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Back to your question about Europe.
One thing that I will always remember is the return trip from Italy, as we approached Milan, I could see the snow capped Alps in the distance. It reminded me of the scene from the film, Von Ryan's Express, with Frank Sinatra and Trevor Howard, where the escaped prisoners cheered as their train approached Milan and they saw the snow capped Alps.
Running a portable miniature railway (www.crtc.org.uk) and building the equipment that goes with it.
Europe!
First trip was to grand burstin hotel in Folkestone with trips to Canterbury and full day trip to Brugge in Belgium by cross channel ferry.
Hotel, large with bad reputation. Check trip advisor!!!! It had an A wing, B wing, C wing. My first thought, hotel or prison?
Day trip to Brugge. Short trip to Dover, 45 min wait for ferry, 1h 30m trip across channel, 1h 30m by road to Brugge. 2h in Brugge. Then back again. Including long wait at passport control in Calais. And we saw the Calais 'jungle' with migrants from the motorway. Knackered from all the travelling in one day.
Second Belgium trip I did was for 5 days and stayed in Ostend at Royal Astor hotel. Again trip to Brugge only 40min to get there. And trip to Dutch town of Sluice.
Third Belgium trip for 7 days. Visits to Brugge, Ghent, Antwerp, Brussels.
Germain visit was to Rhineland, nice family hotel, a converted convert, trips to Koblenz, limberg and boat trip on Rhine and a couple of other towns. I got pick pocketed on this trip. My fault
Italian trip 7 days, with overnight stays at French hotel, with organised trips to Florence, Rome and Pisa. Hotel in tourist town of montecatini termi. Hotel Byron. A nice touch was that with key card they gave a paper slip with hotel name, address, Tel number and email. In case we got lost.
Italy was sunny and beautiful in late April temp in mid 20s c. England was rain and around 8c at home.
Visited Lynton and Lynmouth with mum and dad in 1971. Big memories of that trip... going through Cheddar Gorge on the way, then driving up Porlock Hill! Do they still have the cliff railway at Lynmouth, which takes you up to Lynton (or vice-versa of course!)?
I could go on for hours. But that would indicate an autistic self involved person. ( Which I am BTW).
Anyway, going back to 2013, my sister and her husband invited me to join them on their new year holiday on the isle of Wight. That was my first experience of an organised coach trip and staying in hotels. And first ferry trip from Portsmouth to Cowes.
That was a good hotel experience. The Royal esplanade hotel in Ryde. The hotel manager came onto the coach and explained to everyone the meal times etc and welcomed us. I learnt about checking in, checking out, leaving keys at reception when leaving the hotel and why. Keys had massive brass label attached to them. In fact our coach party were the only guests staying in this budget hotel.
Two of you are familiar with Devon.
First trip to Devon was to a hotel in Torquay. The Tor park hotel. We had organised trips to Totnes, Dartmouth, Buckfast abbey. brixham and Plymouth. Have photos of all. Coach driver was very talkative giving us history of places and some very bad jokes!!!
Second trip to Devon was to the other side, lynton, just above the famous flooded village of lynmouth(1952) and we had organised & memorable trips to Minehead, Ilfracombe and Barnstaple.
I met some interesting people who lived near me at different times and learnt facts such why a church in Guisely near me has new stocks. Turns out that the old historic one's were stolen.
Will post a few photos later.
I miss the Devon I knew then, in the early '70s. Then, Totnes was still a traditional Devon market town, full of native Devonians and native character. Now, it's like a cross between Richmond-upon-Thames and Glastonbury - full of rich hippies. The village we lived in was mentioned in the Domesday Book, and had families living in it who went back many generations - including to the middle ages. Now, virtually all of them have gone - displaced largely by Londoners. It's an enclave of the ultra-wealthy. It's very sad, but it happens everywhere, I'm afraid.
Did you? I used to live in Devon...I miss it
If you say Kent, I'll be surprised. It's a very strange place. People are generally quite insular and not very friendly. Maybe that's why it kind of suits me - not that I'm insular in other ways. Judging by some of the attitudes I've heard on the streets and read in the local papers over the years, people are pretty reactionary.
Where did you visit in South Devon? I used to live near Totnes.
I don't know if this counts as a hobby.
Travelling on coach holidays and exploring new places, this fits in with my photography hobby.
At one time I was terrified to travel on these type of trips. I didn't know how to behave in hotels or how to cope with travelling with complete strangers or how I would cope with my lack of foreign languages
Then I did thirteen trips in one year. And I realised that this could be considered obsessive behaviour.
My trips in 2015 were.
I got to see a lot of countryside, different cities, met many interesting people. Enough hotel experience for a lifetime. Went by Eurostar twice. Ferries 12 times.
It's a nice hobby but expensive.
there are many things that i would like to do...but don't often have the opportunity to practice. I love walking in the countryside, nature, literature, philosophy, psychology, science, technology, history...
i love jazz and would love to visit the theatre more, see an opera, farm a small croft, teach more, give more, be more....
more of what...you may ask....be more of me!! - lol
My hobbies are things I've pretty much had for life. Writing (primarily), reading, some kind of creative work (image editing has opened up the world for me!). I was a runner for over 30 years, but got sick of getting age-related injuries - especially Achilles tendonitis. I swim and cycle a lot instead now - though I've done both of those for years, too.
I did martial arts for a few years (Bujinkai karate) because I was interested in the spiritual side of the discipline as much as being able to learn how to defend myself. I applied myself rigorously, reaching blue belt (7th kyu - three below 1st Dan black belt), but I never really had a natural aptitude for it. Kata (learning a routine sequence of moves for each grade) is integral to the practice, and I used to love practicing kata because it is practiced alone, in one's own space, and is about the individual learning mastery over his or her body. I was less keen on sparring. Despite what I'd learned, my technique always fell apart during sparring. I simply couldn't co-ordinate, or anticipate what was coming at me in order to counter it. Maybe a body language issue. I also couldn't maintain eye contact with my sparring partner, which is also not good. In the end, I gave up following my blue belt grading because it was so physically gruelling. I don't mean the exercise itself, but the fact that I picked up some severe body bruising and a couple of cracked ribs which left me in agony for days. Unfortunately, with any martial art, you get an element that's more in it for the macho thing. Some of the black belts clearly enjoyed being able to show off their skills in aggressive combat. They loved the blood and bruises. They often used to walk home from the dojo afterwards still wearing their gis, just posing. But this isn't really in the true spirit of the discipline. It probably varies from one group to another. If you go into it for the right reasons, and with a Cain-like degree of open-mindedness and humility, you'll probably find it hugely rewarding. It's certainly a great way to develop spiritually (if you're that way inclined) and physically. It pushes you to all of your limits.
Well, suppose it's quite good - Deutsch ist meine Muttersprache :)
Norway is good so far, people don't usually ask how you are as a way of saying hello (and nothing else). They may ask it, but it's a question and you are allowed to give an answer. Maybe that's not the most important thing in the world, but it makes me feel a little more relaxed.
I don't use an app for geocaching (have got a GPS thingy) but I know others who do and the one they use is for free. It's called c:geo.
How funny, du kannst natürlich auch gerne auf Deutsch schreiben ;-)
And I'm learning Norwegian too - perhaps not exactly a language you need as a tourist, given that there are only a bit over 5 million people speaking it and most of them also speak English really well, but I live here now, so that makes it kind of important.
I like making things nobody really needs - cards, wood stuff, vases from broken lab glassware, amigurumis and other crochet/knitting, funny geocache containers... If you have thought about trying geocaching then you should simply give it a go! Start with something easy, and somewhere quiet because it will take you a while to find even quite easy ones in the beginning and you start feeling suspicious pretty quickly when there are people walking past all the time. It's great fun and a hobby that probably attracts a higher percentage of people with Aspie traits than there are in the general population. Until I tried it I thought I don't like any trainspotting sort of thing - well, changed my mind about that. I find it a great way of exploring interesting areas I would not find otherwise and to have a purpose when going out on my own (which I would otherwise do a lot less).
