A change of tact
What's with the lack of exotic destinations on this supposedly Asian travel blog? Well, once upon a time I filled up my passport and had to return home to get a new one. That was almost two years ago.
In the mean time the new passport has been taken across various parts of Europe, some of it warm, some of them cities and some of it alpine from the temperate base of England.
A travel blogger who is not backpacking? Can this be? Can you claim to be a traveller when you use a suitcase or a snowboard bag? Do backpackers go on press trips instead of the budget blag?
Yes you can. And with this in mind, have a peak at these quick tips for travel to European mountains.
Can I just say Les Deux Alpes in France, and can I just say, I don't think it's possible to tire of that resort. All it needed was global warming to turn on it's head and have a really good dump of snow. We shall persevere for the future and keep hoping.
Thankfully the Alps are under two hours away by plane, or if you're wary of the carbon footprint, many a mountain train will take you up there. Euro star does a ski train to the mountains that could be warranted a party in itself, either way most of Europe is cheap enough to get to now and holiday deals can be found any where, including ski pass, that unless you actually don't like riding (and if so my god why!) then there's no excuse not to go.
Unless you have no friends, in which case you have my sympathies, let's form a group or use the new tinder style ski dating app, Snowflake.
It certainly is that time of year again. Where the snow addicts among us start dreaming up where we would like to spend the next six months while the sun has it's long holiday to where it seems naturally more at home- on the other side of the planet and no where near England. And then some of us remember that we now have jobs and cars and rent to pay and wonder where the hell it all went wrong? How did being an adult creep up on us and get in the way of the fun?
Or is that just me and am I just really Peter Pan?
Any way, I was here and there and everywhere and now I'm just here, enjoying the stillness with a glass of red wine that doesn't have to be kept in the fridge to stop it 'maturing' in to vinegar for all the heat.
Then there was the trip to Tignes Val Claret, a place you can definitely get tired of unless you venture to other parts of the mountain. Despite that, when the time comes to leave you still don't want to, no matter how tired you might be of the same runs. Would anyone be up for a long mountainous road trip one day when we're all millionaires?
Tignes is a great resort, especially if you like the purpose built concrete look, which I oddly do. It's easy to ski in and out, good access to a pile of other resorts like Val D'Isere, Tignes' Le Lac and Les Brevieres in the Espace Killy ski area, which has two, count em two, glaciers! It's also in the Savoie region of France, best known for yummy mountain food like tartiflette.
Bit of local trivia or mountain myth for you, but one of the villages was flooded,Tignes' Lac Du Chevril when the dam was constructed. So the story goes, some villagers refused to move to where the authorities were rehousing them and stayed with their homes even when the village was sunk. Supposedly you can see the village when they drain the dam every couple of years. It's become such seasonaire urban myth that a tv show was made about it called Les Revenants - The Returned.
Other than that the international travel has paused apart from the press trips to Deauville and Munich. Go by the way, go for the food, for the French riviera style glam even if it is on the North of France and not the south. Go to see the architecture and resilience of post war France at Le Havre, and to eat lovely crepes. Go to sample all the cider in the region and all the horses. Deauville is Normandy and, by the by, France's biggest cider producing and stud farm region. It must be the apples.
And might I add the light. Northern France is much less polluted and more forested than most of England. After three days there I felt like my lungs had been cleared of all smog, everything was so crisp and fresh, but also warm in the sparkling sunlight.
As you can also guess Munich was a great city break and I was never far from a beer or three. Their biergartens are pristine and with the weather not dipping below 30 degrees it was a no brainer to spend half the time walking around the city learning history so we could write, and the other half quenching thirsts in a sculpted biergarten. Or cycling around on a Dutchie down to the river to cool off in melted mountain ice that trickled its' way down to Munich. Or watching men's calves saunter around in lederhosen.
Men would, and still do, wear lederhosen because it was practical while working in the fields. Not only that it showed off their legs to nearby maidens who were looking for a strong farm boy to look after them. That's a historic fact about Bavaria there and I took my lead from that fact. There really were so many men and women walking around in their national dress. You wouldn't get that at home.
Have we lost out there?
That's the short extent of my non-exotic travels in 2015. An abismal lack when put against 2014! As I said, my radius of movement has drastically shortened down to something like 3 miles a day. Being static doesn't suit me and I frequently find myself looking for an escape button before reminding myself that sometimes you have to put down the bag and actually work to find some new experience that might lead you somewhere unexpected. Like in to a van across Europe, and with any luck with some company.
