Living La Dolce Vita

Lake ComoBuongiorno from Italia! What a change it has been to come to Italy. When we arrived in Como from snowy Switzerland yesterday afternoon it was still cloudy, but noticeably warmer. And today it was gloriously sunny and reached a high of 67! It is like we've been transported into another world, yet we only drove a little more[...]

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by Jour ~ Friday, March 28, 2008 0 comments

Train Ride to St. Moritz

Today we took a train ride from Chur to St. Moritz, which takes two hours each way. The Alpine scenery was just as lovely as you would expect - magnificent white peaks, small villages, clear blue mountain streams - and the train was clean and efficient, as always in Switzerland. We spent two hours wandering around St. Moritz, which[...]

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by Jour ~ Wednesday, March 26, 2008 0 comments

Tulu Nadu - A tryst with the Gods amidst beautiful beaches

They always say that the Gods reside in beautiful abodes - that is why they are up in the skies or atop mountains or in the midst of wild forests and deep oceans .No wonder in ancient days, man worshipped nature. I have an appointment with some of the deities who live in the beautiful[...]

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by Jour ~ Tuesday, March 25, 2008 0 comments

Neuschwanstein and Chur, Switzerland

Yesterday was our day trip to Neuschwanstein Castle, and we had such a good time. The castle is located in the very south of Bavaria, close to the Austrian border. The drive was beautiful and a lot more Alpine than I expected. As a bonus, we found a great radio station with traditional German music, just the sort you'd hear on a[...]

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by Jour ~ Tuesday, March 25, 2008 0 comments

Augsburg

Happy Easter and greetings from Augsburg! Augsburg is a fairly large city not far from Munich in Bavaria. It doesn't have the narrow-winding-street charm of Bamberg or Regensburg, but it has a fine Old Town and some very nice churches. We are staying in the Dorint Hotel, which is about 10 minutes walk from the Old Town. It is in[...]

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by Jour ~ Sunday, March 23, 2008 0 comments

Murudeshwar - work is worship !

I have no idea what their discussion is about at such high places...maybe its about attaining nirvana ...My next post will be about Murudeshwar , the temple, the beach and some of the temples that I visited along the coast[...]

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by Jour ~ Sunday, March 23, 2008 0 comments

Beautiful Bamberg

We had such a nice time during our three nights in Bamberg. Neither of us had ever heard of it before, but it is a World Heritage Site and a very popular destination for German tourists. As I mentioned in the last post, it turned out to be one of the most enjoyable cities we've visited in Germany - highly recommended! We got a bit[...]

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by Jour ~ Tuesday, March 18, 2008 0 comments

Regensburg

View of Regensburg from across the Danube RiverRegensburg is another fantastic Bavarian city full of lovely things to see. We've changed our plans from staying here two nights to staying four nights, not leaving until Saturday. This will give us time to see more in Regensburg as well as make a day trip into the Czech Republic (probably[...]

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by Jour ~ Tuesday, March 18, 2008 0 comments

Last Morning in Erfurt

Greetings from rainy Bamberg! This is such a beautiful and interesting city, one of our favorites yet. But I have to back up to our last morning in Erfurt (Saturday), which we crammed a lot into. It was sunny and comparatively warm - perfect for seeing a few more sights before leaving Erfurt. We started with a tour of the Augustinian[...]

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by Jour ~ Monday, March 17, 2008 0 comments

Maravanthe - go with the flow !

Driving down NH 17 is a truly blue trip... A view of the Arabian Sea on one side of the road glistening in the sun and the serene Souparnika river on the other side ..welcome to Maravanthe Beach, close to Kundapura in coatal karnataka. A few resorts dot this virgin beach but boating[...]

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by Jour ~ Sunday, March 16, 2008 0 comments

Wartburg Castle and Eisenach

Today we visited the Wartburg Castle, which is on a forested mountain overlooking the town of Eisenach, 45 minutes west of Erfurt. It is a very good castle. It was founded in 1067, is a World Heritage Site, and Adolf Hitler is said to have called it "The most German of German castles."We really enjoyed our visit, but it did not[...]

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by Jour ~ Friday, March 14, 2008 0 comments

Enjoying Erfurt

We are having a very nice time in Erfurt, where we are based for four nights. The two-hour drive from Wittenberg was efficient as always, on excellent high-speed freeways. Erfurt is in the dead center of Germany, in the province of Thuringia (known for its forests and sausages). The landscape became almost immediately more beautiful[...]

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by Jour ~ Thursday, March 13, 2008 0 comments

Worlitz and more Wittenberg

Oy vey, it is hard to keep up with the blogging at our new travel pace! I really hate to leave out any details or interesting photos from each of the places we visit, but it seems I am going to have to resign myself to becoming increasingly brief. On the bright side, we finally have good wireless internet at our current hotel, so[...]

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by Jour ~ Wednesday, March 12, 2008 0 comments

Greetings from Wittenberg

It is our second and final night in Wittenberg and we have had a really good time here. We are staying at the Luther Hotel, appropriately enough, which is pretty nice and very central. The funniest part about it is that absolutely everyone we have seen and heard here is American. Mostly from the south and mostly on a Christian-themed[...]

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by Jour ~ Monday, March 10, 2008 0 comments

Karwar - you wish to linger forever ..

Coming soon - The Mangalore to Karwar trail ..A slice of the west coast in India...karnataka's beaches and temples as we drive down the coast, stopping by at beaches and taking in some spiritual moment[...]

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by Jour ~ Sunday, March 9, 2008 0 comments

German celebrities and other Berlin sights

We saw two big celebrities in our last two days in Berlin, although you may have only heard of one of them! The first was Boris Becker, who strolled past while we were eating delicious Italian food in the KaDaWe department store yesterday. That was pretty fun. He was by himself and wore a green Nike baseball cap. The KaDaWe (short[...]

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by Jour ~ Friday, March 7, 2008 0 comments

A little more from Berlin

I'm very sorry the blogging has been sparse since we arrived in Berlin - it turns out the only internet we have is down in their computer room, so it's not that fun to spend the usual hour or so I do on blogging down here (in addition to all the "work" e-mails I have to keep up on). Plus we really wear ourselves out with sightseeing[...]

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by Jour ~ Wednesday, March 5, 2008 0 comments

Hello from Berlin!

David here reporting that we have made it to Berlin safely and are having a great time despite very cruddy weather. This morning I woke to find it actually snowing outside! Not exactly what we are looking for right now but still fun. Here are some pictures from the doorway of our hotel:We have done better then usual at getting to[...]

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by Jour ~ Tuesday, March 4, 2008 0 comments

Sun, sand and beaches .

Need I say more[...]

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by Jour ~ Tuesday, March 4, 2008 0 comments

Exploring Hildesheim

We had a very nice day out in Hildesheim yesterday. The weather was no better than when we arrived, unfortunately, and it was all we could do not to blow away out there. But we adapted by spending as much time as possible inside churches and museums!We passed on the breakfast buffet at our hotel, for which they want €16 each, and[...]

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by Jour ~ Sunday, March 2, 2008 0 comments

And the adventure begins!

Greetings from Hildesheim! We have begun our grand European tour and we are having a great time so far. And it sure is nice to have reliable internet again so I can tell you about it!I'll get our only complaint out of the way first: the weather. Last night a hurricane blew through northern Europe, and particularly Germany. It even[...]

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by Jour ~ Saturday, March 1, 2008 0 comments