Blogs from Luxembourg, Europe - page 7

My thought about the countries so far: Scotland - Cold, windy, beautiful! Drive on the wrong side. People are friendly. Galic is weird! Really like Irn Bru soda! Neil, our guide rocks! Germany - Warmer, but windy on the Rhine. Enchanting towns. Everyone rides bicycles. Inexpensive for a tourist area. Dogs are everywhere... even restaurants, stores, and train stations! Luxembourg - It may be the country with the highest income per capita in the world, but they don't keep their streets and public places very clean! Spend some money on public maintenance! Clothing... women's at least, is expensive! Lower Luxembourg City (Base?) is quite pretty. Today we had our first breakfast experience in the hostel. Standard fare, except for the coffee/cappuccino machine. After breakfast, we bought the Luxembourg Card so we could use all the b ... read more

After a very peaceful night we hit the road. Keeping one eye on Suzys dashboard we kept checking the fuel consumption which remained constant and the engine ticked over nicely despite the little light which kept telling us something was wrong. The motorways were quiet . It was Sunday and all the lorries were parked up on the service areas and had left the roads to us motorists. We had our bill for using the french motorways £90 for a three days travel from Calais to the Frejus tunnel. We had avoided the tolls back by using the German roads but in all honesty Glenn hated them. They were endless lines of road works. The verdict -driving through France and paying the tolls was better than driving these endless boring roads. No tolls but boring and ... read more

I woke fairly early, packed my bags and headed to the train station. I say "early" but it was really like 8 am. It was super dark, cold and lonely walking the streets to the metro station. Very strange feeling. But I made it and waited for my train platform to be announced. I have to say - I was quite sad to leave Paris. There was still so much more that I wanted to do (Eiffel Tower, Catacombs, Louvre, etc) and I truly loved the people. I had a fantastic time and this is one time I actually mean to come back and in the not so distant future. I LOVED every minute of it! I had booked a first class ticket because, you know… It was a nice, pleasant ride. I napped a little ... read more

Our hotel in Luxembourg, the Novotel, was located in the Kirchberg neighborhood. The Kirchberg Plateau is an area in northeast Luxembourg-Ville. It is not as well known by visitors as the historic center of the old city. Kirchberg was once part of the Luxembourg's extensive fortress complex and housed Fort Thungen. From the demolition of the fortifications in 1867 to the post-World War 2 period, Kirchberg was a rural residential suburb. Modern development of the area began in 1963 with the opening of the stylish red Grande-Duchesse Charlotte Bridge between Kirchberg and the old city. (Try as I might, I could not get a photo of it!) Kirchberg soon became a banking center and then a center for the European Union with the construction of EU agency headquarters and office buildings in the 1990s. There was ... read more

Power tour of France... After a wash-up and change of clothes, we loaded up Tom and Nadine's station wagon and all headed South out of Luxembourg and into France. The drive was mostly on uninterrupted motorways with speeds anywhere up to and above 160 kph... and after checking out the imposing Medieval Haut-Koenigsbourg Castle on the way, where we spent a good couple of hours as the temperatures rose to the high 30's. Luckily it was nice and cool while in the castle and with the air-conditioning working hard for the drive to our first night's destination at Mulhouse where we had our fabulous Peonia B and B that Nadine had found. We stayed in for a magnificent dinner, prepared in house, by fabulous hosts, along with a selection of great wines, as you do when ... read more