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Scandinavia special
Sep. 13th, 2011 10:03 pmLast Saturday's Guardian, noticing that we had shelved plans for a visit to Scandinavia in favour of a Spanish adventure, tried to lure us back with a Scandinavia special. Too late! But there will be other years, so here are the highlights, for reference:
I'm resistant to the 'City Break' style of holiday - all the organisation, all the travel, and then you spend hardly any time at your destination and don't see any of the country when you get there. Nonetheless, Copenhagen sounds good.
And from Copenhagen, you can fly to the Faroe islands (what the article says is that in summer you can fly from Stansted, otherwise it's Copenhagen - but which one would you choose? (Of course, from Denmark you can sail to the Faroe islands on the Norröna...)
Something about the description of a road trip through southern Sweden rubbed me up the wrong way - but if some of the places visited sound a bit bijou for my taste, it could still spark some ideas.
A couple more Scandinavian titbits slip into this week's supplement, under the heading of 'Food Festivals': Helsinki has a herring fair, it seems, and Ebeltoft in Denmark has an apple festival (both in October).
But the real temptation is the article about the Invito a Pranzo festival in Friuli, way up in the north east of Italy, a programme of special lunch menus in village restaurants throughout the autumn: I had to grit my teeth to read past the opening sentence ("I live in Venice, and I'll make any excuse to escape the invading tourist hordes at the weekend...") but it was worth it.
Or we could just go to the Morvan, and stay at the Hôtel du Morvan for the Foire aux marrons (chestnut fair) in St Léger-sous-Beuvray; searching for that, I discover that Quarré les Tombes also has a chestnut festival, but theirs is a Fête de la Châtaigne - when we were in St Léger I acquired a leaflet which explained the difference between 'marrons' and 'châtaignes', but my hazy recollection of what it said is that it's too technical for people to worry about.
All of these things would be good; but first we will go to Spain, and that will be good, too.
I'm resistant to the 'City Break' style of holiday - all the organisation, all the travel, and then you spend hardly any time at your destination and don't see any of the country when you get there. Nonetheless, Copenhagen sounds good.
And from Copenhagen, you can fly to the Faroe islands (what the article says is that in summer you can fly from Stansted, otherwise it's Copenhagen - but which one would you choose? (Of course, from Denmark you can sail to the Faroe islands on the Norröna...)
Something about the description of a road trip through southern Sweden rubbed me up the wrong way - but if some of the places visited sound a bit bijou for my taste, it could still spark some ideas.
A couple more Scandinavian titbits slip into this week's supplement, under the heading of 'Food Festivals': Helsinki has a herring fair, it seems, and Ebeltoft in Denmark has an apple festival (both in October).
But the real temptation is the article about the Invito a Pranzo festival in Friuli, way up in the north east of Italy, a programme of special lunch menus in village restaurants throughout the autumn: I had to grit my teeth to read past the opening sentence ("I live in Venice, and I'll make any excuse to escape the invading tourist hordes at the weekend...") but it was worth it.
Or we could just go to the Morvan, and stay at the Hôtel du Morvan for the Foire aux marrons (chestnut fair) in St Léger-sous-Beuvray; searching for that, I discover that Quarré les Tombes also has a chestnut festival, but theirs is a Fête de la Châtaigne - when we were in St Léger I acquired a leaflet which explained the difference between 'marrons' and 'châtaignes', but my hazy recollection of what it said is that it's too technical for people to worry about.
All of these things would be good; but first we will go to Spain, and that will be good, too.
