The view of the valley is perfect from the alpine meadow, as we sit warm in the sun, listening to The Magic Flute at the annual Mozart Festival. This could easily be Salzburg or Kitsbuhl, but actually is the mountain village of Stowe in the Northeastern U.S. state of Vermont. Stowe lies in the heart of the Green Mountains, where the cold winters make for fantastic snow sports, and the fall brings leaf peepers to see the foliage. I’m most fond of the summers though, when the forest seems to be in full bloom, and the weather is pleasant. (more…)

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It isn’t very difficult to see why southern Spain’s Costa del Sol is such a hit with European holidaymakers. With its white-sand beaches and mountainside citrus groves, this stretch of Malaga coastline is a marvelous slice of pure Mediterranean, boasting an average of over 300 sunny days a year. In the past sixty years, the region has gone from backwater to big-time; today, the geography of the coast is a litany of high-end resort towns, like Marbella and Torre del Mar, which cater to the wealthier crowd.

Despite the Costa del Sol’s reputation as a seaside playground for the rich and famous, visitors willing to go beyond the beach may find themselves surprised by how much the region has to offer. They run the gamut from outdoorsy to intellectual, from windsurfing all the way to wine tasting. Malaga’s coast offers an array of adventures to suit every palate, each one flavored with the Costa del Sol’s unique Andalusia-meets-Mediterranean charm. (more…)

Tags: addition, advance, air, Alhambra, altitude, Andalusia-meets, anyone, ape, are, area, array, average, backwater, Barbary, bargain, beach, belief, biking, bit, break, calm, Cave, cavers, center, century, challenge, chamber, chance, charm, check, check th, citrus groves, city, classical music performances, coast, coastline, cobblestone, cold, conservation, conservation concerns, continent, Costa, costa del sol, crowd, Day, destination, drive, due, edge, equipment, era, Europe, event, excursion, experience, forest, gamut, geography, Gibraltar, globe, Granada, Group, head, hiking, hiking boots, hinterland, hour, house, hungry travelers, Iberian, king, lace, litany, Malaga, Mar, Marbella, Mecca, Mediterranean, mediterranean charm, Moorish, mountainous hinterland, mountainside, music, name, Nerja, Nieves, offer, order, outdoorsy, package, palace, palate, Paleolithic, park, peak, peninsula, place, Plan, planning, playground, population, practice, price, region, reputation, resort, rock, sand beaches, score, search, seaside, seaside resort town, Sierra, sierra de las nieves, sixty, skeletal, skeletal remains, slice, snowfall, Sol, southern Spain, Spain, spice, square kilometers, Strait, stretch, sun, system, Tarifa, tasting, territory, time, Today, Torre, torre del mar, Torremolinos, Tour, town, trek, trip, vertical caves, view, virgin pine, water, way, weather, while, wine, winter, year

I sat down at the slender, grey-topped table next to the leafy fence that marked the edge of the Gimbsheim Weinbrunnenfest. My company for the evening, all of whom were more than three times my age, could easily have been half the participants in any small town ladies night bingo club.

Expecting to slowly sip a glass of wine or two over conversation of knitting, gardening, or perhaps if it got a little edgy, how so-and-so had stolen someone else’s goulash recipe and passed it off as their own, I settled in with a mild sense of dread. (more…)

Tags: Abend, afternoon, age, air, answer, approval, area, ascent, awkwardness, bakery, bike, bike ride, bingo, bit, boy, breath, butcher, cathedral, chuckle, club, Coliseum, comment, commercialism, community, company, conversation, couple, dance, dancing, didn, dread, drink, drinking, edge, Eiffel, elderly woman, Europe, evening, evening festivities, Expecting, experience, farmer, fence, festival, floor, flung, Food, foot, Friday, garden, gardening, Germany, gift, Gimbsheim, glass, glass of wine, goulash, goulash recipe, grape, Guten, hadn, hair, haired woman, Hilde, hillside, housing, humor, July, ladies night, landscape, laugh, locals, mild sense, moment, monument, morning, Mosul Valley, music, narrow streets, Neuschwanstein Castle, next morning, night, night bingo, nothing, Oppenheim, Paris, postcard, recipe, region, Rheine River, Rheinhessen, ride, ridge, Riding, road, rock, Roman, round, Ruth, Scattering, scene, scenery, search, sense, shirt, shop, sightseeing, sip, site, someone, something, spot, Square, St. Mark, stand, stone, strung, table, three times, time, tourist, Tower, town, town ladies, translation, variety, War, wasn, way, weekend, Weinbrunnenfest, wine, wine festivals, wines, woman, world, year

Admittedly, it takes some will power to peel off your sleeping bag and get out of a car when mist still creeps across the fjells – the mountain plains in Norway – at 45°F on a chilly summer morning. However, traveling by car is the best option to explore this country, which would reach from the mouth of the Mackenzie River to Bristol Bay in the south-west of Alaska, if you transferred it from Europe to the American continent – or, in other words, it would stretch from Maine to Alabama.

The Norwegian Automobile Federation offers 268 camp sites and additionally there are about one thousand other camp and cabin sites as well as parking lots for caravans and recreation vehicles throughout the country and its fifteen national parks. Due to the Norwegian allemannsretten (everybody’s right), you may also park your car somewhere beside the road for just one night, which makes it easy to follow Norway’s national roads and enjoy the quiet lakes, dense woods, gentle hills, steep mountains, roaring waterfalls, sparkling glaciers and narrow fjords alongside. (more…)

Tags: Alabama, Alaska, allemannsretten, altitude, american continent, art, Artists, August, Automobile, bag, Baltic Sea, Blessed, boat, Bristol Bay, building, cabin, camp, canal, car, Caribbean Sea, century, chilly summer, church, cliff, coast, Columbus, cone, continent, Copenhagen, country, cradle, cycling, Dalen, difference, Eighth, eighth wonder of the world, end, energy, entrance, Europe, everybody, exaggeration, fall, farm, Federation, festival, fifteen, fjellveien, foot, Gaustatoppen, gentle hills, geology, gulf stream north, Hardangervidda, Heddal, hiking, history, home, hotel, house, hydroelectric power stations, interior, isn, itinerary, Jens Esmark, king, Kjerag, Krokan, Lake Bandak, Lake Norsjoe, level, longships, lot, Lysebotn, Lysefjord, Mackenzie River, Maine, masterpiece, Meandering, medieval, middle, mist, morning, mountain, mouth, Museum, narrow fjords, national roads, Newfoundland, night, north, North Sea, north sea oil, Norway, Norwegian, Notodden, offer, oil, option, Oslo, paddle, parish, parking, path, peel, place, plenty, power, Preikestolen, professor, pulpit, quiet lakes, raft, raft wood, recreation, region, resort, right, Rjukan, road, roaring, rock, sail, Sauland, scenery, sea, season, sentence, Skagerrak, Skien, skiing, south, southern neighbors, steel, steep mountains, Stream, summer, summit, Telemark Canal, Textiles, the Gulf, Tinn, Today, tourism, tourist, town, trip, troll, Tuddal, vacation, valley, Vemork, Vestfjorddalen, Via, view, visitor, waterfall, waterway, west, Wonder, wood, world, year

Watch out! Here comes another one. We’re walking down the boardwalk in Oludeniz, Turkey which also doubles as a paragliding landing zone. It’s no wonder people leap from the surrounding mountains and glide down to a soft beach landing, into this bay that’s one of the most photographed areas of the Mediterranean coastline.

Oludeniz means “dead sea” in Turkish. The actual town is named Belcekiz, but if you walk a couple hundred meters down the beach, you reach a peninsula of sand which creates a sheltered lagoon. The still, deep blue water behind this spit of land is the “dead” calm sea.
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