A crowd of over 30 thousand people is cheering and waving flags. I’m right there in the middle of it overcome with unusual pride over the success of our team. I’ve never experienced something like this before. Then it strikes me: “How the heck did I end up here?” It was at last year’s Ski Jumping…
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My Lessons of 2015 in Other People’s Wise Words
Once again it’s the time of year when you can’t miss all the “2015 in retrospect” posts. Even Facebook is constantly nagging me to share my highlights of the last twelve months with everyone. Unfortunately I don’t post nearly enough selfies for Facebook to create a noteworthy recollection of enviable experiences. Neither are my attempts…
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Only in New Orleans: Second Line Parades
He said he was the oldest still active DJ in New Orleans. I’m not sure if he was fooling us or not. I don’t even know if that’s really what he said as I could barely hear him over the sound of loud bounce music. Combined with his thick southern accent and a couple of…
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Discovering true New Orleans on a Sunday bar crawl
The Uber driver drops us off in a quiet street of Central City on a sunny Sunday morning. If it was our first visit to New Orleans I would have second thoughts about walking alone in this neighborhood. But today we’re not walking, we’re visiting someone. A guy we’ve never met before. »Join French 75’s…
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Alternative guides to New Orleans
I bought my first guidebook some 20 years ago, at that time still unaware of the Lonely Planet series. With my husband-to-be we were planning to rough it in Ireland (i.e. to camp) so Rough Guide seemed to be the best fit. Later on the recognisable blue bible became our constant travel companion and curling…
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Bed & Breakfasts that deliver what hotels promise you
Have you ever read what hotels say about themselves on their websites? Sometimes I wonder if people writing those descriptions all use some secret thesaurus of “clever words and expressions for hotel marketers”. It seems as if they all combined a bunch of inspirational phrases at random to convey the unforgettable experiences guests can look forward to.…
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People I don’t want to sit next to on planes
I am not the most sociable person on earth. Presented with a choice of small talk with a total stranger and reading on my iPad I would push the ear buds further into my ears and pick the latter. Usually, this character flaw isn’t causing me any trouble. It only deteriorates a bit before a…
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Utrecht – Amsterdam’s cool little brother
I could name many highlights of our trip to Holland. Amsterdam was not one of them. Maybe I’m doing it injustice and it was only an unfortunate combination of events that led to my disappointment. From our early morning trek around the Nieuwmarkt district desperately tring to find a decent breakfast things took a turn…
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Camping challenges for dummies
Camping can be a great way to spend your holiday at one with nature, enjoying the great outdoors. If and only if you’ve grown up with it from your early childhood and never stopped practicing. If, however, you’re a complete novice or your last camping experience goes more than ten years back, you should brace…
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To camp or not to camp
It’s been almost a month since we’ve returned from our early summer holiday on Brač island. Since then all my social media newsfeeds have been full of pictures of beaches, sunsets and scantily clad people. This makes me even more determined to capitalise on the promise I made to myself (once again), that this summer…
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Travel-Sehnsucht 