Have to agree Krakow is an amazing place, and you can get out of it exactly what you want. Relaxing break, historical break, shopping trip or the usual type of stag trip. Local were brilliant, and the main square was fantastic. Have to say Berlin is also amazing. The most amazing thing though was walking through a random park, just like Hyde Park or similar, and spotting naked germans everywhere sunbathing, playing ball or having a BBQ!! Also Swindon.... ha ha!!
I have been to Budapest several times and thoroughly recommend it. The thermal public baths near Heroes Square (also worth a look) are superb and consist of three outdoor pools at different temperatures plus the whole area is surrounded by an ampitheatre containing all sorts of spa treatments and water features, steam rooms, jacuzzis saunas etc. Worth a day in my book and really easy to get to as the yellow metro line stops at Heroes Square (I think the station is Oktogon but it is pretty easy to find). The Museum of Terror is worth a visit IF you have an interest in the grim period around the war in Hungary with both Nazi and communist occupation. Is is also on the Yellow Line (Opera station I think). Out of town you have the Momento Park where a number of huge communist statues and artworks have been moved to. You can also cruise on the Danube. The castle area on the Buda side of the river is worth a day as you have the Castle which also holds the National Gallery and the Cathedral and the National Military Museum is there. Margarit island is is the middle of the river and is a nice quiet green place. There are lots of good restaurants at reasonable prices - best bet is to ask at the hotel. There is an excellent steakhouse at the top of the Mamut (Mammoth) Shopping Centre. If you go I would recommened buying books of 10 tickets for the metro as they are much cheaper that way and represent better value than the day passes. It is not as developed as other Western cities, more like Prague 20 years ago.
Not Sofia, but I did visit Nesebar on the Black Sea coast two years ago. Unfortunately close to Sunny Beach, which makes Benidorm look like legoland Nesebar old town itself, on a peninsula, is superb. The modern part is not bad, either and you can get regular buses north to Varna or south to Burgas, both well worth a look. I know this doesn't address your Sofia enquiry, but as a country, I found Bulgaria charming, affordable and very friendly - now they've shaken off the shackles of being communist Russia's major holiday destination Inland has majestic scenery and excellent birdwatching, not to mention vast amounts of perfectly quaffable wine Nazdravé!
Brilliant, Norfolkbhoy I had my heart set on a trip to Dubrovnik this spring - until I read your Budapest report. Now I'm all in a quandry again
Dubrovnik is lovely Cromer and reasonably compact too so is great for a long weekend. Nice is nice (excuse the pun) as is the whole Cote D'Azur and again is great for a long weekend visit. I did an aviation spotting trip to Japan a few years ago - the people are fantastic, the food good and the place super efficient. I flew from Sapporo to Osaka via ANA and the aircraft was 5 minutes late and they apologised profusely for the inconvenience this had caused. Tokyo is a very exciting place - I'd like to go back to Japan as I found it a very friendly place to visit.
Cheers for the feedback! I'm mildly concerned that if we go to Bulgaria I'll have to pretend to be cultured because there won't be much else to do, but maybe for a week or something it would be nice!
I'd day there's quite a contrast between the two, there are no beaches in Budapest to start with. I personally absolutely loved Dubrovnik, the old walled city is simply beautiful with some cracking restaurants hidden down the little alleyways and then we spent ten days or so on a couple of the islands just off the coast - Lopud and Kolocep - which were amazing, and the weather was out of this world for our entire time out there. The women weren't too shabby to gawp at either
Nobody has mentioned Valencia yet - Spain's third city has good beaches and the city of arts and science built on the dry river ben of the city is an amazing piece of architecture - look it up on the net. It is supposed to represent a whale skeleton. The city hosts an excellent aquarium a modern style zoo good food, friendly locals, not too many other Brits annoying the locals. It has an imressive cathedral and the city centre is old, pleasant and has a couple of nice squares. Public transport is excellent, cheap and dead easy to use. Contrary to an earlier post I really liked Vienna - the Summer Palace (Schonbrum) is worth a visit - huge and impressive with a zoo, a maze and a large folly in the grounds. It has fantastic gardens. The winter papalce and cathedral are also worth a visit. The city is polite and friendly and they have an excellent music and food festival outside the Rathuas during the summer. They either have live performances or videos of all different kinds of music and then a load of world food and beer/wine concessions so if you go you can eat Chinese to start and have Croatian dumplings to finish whilst drinking local wine. It is packed every night with locals and free (other than what you eat and drink obviously). Berlin is brilliant. Absolutely loads to see and do. If palaces are your thing Potsdam and Charlottenberg are excellent and Museum Island has the Alte, Neure and Pergammon Museums. If you only do one make it the Pergammon which is basically built to house whole structures taken from Greece/Rome/Turkey and has a room which is a greek temple, another which is a Roman city entrance and another which is one of the gates and part of the city wall from Babylon. I cannot recommend it highly enough. Food and transport are both good. I found Checkpoint Charlie to be a bit uninspiring. Paris is obviously brilliant, nice and compact and easy to get to. Bruges is quiet and charming and has superb beer, chips and waffles (so not a good place to go and diet). I liked Bremen (quiet) and Hamburg (lively). In the US New York is tremendous - go to the met as seen in Night at the Museum, San Fran is somewhere a European would feel at home and has a nice vibe to it, LA did little for me and Vegas is an adult playground - if you like that sort of thing you will not be disappointed but it is not exactly the height of restraint or culture! i haven't spent too much time in Australia but I would take Melbourne over Sydney but both are good. I loved South Africe and managed not to get shot by any ex-olympians which was a bonus. Rajistan is worth a trip if you are in india - Jaipur (the pink city) and Jodpur and both full of history and the palace from Octopussy (name escapes me) is also in Rajistan. Delhi has lots of interesting buildings and Agra is worth going to see the Taj Mahal and the White Palace. I wouldn't bother with Mumbai. Forgot to mention Rio is fun and spookily like as seen in the pixar cartoon. If you are in S America the Iguassa Falls are massive and make either Niagra or Vic falls look like leaky taps. BA is worth a short visit for the steaks and red wine and the area around the Boca ground is interesting but I wouldn't rush back. The people are much more friendly than you may imagine but they are generally pretty chippy about the Falklands so best not bring it up. for some reason the coffeee I had in Argentina was universally poor whereas in Brazil generally excellent. you could honestly tell which side of the border you were from the quality of coffee. Agree with concensus about Egypt - pyramids awesome, sphynix disappointing. Cairo museum brilliant but take out King Tut's items and not a patch on the British museum. Luxor worth a visit for the temples and valley of the kings. Not travelled much in Italy but Pompei and Herculaneum hugely impressive. Food in sorrento as good as you would imagine. I'm off to Lisbon later this year with young family so any recommendations would be appreciated.
As many have said - great thread. Always good to pick up recommendations and add places to the (never-shortening) list of places I've got to get to. I'll stand in line with the others queueing up to wax lyrical about Italy. Despite the above-said list of new places, we keep going back to this country every few years. Agree with the shout-outs for Florence and Siena. Pretty much the whole of Tuscany is worth seeing, and the general standard (not just from top-end places) of food and wine are unbelievable. I'd also suggest visiting some of the hill-top towns in the area as well - Volterra and San Giminagno for preference. It's not the most expensive place in the world to do a fly-drive and keeping to the country roads intead of the motorways it's a really great way to see eveything. Agree that Rome is out of this world. Go for a week and you won't come near to seeing everything there is. (Which is a great excuse to go back). Southern Italy? Meh. Naples is one of the worst places I've ever been to. If you want to see Pompeii, Sorrento, the Amalfi Coast etc (which are all worth it imo), then fly to Naples, get the hell out of there on day one and stay elsewhere for the duration. The gods-blessed island of Rhodes. Ignore Falaraki with its nightclubs, waterpark and yoof-culture shennanigans and get yourself down the coast to Lindos. Best place I've ever been for a relaxing break. There's naff-all to do there, but it's a great place for doing naff-all (apart from eating, drinking and catching up on your tan and your reading). Definitely go along with the emphasis on Egypt. It is a fascinating place, both ancient and modern. The weight of millenia comes as almost a physical shock when you're confronted with the pyramids at Giza and Saqquara or the temples of Kharnak and Luxor. You expect to be blase about them becuase you've seen so much of them on film and tv, but nothing prepares you for the reality. And the Egyptian people are by far the friendliest I've ever met. (I only hope their country settles down so they can get the tourists back in proper numbers). My no.1 life experience so far has got to be lounging on the deck of a small Nile cruise boat, sipping a beer as some of the most unchanged riverside scenes in history slide past, with the sun setting and the call to mosque floating out over the water... ...I want to go back right now as I'm typing this... If there's one piece of advice I could give about travel abroad, it's just to embrace the experience as much as you're able to. Talk to the locals. (A lot of people around the world speak English, and even if they don't it's amazing how far you can get with a phrasebook and the willingness to try, no matter how foolish you might feel at times). Eat where the locals eat. Try what they're eating. Buy the house wine, as it seems to be only in England where that's a bad option. (Except for Egypt, DO NOT DRINK THE WINE THERE ) Go by public transport. Walk around and see stuff. As long as it's a "safe" country (and that's always relative), get away from the herd and sample some of the less-travelled paths. There's a lot out there that's worth experiencing. Try not to wait until "later on sometime" to do it. Oh, and very briefly - don't forget your own country. Plenty of places to visit in the UK and holiday cottage lets are a fab way to do it. Sling cases in back of car and drive to destination. Airports, flights, transfers etc not required. I've waffled on far too much. Getting my coat now..
Have to agree with Worf on this - a lot of my best experiences have been by chatting with locals and finding out where they eat, what they eat and where they go. They are good savings to be made from eating slightly off the beaten track - In Prague three stops on the tram quarters the price of a beer in Wenclessness Square and there is an amazing lido at the end of one of the tram lines made more entertaining as very few people speak english there as it is way off the beaten track. I've also had the philosophy that if you are friendly and respectful of local customs 99.9% of people you meet are fundamentally decent and will help you if they can. Travel for me is the great advance that my generation has made and for all of the brickbats they receive I know that I would not have made it to half as many places in Europe had Ryanair and Easyjet not made flying cheap in the 90's.
Agree with many of the suggestions on here. If you liked the pyramids then you must visit Petra. Nothing can beat the Indiana jones moment of going for nearly a mile through an incredibly narrow cut in the mountains to see the Treasury building. And once you are there the amount to see is just amazing - particularly recommend climbing to the Monastir facade. however if you go to Jordan give Aqaba a miss. Drove into town with visions of Peter O'toole in Lawrence of Arabia - first thing i saw was a Coronation St Theme Bar. Many years ago I worked in Brunei. I made friends with local Ibans and used to travel right into the heart of the rainforest to visit their family long houses. Drunk more tuak than is good for anyone. Well away from the tourist trails and totally authentic. If you do go to Sarawak the Mulu National Park is a must. Standing outside a cave as 3 million fruit bats fly overhead is an incredible experience. Also worth continuing into Sabah and climbing Mt Kinabulu. Doable in two days and walking from rainforest to bare mountain top is a great experience. After the climb go to Poring to relax in the hot springs there. Also worth seeing the Orang Utans. Finally a long weekend in Istanbul is fantastic. Blue Mosque, Topkapi Museum, Grand Bazaar, Spive Market, Hag Sophia are all things you should experience before you die. Also spent 5 years in Saudi Arabia for my sins. Hard to visit, unless you are a Muslim pilgrim, but the desert, particularly the empty quarter, is fascinating. Spent some time at the oil plant there that is shown in the trailer for the BBC series Wild Arabia.
Plus in 3 weeks time (15th - 19th March) they hold possibly the wildest, wackiest of all Spanish fiestas, Fallas de san José. I've been three times now, and it's f**king mental Huge papier maché and wooden sculptures are built on virtually every street corner in the entire province, judged for artistic value (and caricature content!) before being systematically burnt, one by one, until the winner in each town or village, the falla major, I think, is the last to go. By this time the entire population of the town is gathered in the main plaza and there is much weeping and gnashing of teeth as millions of pestas/euros literally go up in smoke. Add to that hours of music, firecrackers and organised firework displays every night plus a solemn procession to present flowers to the Virgin Mary by the cathedral - trust me, you need a week to get over it Check the wiki link : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falles
yep big up to germany. berlin, munich, cologne, nuremburg all very cool. the Koln Dom, yes maestro it's rather large - i think i had a minor fear of heights going up it!
Forgot Istanbul - well worth a visit. Agree with Fleck, Topaki museum particularly good and I recommend one night having dinner in one of the roof top restaurants overlooking the Blue Mosque as the sun sets. Pretty impressive.
Agreed, Norfolkbhoy. The only reason I went to Santiago de Compostela, Alghero (Sardinia), Provence and Lake Garda was not because they were on a 'to do' list, but because Ryanair added them as new destinations. And I've adored each and every one of them!
Never been to Valencia but it sounds interesting and a place I'm putting down as a place to visit. Not a great fan of Spain to be honest - I think Barcelona is over-rated and riddled with criminals, Madrid is ok but not as nice as many of the European capitals such as Paris, Rome, Amsterdam, Lisbon, etc. However, I do recommend both La Corunna which is very ornate and friendly and especially Bilbao which I found fascinating - the Guggenheim Museum is an architectural masterpiece (if you like modern architecture) and some of the older buildings are good, especially the old art-deco railway station.
Amen to that. It's more expensive to get around now than it was then unfortunately. Had some cracking holidays we probably couldn't afford now. Anybody know much about China? Have always fancied a trip there - a rail journey and/or a boat down the Yangtse River look appealing.
OCF, I don't know if you were tempted to have a look at Segovia or Toledo while in Madrid? I got a ten day flight to Madrid, hung out there for 4, train north to Segovia - of aquaduct and flying gothic buttress fame, then back via Madrid and train south to Toledo. Three provincial capitals in just over a week and all brilliant for totally differing reasons I guess that's easy when you travel alone, as I tend to do, no arguments or debates about where to go or what to see. Make it up as you go along.
Valencia is nothing like Barcelona which I found to be a bit touristy and too busy for my taste. I know it is sacreligious but I was underwhelmed by the Camp Nou and thought it was pretty run down when compared to many English grounds. Agree with comments about criminals as well - lots of pickpockets around the station.
