General Archives ⋆ The Passenger

November 26, 2024November 27, 2024

Winter Wonderland

When the days are getting shorter and colder, a part of Hyde Park close to Speakers’ Corner turns into the Hyde Park Winter Wonderland – a crazy mix of a Christmas market, the Oktoberfest and a fun fair. Winter Wonderland began at London in 2005 and was ever-growing since then (if you ignore the Covid-19 times). It combines good music, festive lights, fun rides and overpriced food and drinks. A funny adventure letting you taste unexpected food creations and experience the joy of amusement parks.

November 6, 2024December 8, 2024

Tajine

The Moroccan kitchen has a lot to offer: beginning with the national dish couscous, via pastilla (a pie filled with meat and vegetables) to harira, a soup made of lentils, chickpeas, rice and onions. Bread is incredibly important and traditionally food is eaten together from one plate only with the fingers of the right hand. As a tourist you’ll for sure most often find knife and fork in restaurants – with street food it is different.

November 4, 2024November 17, 2024

Villes impériales

When people visit Morocco, they typically visit the four villes impériales: Fès, Meknès, Marrakech and Rabat. These four have been capital cities throughout time for different dynasties of rulers: Idrisids (Fès), Almoravids (Marrakech), Almohads (Marrakech), Marinids (Fès), Saadis (Marrakech, Fès) and Alaouites (Fès, Meknès, Rabat). They shaped their favorite cities, contributed new buildings to them and left their traces.

October 5, 2024October 21, 2024

Oldest republic

San Marino was founded in 301 and is probably the oldest still existing republic with the oldest still used constitution (established in 1600). The country only has 30,000 inhabitants – much less then most European cities – and is fully surrounded by Italy. Official language is Italian, currency is the Euro; but the country is not part of the European Union (only of the United Nations). The legend says that quarryman Marinus fled from Rimini because Christians were prosecuted in the Roman Empire and went up to mount Titano to build a monastery there.

August 9, 2024August 23, 2024

Hard to reach

Andorra is potentially the country in Europe that is hardest to tick off your travel wish list. It is just a tiny country with under 80,000 inhabitants on 468 km² in the Pyrenees between Spain and France. There is no airport and no railway station, your best chance is to fly to Barcelona or Toulouse and take a bus ride into the mountains which lasts 3-4 hours. It is a bit unusual that the capital city Andorra la Vella is so complicated to reach but the trip through the mountains is very scenic and well worth the effort.

July 4, 2024July 31, 2024

Bear Country

The province British Columbia has the abbreviation BC, but these two letters can also be read in a different way: as Bear Country. That’s what British Columbia is. When hiking on Vancouver Island or up to the Yellowhead Mountain there are typically two potential threats: cougars and bears. While cougars and wolves are mostly shy and invisible, you’ll meet bears quite frequently; black bears more often than grizzly bears. On Vancouver Island alone there are around 7,000 of them and knowing how to react and which precautions to take is a must.

July 3, 2024July 31, 2024

Sailing

Well, the ferry boats between Vancouver and Vancouver Island are powered by natural gas and not by the winds – but nevertheless they speak of sailing between mainland and island. There are different routes but the most important ones seem to be the one going from Tsawwassen south of Vancouver to Swartz Bay (for visiting Victoria) and the one from Departure Bay (a well chosen name) near Nanaimo to Horseshoe Bay; the perfect arrival point for a trip through the Sea-to-Sky community via Squamish up to Whistler.

July 1, 2024August 3, 2024

CAD

Currency of Canada is of course the Canadian Dollar (CAD, $ or C$). It is divided into 100 Cents and exists since 1871 when it became the first uniform currency for all Canadian provinces. There are coins for one and two dollars, as well as cent coins mostly showing wildlife of Canada. The banknotes from five to 100 $ currently show Canadian innovations from elements of the ISS and trains to insulin. The issue is that you’ll probably won’t get to see them as Canada has gone cashless nearly everywhere.

May 31, 2024June 23, 2024

Pit Stop

Every year the eyes of the world turn to Monaco for the Formula 1 Grand Prix when the fast cars race through the narrow streets of the city and pass along the Casino as well as the Port Hercule. But Monaco as one of those microstates in Europe, fully surrounded by France, is always worth a visit. It is reigned by prince Albert II, became independent from France in 1489, has 40,000 inhabitants (thereof 8,000 citizens) and can be considered one of the safest places in the world with one policeman and -woman per inhabitant.

May 31, 2024June 4, 2024

Respectueux du climat

When I had given myself the mission to visit my hitherto unseen European microstates (Liechtenstein, Monaco, San Marino and Andorra) I immediately thought that this should be possible in an eco-friendly manner. Reaching Liechtenstein with Deutsche Bahn and SNCF was hassle-free, but the trip to Monaco was a very long one with many things that could go wrong. I tried it anyway.