Blogs from Vaduz, Liechtenstein, Europe - page 2

In my years of wandering the planet, I have had the opportunity to visit kingdoms, constitutional and otherwise, as well as the odd emirate and sultanate. But I had never been to a principality until I set foot in teeny-tiny Liechtenstein a couple days ago. When I was in elementary school, I stumbled on a book about the micro-states of Europe – Andorra, San Marino, Monaco, the Vatican City, and, of course, Liechtenstein (Luxembourg, although on the small side, is a giant in comparison to these guys, so was not included) – and I was entranced, sparking an early interest in such compact political entities. How can such a country exist in this day and age? How can it sustain itself as a distinct unit in this globalizing world? My travels have taken me to some ... read more

Friday 26.2.2010 day 136 Liechtenstein To drive to Liechtenstein, to get there we had to drive from Germany though Switzerland and Austria. So we drove though 4 countries today! Liechtenstein borders Austria on one side and Switzerland on the other were the Rhine is there border. It is in a valley with the Swiss and Austrian alps towering over it. I think that it would be a very hard country to defend. It disbanded it army in 1866 after a military engagement were non of it’s 80 soldiers were killed infract 81 returned including a new Italian ‘friend’. It is the 6th smallest country in the world. It is 25km long and 6km wide. Its head of state is Prince Hans-Adam II and he is said to be worth about uk £3.3 billion. At one point ... read more

Four countries, two days, more walking than you can imagine. It's a beautiful thing. Monday morning, Libor and I were at the train station at the ungodly hour of 5:30am to catch our train at 5:45. At about 10 we pulled into Salzburg, though we were late in catching our connecting train since we weren't travelling with ÖBB , but die Deutsche Bahn. Let us be a little prejudiced, ok? We've lived in Austria for almost 6 months now, of course there's animosity between us and Germany :) Anyways, after waiting a half-hour in Salzburg, we boarded the train, took a small ride through Germany, went through Innsbruck, and at about 3:30 on Monday afternoon arrived in Feldkirch, one of the western-most cities in Austria, which only took us about 10 hours to get to. For ... read more

Left the lakes and arrived in the Tyrol region of Austria! decided to stay near the border of Liechtenstein, in a town called Feldkirch coz the hostel was cheaper! haaaaa! On the train ride there, the sky was beautiful and the mountains and villages were very nice to look at. Then, went through a tunnel for about 5 mins, came back out and FOGFOGFOG! Visibility level became 100metres!!!! OMG.......and the whole evening was glooomy. Anyways, arrived late and everything was closed.....then found out the Night museum tour was tonight! one price for all museums and free bus rides!!! Strolled around Feldkirch first and went to this exhibit that had nice pieces, but I couldn't get the meaning of it at all. then, Ihopped on and first went over to the museums in Vaduz! Vaduz was pretty ... read more