2008 - in retrospect
2008 started with a visit to Basel for the Fasnacht celebrations. Often known in Basel as "the three wonderful days" Basler Fasnacht is the most important date in the Basel festival calendar and
one of the most popular celebrations in Switzerland. Indulging
ourselves in Switzerlands tradition of Fasnacht celebrations,
we also went to Liestal
for Chienbäse in which a procession of fire is held
in the Old Town of the city.
Over the years (since well before this site ever went online) I've travelled to most of the major tourist destinations of Switzerland. It was, therefore, a most pleasant experience to head out to the Kartause Ittingen - a former Carthusian Charterhouse in near Frauenfeld in Canton Thurgau. I don't think that the Charterhouse is especially well known outside Switzerland and we only found out about it recently.
Our
first trip outside Switzerland was to Ladbergen
and Münster in North-Rhine Westfalia in Germany. We'd
never been to either place before so it was quite nice to start
off with somewhere new. We had some personal business to attend
to in Ladbergen, which is a smallish affair but played a role
during The Thirty Years War when many troops were stationed
there. We were informed that many of the houses with wooden
beams on the exteriors were present during this period and
were used to house troops and horses. We spent overnight in
Múnster which also played a critical role and one of
the two treaties which together are known as the Peace of Westphalia
which ended The Thirty Years War was signed here - the two
treaties are known as The Treaty of Münster and The Treaty
of Osnabruck, Osnabruck being close by.
We
made our first trip of the year to Brussels
in March. We flew into Brussels airport on the Saturday
morning and spent half a day in Brussels itself before heading
down to Luxembourg. I'd not been to Luxembourg for the thick
end of 20 years, so was kinda looking forward to spending a
bit of time there. I had remembered Luxembourg as being a small
city and, in that at least, my memories were confirmed. Sadly,
the weather didn't play ball and we spent the Sunday darting
in and out of the rain which, literally, put a bit of a dampner
on proceedings. We had planned to head to Brussels again this
year but events got in the way so this was our only visit to
either Belgium or Luxembourg this year.
Over
the Easter weekend, we
visited Milan, Turin and La
Venaria Reale. We found out about an exhbition about the
House of Savoy the Palazzo in the print edition of the Financial
Times which provided the impetus for the whole trip. We'd
never been to Turin or La Venaria Reale before so a long weekend
with an exhibition on was a good oppurtunity to visit. We later
also found out that some of the works of Canova would be exhibited
at the Palazzo Reale in Milan as part of a cultural exchange
with the Hermitage
Museum in St Petersburg which is one reason why we decided
to stop overnight in Milan - apart from it being handily half-wayish
and en-route!
In
April, we made a day
trip to Aproz in Canton Valais for the Cow Fights or Combat
des Reines as they're known locally. This was probably one
of the more unusual trips we made this year - well it was unusual
for us anyway. We've never been to a cow fight before and this
is nothing like the Bullfight I'd seen in Seville several years
ago. It was much, much more sedate. The cows naturally fight
each other for supremacy in the herd and to establish the social
order. The don't need encouraging - some prick each other,
others lock horns while yet more simply eyeball each other
and one simply submits. Either way, it's a rivetting day out
for city boys wondering if testosterone is a financial-services
only thing. (BTW, it isn't.)
Over
the summer, we went to Italy
for a week. Our trip included a day in Milan for
the second time
this year. We spent a couple of days
in Florence which included a most enjoyable meal at the Osteria
Caffe Italiano. No trip to Florence is complete without
a visit to the Duomo and Bapistry - both of which are splendid
pieces of Renaissance architecture. We also made our first trip
to Pisa to see the world famous UNESCO
listed Leaning Tower of Pisa. Several days in Rome is
always a welcome experience and this trip was no exception.
We revisited the Vatican Museums which are hugely impressive
and an absolute must see - especially if this is your first
visit to Rome as they
include the ornate Raphael Rooms and the world famous Sistine
Chapel. A trip through Italy is
always enjoyable and this was certainly a highlight of the
year. An excellent line of historical monuments, most UNESCO
listed, good food, better wine, even better joie-de-vivre all
join into this smelting pot to give us the great thing we now
know as "Italy." Irreplacable.
The weekend trip to the Dachau
concentration camp and to the Bavarian town of Füssen was
a fairly schizophrenic affair. Dachau, I found, was a throughly
emotional affair for all the wrong reasons of history which
I don't want to dwell on here on these pages. Füssen,
on the other hand, the following day, no less, was a much more
joyful affair with a splendid old town, an enjoyable lunch,
a beautiful castle with splendid views over the old town and
an unexpected medieval festival to boot. To be honest, I'm
not sure I would have designed a trip like this from scratch
- but after the traumas of Dachau, a visit to a beautiful old
town we'd visited some years ago, and to stumble across a medieval
festival was just the fillip an otherwise depressed person
needed.
Our day
trip to Ulm was a fairly last minute affair and one which
came about as the Ulmer Münster shares the same master
mason as the Bernese
Münster - a building of which I am enormous fan. The
Cathedral lacks the austerity of many other Gothic constructions
and is a splendid example of the German-Gothic style of architecture
and boasts the worlds tallest spire at a whopping 161 meters
in height! The Münster does, however, boast the pointed
arching and ribbing typical of the Gothic style and wonderful
fresco before the choir.
If one trip to Italy per year isn't enough, we felt compelling to make another visit to Rome for a weekend. This time to see the "Casa Augusto" - the House of Augustus - on the Palatine Hill of Rome. Which was an absolute joy. That it was possible at all to restore the frescoes of this 2,000 year old monument is remarkable, let alone ensure that it is safe enough for the public to enter.
For
our penumlimate trip of the year, we had a driving weekend
to Salzburg. We stopped in Bregenz en
route in atrocious weather and were pleased to find the comfortable Hotel
Weisses Kreuz, right off the street, which also had a very
enjoyable restaurant with a selection of splendid Austrian
wines. Salzburg is
one of the most beautiful and, consequently, one of the most
popular tourist destinations in Europe. And
justifiably so. The Old Town and the views from the mountain-top
castle are the stuff picture-postcards are made of. Sadly,
this also means it's straight-forward to encounter a "Leicester
Sqaure Experience" - but at least it'll be in somewhere
beautiful.
For
the final trip of the year we headed up to the Alsatian town
of Strasbourg
for the Christmas market which, I'm totally honest, was
something of a disappointment. The town itself was beautiful,
the Cathedral in particular, and a joy to walk around. But
for all the huff-and-puff of the Frenchies about fresh, local
produce being available at the multitude of markets they offer
- we found pitifully small amounts of it here. We were informed
that we likely missed the main chunk of the market - but we
couldn't find it even with the numerous signs. Given the tat-to-local
ratio of the market we did see, one wonders how much tat they
needed to fill the rest that bit.