palace of Laeken in northern Brussels. The website of the Belgian Monarchy describes the function of the Royal Palace as follows:
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20 February 2023 | Author/Destination: European Union / Europäische Union | Rubric: General , Theme Weeks , UNESCO World Heritage
Reading Time: 8 minutes
Évora’s historic downtown © Bunks/cc-by-3.0
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Alentejo Region, a historical and cultural rich region, is one of the seven
NUTS 2 regions of Portugal . It covers all of the historical
Alentejo Province and part of the historical
Ribatejo and
Estremadura provinces . The the largest city and capital is
Évora .
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20 February 2023 | Author/Destination: North America / Nordamerika | Rubric: General
Reading Time: 7 minutes
© Patrick Pelster/cc-by-sa-3.0
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Cathedral City, colloquially known as “Cat City”, is a desert resort city in
Riverside County, California , United States, within the
Colorado Desert ‘s
Coachella Valley . Situated between
Palm Springs and
Rancho Mirage , the city has the second largest population, after
Indio , of the nine cities in the Coachella Valley. Its population was 51,493 at the
2020 census , a slight increase from 51,200 at the
2010 census .
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19 February 2023 | Author/Destination: North America / Nordamerika | Rubric: General , San Francisco Bay Area
Reading Time: 6 minutes
Filbert Street and Grant Avenue, looking towards Coit Tower © Goodshoped35110s
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Telegraph Hill (elev. 285 ft (87 m)) is a hill and surrounding neighborhood in
San Francisco ,
California . It is one of
San Francisco’s 44 hills, and one of its original “Seven Hills” . The
San Francisco Chronicle defines the
Chinatown ,
North Beach , and Telegraph Hill areas as bounded by Sacramento Street, Taylor Street, Bay Street, and the water. The neighborhood is bounded by Vallejo Street to the south, Sansome Street to the east, Francisco Street to the north and Powell Street and
Columbus Avenue to the west, where the northwestern corner of Telegraph Hill overlaps with the North Beach neighborhood.
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18 February 2023 | Author/Destination: North America / Nordamerika | Rubric: General
Reading Time: 7 minutes
© Richard Zietz/cc-by-sa-3.0
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The Thirteen Colonies, also known as the Thirteen British Colonies, the Thirteen American Colonies, or later as the
United Colonies , were a group of
British colonies on the Atlantic coast of
North America . Founded in the 17th and 18th centuries, they began fighting the
American Revolutionary War in April 1775 and formed the
United States of America by
declaring full independence in July 1776. Just prior to declaring independence, the Thirteen Colonies in their traditional groupings were: New England (
New Hampshire ;
Massachusetts ;
Rhode Island ;
Connecticut ); Middle (
New York ;
New Jersey ;
Pennsylvania ;
Delaware ); Southern (
Maryland ;
Virginia ;
North Carolina ;
South Carolina ; and
Georgia ). The Thirteen Colonies came to have very similar political, constitutional, and legal systems, dominated by
Protestant English-speakers. The first of these colonies was
Virginia Colony in 1607, a
Southern colony . While all these colonies needed to become economically viable, the founding of the
New England colonies , as well as the colonies of Maryland and Pennsylvania, were substantially motivated by their founders’ concerns related to the practice of religion. The other colonies were founded for business and economic expansion. The
Middle Colonies were established on an earlier Dutch colony,
New Netherland . All the Thirteen Colonies were part of
Britain’s possessions in the New World , which also included territory in
Canada ,
Florida , and the
Caribbean .
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17 February 2023 | Author/Destination: North America / Nordamerika | Rubric: General
Reading Time: 7 minutes
Deerpath Building and Theater, part of the Lake Forest Historic District © flickr.com – Teemu008/cc-by-sa-2.0
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Lake Forest is a city located in
Lake County, Illinois ,
United States . Per the
2020 census , the population was 19,367. The city is along the shore of
Lake Michigan , and is a part of the
Chicago metropolitan area and the
North Shore . Lake Forest was founded with
Lake Forest College and was laid out as a town in 1857, a stop for travelers making their way south to
Chicago . The Lake Forest City Hall, designed by
Charles Sumner Frost , was completed in 1898. It originally housed the fire department, the Lake Forest Library, and city offices.
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16 February 2023 | Author/Destination: European Union / Europäische Union | Rubric: General
Reading Time: 9 minutes
© Vignaccia76/cc-by-3.0
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San Casciano in Val di Pesa is a
comune (municipality) in the
Metropolitan City of Florence in the
Italian region
Tuscany , located about 15 kilometres (9 mi) southwest of
Florence . San Casciano in Val di Pesa borders the following municipalities;
Greve in Chianti ,
Impruneta ,
Montespertoli ,
Scandicci and
Tavarnelle Val di Pesa .
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15 February 2023 | Author/Destination: Russia / Russland | Rubric: General , Museums, Exhibitions
Reading Time: 7 minutes
© flickr.com – Dennis Jarvis/cc-by-sa-2.0
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The Kunstkamera (or Kunstkammer (
German for “Culture Room” (literally) or “Art Chamber”, typically used for a “
cabinet of curiosities “) is a
public museum located on the
Universitetskaya Embankment in
Saint Petersburg , facing the
Winter Palace . Its collection was first opened to the public at the
Summer Palace by
Peter the Great in 1714, making it Russia’s first museum. Enlarged by purchases from the
Dutch collectors
Albertus Seba and
Frederik Ruysch , the museum was moved to its present location in 1727. Having expanded to nearly 2,000,000 items, it is formally organized as the
Russian Academy of Science ‘s
Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography , abbreviated in Russian as the МАЭ or МАЭ РАН.
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14 February 2023 | Author/Destination: Australia / Australien | Rubric: General , Architecture
Reading Time: 9 minutes
Coober Pedy opal at the South Australian Museum © Bahudhara/cc-by-sa-3.0
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Coober Pedy is a town in northern
South Australia , 846 km (526 mi) north of
Adelaide on the
Stuart Highway . The town is sometimes referred to as the “opal capital of the world” because of the quantity of precious
opals that are mined there. Coober Pedy is renowned for its below-ground dwellings, called “
dugouts “, which are built in this fashion due to the scorching daytime heat. The name “Coober Pedy” is thought to derive from the
Aboriginal term
kupa-piti , which means “whitefellas’ hole”, but in 1975 the local
Aboriginal people of the town adopted the name
Umoona , which means “long life” and is also their name for the
mulga tree . In the
2016 Australian census , there were 1,762 people in Coober Pedy.
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