Theme Week La Rioja

26 January 2015 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Bon voyage, Theme Weeks Reading Time:  6 minutes

Autumn in La Rioja © flickr.com - Jesus Solana/cc-by-2.0

Autumn in La Rioja © flickr.com – Jesus Solana/cc-by-2.0

La Rioja is an autonomous community and a province in Spain, located in the north of the Iberian Peninsula. Its capital is Logroño. It covers part of the Ebro valley towards its north and the Iberian Range in the south. The community is a single province, so there is no County Council and it is organized into 174 municipalities.   read more…

Theme Week Champagne

10 January 2015 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Bon voyage, Bon appétit, Theme Weeks Reading Time:  6 minutes

© flickr.com - Phillip Capper/cc-by-2.0

© flickr.com – Phillip Capper/cc-by-2.0

Champagne-Ardenne is one of the 27 regions of France. It is located in the northeast of the country, bordering Belgium, and consists of four departments: Aube, Ardennes, Haute-Marne, and Marne. The region is famous for its sparkling white wine (champagne). Its rivers, most of which flow west, include the Seine, the Marne, and the Aisne. The Meuse flows north. The capital is Châlons-en-Champagne. The historical most important is city is Reims.   read more…

Theme Week Carinthia

22 December 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Bon voyage, Theme Weeks Reading Time:  4 minutes

Velden am Wörther See - Velden Palace © Johann Jaritz/cc-by-sa-3.0-at

Velden am Wörther See – Velden Palace © Johann Jaritz/cc-by-sa-3.0-at

Carinthia is the southernmost Austrian state or Land. Situated within the Eastern Alps it is noted for its mountains and lakes. The main language is German. Its regional dialects belong to the Southern Bavarian group. Carinthian Slovene dialects, which predominated in the southern part of the region up to the first half of the 20th century, are now spoken by a small minority. The capital city is Klagenfurt, which in Slovenian language is called Celovec.   read more…

Theme Week Lombardy

24 November 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Bon voyage, Theme Weeks Reading Time:  7 minutes

Villa Isola del Garda © Luca Capuccini

Villa Isola del Garda © Luca Capuccini

Lombardy is one of the 20 regions of Italy. The capital is Milan. A sixth of Italy’s population lives in Lombardy and about a fifth of Italy’s GDP is produced in the region, making it the most populous and richest region in the country. It is also the region with the most Unesco World Heritage Sites in Italy. Although Lombardy is often identified as merely an economic and industrial powerhouse, it has a rich and diverse cultural heritage. The many examples range from prehistory to the present day, through the Roman period and the Renaissance and can be found both in museums and churches that enrich cities and towns around the region. Lombardy contains numerous museums (over 330) of different types: ethnographic, historical, technical-scientific, artistic and naturalistic which testify to the historical-cultural and artistic development of the region.   read more…

Theme Week Hamburg, the gate to the world – Elbe suburbs

5 November 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, Bon voyage, Hamburg, Theme Weeks Reading Time:  10 minutes

Strandhotel © Staro1

Strandhotel © Staro1

The Elbvororte (Elbe suburbs) are located in the West of Hamburg with an increased density of wealthy inhabitants. The greatest and most of impressive collection of villa’s from 18th and 19th centuries are located here, as well as the headquarters of the oldest and most prestigious companies in the city. Like nowhere else in the city here you can experience and observe the typical Hamburg life philosophy. Besides the quarters described below there are Sülldorf, Klein Flottbek (home of the Derby Park hosting the Riders Tour and other international derby events), Groß Flottbek and Osdorf.   read more…

Theme Week Provence

20 October 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, French Riviera, Bon voyage, Theme Weeks Reading Time:  14 minutes

Moustiers Sainte Marie © Nepomuk

Moustiers Sainte Marie © Nepomuk

Provence is a geographical region and historical province of southeastern France, which extends from the left bank of the lower Rhône River on the west to the Italian border on the east, and is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea on the south. It largely corresponds with the modern administrative région of Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur, and includes the départements of Var, Bouches-du-Rhône, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence and parts of Alpes-Maritimes and Vaucluse. The Romans made the region into the first Roman province beyond the Alps and called it Provincia Romana, which evolved into the present name. It was ruled by the Counts of Provence from their capital in Aix-en-Provence until 1481, when it became a province of the Kings of France. While it has been part of France for more than five hundred years, it still retains a distinct cultural and linguistic identity, particularly in the interior of the region. The original Roman province was called Gallia Transalpina, then Gallia Narbonensis, or simply Provincia Nostra (‘Our Province’) or Provincia. It extended from the Alps to the Pyrenees and north to the Vaucluse, with its capital in Narbo Martius (present-day Narbonne). In the 1940s, Provence underwent a cultural renewal, with the founding of the Avignon Festival of theatre (1947), the reopening of the Cannes Film Festival (begun in 1939), and many other major events. With the building of new highways, particularly the Paris Marseille autoroute which opened in 1970, Provence became destination for mass tourism from all over Europe. Many Europeans, particularly from Britain, bought summer houses in Provence. The arrival of the TGV high-speed trains shortened the trip from Paris to Marseille to less than four hours. Most of Provence has a Mediterranean climate, characterised by hot, dry summers, mild winters, little snow, and abundant sunshine. Within Provence there are micro-climates and local variations, ranging from the Alpine climate inland from Nice to the continental climate in the northern Vaucluse. The winds of Provence are an important feature of the climate, particularly the mistral, a cold, dry wind which, especially in the winter, blows down the Rhône Valley to the Bouches-du-Rhône and the Var Departments, and often reaches over one hundred kilometres an hour.   read more…

Theme Week Lebanon – Baalbeck

24 September 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Bon voyage, Theme Weeks, UNESCO World Heritage, Union for the Mediterranean Reading Time:  9 minutes

© Baalbek Museum/cc-by-sa-3.0

© Baalbek Museum/cc-by-sa-3.0

Baalbeck is a town in the Beqaa Valley of Lebanon situated east of the Litani River. Known as Heliopolis during the period of Roman rule, it was one of the largest sanctuaries in the empire and contains some of the best preserved Roman ruins in Lebanon. The gods worshiped at the temple, the triad of Jupiter, Venus and Bacchus, were grafted onto the indigenous deities of Hadad, Atargatis and a young male god of fertility. Local influences are seen in the planning and layout of the temples, which vary from the classic Roman design.   read more…

Theme Week Abruzzo

22 September 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Bon voyage, Theme Weeks Reading Time:  10 minutes

Abruzzo map © Idéfix/cc-by-sa-3.0

Abruzzo map © Idéfix/cc-by-sa-3.0

Abruzzo is the northernmost region of Southern Italy, with an area of about 10,763 square kilometres (4,156 sq mi) and a population of about 1.3 million inhabitants. Its western border lies less than 50 miles (80 km) east of Rome. The region, divided into the provinces of L’Aquila, Teramo, Pescara and the Chieti, borders the region of Marche to the north, Lazio to the west and south-west, Molise to the south-east, and the Adriatic Sea to the east. Abruzzo is split into a mountainous area in the west with the Gran Sasso D’italia, and into a coastal area on the eastern side with the beaches of the Adriatic sea. Geographically it is more of a central than southern region, although ISTAT (the Italian statistical authority) considers it to be part of Southern Italy, as a vestige of Abruzzo’s historic association with the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies.   read more…

Theme Week Ulster – Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland

18 August 2014 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Bon voyage, Theme Weeks Reading Time:  7 minutes

Flight of the Earls sculpture in Rathmullan © geograph.org.uk - Willie Duffin/cc-by-sa-2.0

Flight of the Earls sculpture in Rathmullan © geograph.org.uk – Willie Duffin/cc-by-sa-2.0

Ulster (Irish: Cúige Uladh) is one of the provinces of Ireland, located in the north of the island. In ancient Ireland, it was one of the fifths (Irish: cúige) ruled by a rí ruirech, or “king of over-kings”. Northern Ireland is often referred to as ‘Ulster’, despite including only six of Ulster’s nine counties. This usage is most common amongst people in Northern Ireland who are unionist, although it is also used by the media throughout the United Kingdom.   read more…

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