The Rugged Beauty of the Faroe Islands

Sitting smack-dab in the center of the North Atlantic Gulf Stream, the Faroe Islands are a bundle of green-archipelago paradise peeking from the blue ocean like cats’ eyes between Iceland and Scotland. You might think this to be an odd place to find a slice of Eden — high-latitude ocean, cold and rainy, icy and desolate (like Iceland and Scotland themselves!) — but the warm waters of the Gulf Stream keep the temperatures … well, temperate. Summertime averages are 51 degrees (11 Celsius), with bright sunshine and fresh sea air that’ll clean your city-soot lungs in no time.

Cool air during the summer is what we all long for, and what the Faroese call their “destination draw” for outdoor activities and “becoming one with nature.” Hiking is king here, and of the 18 islands in the archipelago, 11 boast trails with seaside, cliffside, and mountaintop views. Ferries and guided groups take you on half- and full-day excursions to visit waterfalls, ancient fishing villages, sailing tours, bird watching, and cave exploration.

Since you’re already in the middle of an ocean, take the time to do some deep-sea fishing on one of the dozens of private launches available for half- and full-day fishing trips. Or for a leisurely ocean trip, book spots on some of the famous two-mast schooners that let you experience sea-travel history as only an island people like the Faroese can show you. And there is always scuba diving amid candy-colored fish fluttering through the barrier reefs.

After a day walking-diving-sailing through such pristine nature, you’ll want to taste Faroese cuisine, a truly Nordic experience loaded with fish, seafood, and fresh produce that’ll leave your ears tingling.

Flights to the Faroe Islands are plentiful, with major European hubs servicing the capital city, Tóshavn. City hotels, pensions, B&Bs, and private flats abound on the islands.

Playing poker makes you wonder where you’ve landed: the throne of some alien world or the sweaty tiles of your smoky basement. This is the high and the low of gambling. The draw of poker, like drawing three cards in hope of catching a book-end straight, touches the pain-pleasure areas of our being. Add liquor, however, and you immediately become a loser.

Drinking and poker don’t mix. This ain’t a comparison to drinking & driving or (Holy Lord!) drinking & women. When you drink and play poker, be it at online poker sites or in a casino, your chances of winning fall exponentially. A slowed reaction time is the tip of the iceberg.

Where drinking really fails you is in the bravery (stupidity?) department. Lynyrd Skynyrd sang about taking “a shot of courage” before da da da da daaaa. Well, that’s great, but taking the chance on an inside straight is okay once in a while, but ten times in a row? That’s what liquor does to you. Good advice will always go something like this: save the drink for a nightcap after you collect your winnings from the pay window.

In the annals of spirited holidays for the angler, what could be a more memorable trip than fly fishing on one of Europe’s gazillion rivers, lakes and ponds? Forget the steamy streets of touristy Rome, Paris, Madrid or Berlin this trip. Head for the hills, valleys and plains with a seasoned guide and your favorite tackle.

Get thigh deep in a cold-water river, feel the gush of white-water currents drag your hip basket, and watch the morning sun glint off your rod as you cast your fly for feisty fish. If you’ve never been to Europe for sport fishing, don’t fret, as your needs will be as easily met as any North American angler camp.

August & September are peak months in the north (Norway & Sweden) for haddock and salmon, while October cools the hot mountains of Spain and France to bring trout and pike up for your poppers, dry flies and caddis. Be sure to bring your nymphs, too — but leave the non-fishing wives at home for this exciting excursion.

Summer is busy in Europe, no matter what the economy says. Travel is sort of like beer: you drink it when you’re up because you can … and you gulp it when you’re down to drown your sorrows. When economies sour, travel opportunity opens up: cheap hotels, car rental deals, air fare discounts. This off-season is yet replete with special places for the heads-up traveler.

Italy’s Amalfi coast exhibits some of the most picturesque scenery in the world: vertical towns, scintillating waters, sea air breezes, and dining al fresco. Before June, July & August heat and tourist crowds claim these narrow streets and roads, you can still bag a pension overlooking the Med, and sip sherry on the pebble beaches as the western skies burn crimson in sunset.

Positano is one vertical town that captures imaginations because it’s been in the imagination business since its 10th Century founding. Shipping was its business, and the sea provided its riches. Today all of that history reflects upon you in its cream and peach villas, the dome of the cathedral of St. Maria Assunta, and its famous sandals made to order in any one of a dozen local shops.

If your idea of Italy is Rome, Florence, and Venice, your history is in the right place, but for laid back excitement that lets your feet bathe in Mediterranean waves, the Amalfi coast holds all your desires.

Vltava River Bridges

But Euro-cities are still accessible. First thing is, you have to put costs into perspective: people earn a helluva lot more money these days than the 1970s. Which means that European travel can be met for as little as $100 per day (excluding air fair — sorry).

One city meeting this price ceiling is Prague, Czech Republic. Tourists can purchase discount cards (www.praguecard.biz/) offering savings on pubic transport and free entrance to more than 50 top sites throughout the “city of 100 spires.” Attractions such as evening concerts, Prague’s fantastic zoo, the national art gallery and museum at the top of Wenceslaus square, and shopping & dining — all these savings amount to more cash in your pocket.

Walking tours are a great way to see Prague (and any city), and for years now Free Prague Tours (www.freepraguetours.eu) has taken groups through Old Town and the Jewish Ghetto for on-the-spot talks on architecture, shopping, garden & parks, churches, and city markets.

For accommodation, you need to shop around, but affordable digs everywhere, especially if you travel in groups of 3 or 5 or more, when you can get shared rooms and even negotiate (larger groups) on multi-room rates. For example, the Cloister Inn has $75/night rates within Prague’s historic Old Town; the buildings date to the middle ages and were once used by secret police. How’s that for the weird factor?

Food in Prague runs the gamut of prices, but often if you simply walk off a main street, you’ll find a small restaurant serving authentic Czech food for reasonable prices ($1.50 beers & $7 goulash plates). Don’t worry about language, as most restaurant servers speak English, and menus often are multi-linguistic.

Prague is hard to beat for a cheap European destination, but since we’re all used to doing some travel homework, you’ll discover numerous bonuses with quality websites, a good handbook, and plain old intuition.

“Working here at the Tower of London is absolutely amazing, I feel so privileged to be here and it’s great to be in the uniform at last. I’m still getting used to wearing it but it certainly makes you stand very straight!”

Chief Yeoman Warder John Keohane said: “Yeoman Warder Cameron has been with us for a few weeks now and I can see she already has built up a great rapport with our visitors. Now that she is in exactly the same uniform doing exactly the same duties as her male colleagues, I think she will prove a great asset to the Tower and a valuable member of my team.”

Yeoman Warders are all former military people who have proven service to the crown and boast exemplary records for all duties. Over the following year, Yeoman Warder Cameron will learn by heart the complete history of the Tower so that she can lead one of the hour-long visitor tours that cover the myths, legends and stories of key events in English and Tower history.

Yeoman Warder tours are highlights of any Tower of London visit. The Beefeaters are all gifted storytellers who play to the crowd. The animated behavior entices and sometimes scared the hell out of children. Along the way, they describe grisly executions, house arrests and torture techniques, marriages and wars. On any cold, blustery day in London, a Yeoman Warder tour of the Tower takes the chill off your back.

For a peek at what you’ll experience, visit The Tower of London web site.

Hauppauge, N.Y. – Ask any seasoned travel pro and they’ll tell you: a successful trip starts at home with smart packing! Briggs & Riley Travelware, a leader in innovative, high-quality luggage, polled a host of well-traveled professionals from journalists to business owners to get their top tips and tricks for successful packing.

Jim Lahren, Vice President of Marketing at Briggs & Riley states, “We polled hundreds of top travelers to get their best packing secrets and tips to help consumers save time and headaches in advance of their trip. Some of the key themes that came up repeatedly: pack ahead so you don’t rush, only take essentials, keep important items handy for easy access, and many suggested keeping key garments in the plastic bags they come in from the cleaners to eliminate wrinkles. There were also many unique and funny tips as well.”

Here are the top suggestions for anyone who wants to pack like a pro!

• “Do what I call packing ahead: start a few days before your trip and as you think of things you need/want to bring either write them down or lay them out. This way you make sure you don’t forget anything in the last minute rush.”

• “Never let your husband pack. No good can come from it.”

• “At least a week in advance of the trip, I start reminding my wife she takes too much clothing and packs way too much stuff. I do this with the hope that by the time I’m ready to start squeezing everything in, it won’t be too strenuous an undertaking.”

• “Lay everything out that you intend to take, and then remove one-third of it. This will eliminate ‘over-packing.’” Another respondent suggested, “To limit what I carry, I go through my bag a second time after packing to eliminate things that I might not need. Simple toiletries like tooth paste, mouthwash, and even white t-shirts can be purchased in small quantities after arrival at my destination.”

• “I save clothes that I’m about to throw out and then I pack them when I take a trip. I wear them on the trip and then throw them out before I pack to come home. That means I now have room to pack the new stuff and any souvenirs I bought. Beware though: two people emailed me that they threw their old clothes away at very fancy, high-end hotels. And the hotels had them dry cleaned and Fed Ex’d back to them, thinking they had thrown them out by mistake!”

• “Business travelers who frequent the same hotels can pack a bag or plastic storage box and leave it at the hotel until their next visit. In the interim, the hotel will launder, press and fold clothes as necessary, and hold them for you until your return. Slip the concierge $20 every now and then and you’ll be treated like royalty each time you visit and your property will be well protected for you.”

• “I had a favorite room in a nice hotel in Chicago. The room had a drop ceiling. Because of this I was able to lift a tile and hide things in the room above the ceiling. Every time I went there I stayed in the same room by booking far enough in advance to get it. I kept razor blades, shaving cream, deodorant and several other things in a small Tupperware container above the ceiling and never lost any of it. I don’t go there very often anymore, but I suspect that my things are still there!”

• “I’m on the road constantly and I try to make the road feel as much like home as possible. I try to get hotels to give me the same room every time, of course, but I also carry a couple of pictures of my wife and a couple of pictures of my daughter in my luggage. I also bring a small iPod player so I can listen to my music. My desk – here in Minneapolis today – looks just like my desk at home or my desk in New York or my desk in San Francisco.”

• “First rule: NEVER CHECK BAGS. One roll-on bag that fits in the overhead should do it for any trip – even up to a month. You can do it if you follow my second tip:”

• “Pack EVERYTHING BLACK: black shoes, black undies, black clothes, black makeup bag. It never goes out of style, always looks clean, always makes you look slimmer, it’s good for every season, and it’s easy to accessorize with color. With black, you can travel for two weeks or two months with one little carry-on bag. You’ll look chic in NY or London or Kuala Lampur.”

• “It’s not the clothes, it’s the shoes that matter! Pack with similar colors or styles in your clothes so that you can minimize the number of shoes required for the trip as they take up more space than clothes.”

And most important:

• “I always pack my underwear first so that I don’t forget it.”

Source: Lois Whitney & Christine Carney, HWHPR /New Media
Published: October, 2007

From November 14th, 2007, the journey from London to Paris will take 20 minutes less than before, making the total journey time just two hours and 15 minutes.

For those tourists visiting Europe, the Eurostar is also cleaner and more reliable than airlines, producing ten times less CO2 emissions that is set to be cut even more by 2012.

“Our check-in times are incredibly fast and on-time performance is 92 per cent compared to the airlines’ 55 to 70 per cent,” said Emma Harris, director of sales at Eurostar.

Trains will travel at a top speed of 186mph on the high-speed line, which has the potential to encourage even more passengers to choose rail over air travel around Europe.

The Eurostar also offers cheaper discount deals, with affordable return trips available from £59.

2. Shoe box-size hotel rooms let you and the wife rekindle that lovin’ feeling.

3. Not everyone lives in a castle.

4. Think of restaurant service as a leisure experience — if you haven’t gotten the check after two hours, ask for it!

5. Hey, Guys, if you think American women can get their “bitch” on, just wait!

6. England is the country; Britain is the empire (such as it is).

7. Restaurant portions feed people with figures like bean poles, not barrels of beer.

8. Learn to say “Please” and “Thank you” … even if you must speak English.

9. Ladies on the prowl: get out of Leicester Square, explore some London pubs, and cock will come to you!

10. Pretend you’re Canadian.

2. By law, you have to have a double-barreled name to wear a top hat.

3. The Royal Family are of German origin.

4. All black cabs must have, by law, a dozen sausages in the trunk.

5. Some towns are constructed purely from houses with tin roofs.

6. Scotland did not get regular electricity supply until 1985.

7. Wales has more sheep per square mile than people.

8. All Cockneys are descended from midget Italians.

9. In Yorkshire the only legal profession is mining.

10. The Queen visits every mother at home after they have given birth.

11. French people are not allowed into Lancashire.

12. Prince Philip has a legal right to have sex with any bride the night before she gets married.

13. The pope has a private quarters in Buckingham Palace.

14. London has “gay only” buses which are pink.

15. Australians are not allowed entry to the UK, as they are classed as criminals.