Trips, Tracks and Travels

This year, we spent 10 days or our holidays in the center of the Lake District, to explore this mountainous region of Great Britain, and 2 days near Hadrian’s wall, north-east of Corbridge.
At the Lake District, we had booked at the National Trust Campingsite near the end of Great Langdale, west of Ambleside. Not too expensive, without facilities like a swimming pool or restaurant, and with just a small shop; but quiet and no more light than needed.Out first intention was to stay there for five nights, but since it was so central to the area, we extended our stay and stayed there for the whole period.
The area is famous for its possibly bad weather - being the wettest part of England. But we were lucky. Most rain fell during the first nights, after three weeks of drought - and temperatures were well below normal. At night, it was freezing cold - minimal, but still. But it all improved, and we had pretty good weather for walking: over the fells, following parts of the Cumbria Way on some occasions, and the last leg of the Dales way - whic is very different.
Of course, we did a trip on Lake Windermere and and had a ride in a steam-train form the Southern shore atr Lakeside to the seaside at Haverswaithe, and back. That day turned out to be the only day that rain would have been a problem while walking.
We also had a few very sunny days, and quite warm, so it wasn’t too bad at all.

The last days were spent near Corbridge, allowing us a visit to Hadrian’s wall and Newcastle, before we travelled back.

Of course, all walks have been tracked, and a lot of images have been taken - quite a lot form a panoramic view of the area. So it will take some time before these are published - but I’m working on it.

It has been the annual holiday season for us: since the kids left school, we can plan our holiday in whatever month de desire. This year the trip went to Italy, via Germany and Switzerland - it turned out to be far cheaper than using the French Autoroute du Soleil. And May normally is a nicer month to go there - for the temperatures are still bearable, and most weeds are in flowers.
Our first target was Tuscany, to visit Florence and Siena, and enjoy the countryside. We stayed on a camping site North of Florence, and that meant passing this town to get South - a real problem if you’re not aquainted to the Italian way of signposting, and the wheeled wasps that overtake left and right. We got through once to visit Volterra and San Gimignano, but we decided not to try it a second time.
So, we didn’t do Sienna.
Second stop was in the North of Umbria at the Lago di Trasimeno, where we visisted Assisi - San Francicsus’ town. An easy environment, though quite touristic but since the town is larger than the two others we visited, the masses kind of disappear. We made a walk in the mountains, and visisted some little Etruscan towns in the area.
The third stop was near Venice, but here we could use public traffic (boat, bus, ferry, bus + boat) to get to the town within an hour. We did twice, and the third day we hired bikes to make a cycle tour on the main land.
All these days, temperatures raised from 25 C to 35 C within just over two weeks, and when we left for Luzern to have a few days of mountain-walking in Switzerland (we missed the mountains…), it was even hotter, but on the road, it dropped to a more comfortable value of 27. The next day, after a nice walk to a high point, we were lucky to get a lift back to the camping site: when we got out of the car, all hell broke lose. Second luck: our tent survived the heavy winds, a few ropes of the tarp loosened and all that was under it got wet. But no real damage has been done.

My camera has been damaged beyond repair during the hodiday, but Rita has one as well, so there are many pictures (about 650) and tracking datam availabe here

This year’s holiday we headed for the French Alps. To start - getting used to the paths going up, on a higher than normal altitude - we hired an appartment near Chorges, above the Lac de Selle-Porcon. We stayed here for one week, and the next two were intended to walk the GR56 route around Barcelonette: the Tour de l’ Ubaye.
It turned out to be different - by requirement.
Normally, temperatures would be well above 20 C, dry and sunny normally, and all snow would have disappeared up to 3000m or thereabouts. This time however, things were different. There has been a lot of snow last winter - much more than normal, and spring has been cold, dark and wet - meaning that on higher grounds, above 1800-2000 m, it would snow, no rain.

The first week we did encounter the problems we could face in our tour: Snowfields that could not be crossed without special equipment; propably rain, thunderstorms and cold weather. Nevertheless, we got as high as we could on Charbierres, and conquered the summits of Pic de Morgon and Piolit. We visisted the towns of Gap and Embrun, the abbey of Boscodon and the barrage de Selle Porcon.
The second week we left for a camping site at la Fresqiere, about 10 km west of Barcelonette. To our luck, the hostess was Belgian and could help us in Dutch. She informed what huts were available: The first one was, the secons could not be reachjed by phone, and the third one was closed as a result of bad weather: a lightning strike had resulted in severe damage: no power, no water - and the hust was closed for the time being. But worse: it was virtaully impossible to get around on higher passes without equipment, according the host.
So we had to abandon our plans.
To our luck, the hostess did have nice walks that covered past of the route that we could do. And we did some, but the weather got worse: cold and wet, so in a few days we decided to break our holiday, get to Houffalize in the Belgian Ardennes for a few days and than head beack home.

All walks in the countryside have been tracked, and a lot of images taken. You can access them here. The index page also holds a link to the tracks. Both have been ordered by day.

We always wanted to get to Scotland, and this time it was our schedule. We crossed the Northsea from Ijmuiden to Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and drove over the A1, along the coast, passing Edinburg straight to Milngavie, just North of Glasgow, to have a day in Galsgow - the town of the architect Macintosh - and be at the starting point of out walk along the West Highland Way, to Fort William and the Ben Nevis, Britains highest mountain.

We started the West highland way but got stuck after two days in Rowandennan - because we didn’t plan anything in advance, there was no accomodation, and the bar that did have a “bunkhouse” in Drymen, had their bus broken down. It ended up getting back - by taxi - to Milngavie. That afternoon it began to rain, it rained the next day when we drove to Fort William - during which drive ded encounter the wildlife we liked (but only leaned when lightening up the photograph at home) - to stay on the camping site down Ben Nevis. Here we planned for that last stretches of the path, climb the Ben Nevis and set off by bus to our next starting point: Crainlarich. We made that last part of the path.

After that, we went into the Borders area, close to the border with England, to visit some ancient times, closer to Newcastle. We had to make it in time to catch the boat back.

These are the images - day-by-day - of this holiday. You will find tracks in .GPX and .CSV format.

We walked all the way from Dion to Kalambaka in Northern Greece, in all about 150 km, in 10 days.
The journey started in Thessaloniki, where we arrived by plane from Cologne. We stayed a few days and walked around, looking at all the monuments of Greece’s past. Nest day, we traveled to the excavations of Dion, by train and bus, yo meet the rest of the group, including the “tour leader” - the Man with the Maps. That afternoon, we marched off to Litochoro - the gateway to the Olympus.
The next few days were spent getting up to the top (well, nearly), and down on the other side. From there, we crossed the hills and plains of the northern part of Greece, diverting (by bus and taxi) if theer was no accomodation - that is why we headed by bus to Elassona where we had a resting day (that was mainly spent - walking…).
Some of the group, Rita and I went to Katrini by taxi - the others had to do the same route because the small river they thought to cross turned out to have become a ravine in the years between the time the map was drawn, and the current day…(They did the last part from Katrini and taxi the next day).

Near Kalambaka are the famous monsateries on the cliffs - and some were visisted.
Back by train to Thessaloniki - in the pouring rain, after it had been nice and warm (hot) fro the rest of the trip.

This is the daily report - in maps and images.

This 2-week holiday starts the in French Jura, close to the Swiss border. We camped near a little town called Chatillon, and had some fine walks and rides in the area. The nicest part is the most southern area, embedded in the “Parc National de Haute Jura”, close to Geneva. Because we lost our way there, we could well oversee that part of Switzerland.
The second week we spent in the city of Saint-Die - heavily destroyed (by Germans, mostly) during the Second Worldwar, and restaured as far as feasable. The cathedral for instance has been restored, but the previous Bishop’s Palace wasn’t - a new building ahs been eracted ther, housing a local museum.

The daily report obtains photograhs and tracks

Closer to home this year.
We would like so get into the mountains for a change. Real mountains, that is, so we went to Southern Germany, and stayed on a camping site in Berchtesgaden, close to Salburg. Rita and I went by car with Franka, in two days, and stayed on a camping site about halfway, to allow Franka a shorter time in the car. Kasper would come over by train with a friend of him.
While the boys enjoined themselves on the camping site and in Bechtesgaden, Rita, Franka and I walked in the mountains - mainly guided tours that would take several hours. Since we wer close to Salzburg, we went there a few times, when the weather didn’t allow long mountain walk.

At the end we made a long walk - high up a pass on an “alpine” track: Steep, narrow, rough surface at times, where water ran down the maintain, and stairs….

This is the daily report in images.

This was one of the wettest holidays we ever had….

Some years before, I was contacted by someone in the US who fould my name on the Internet was was curious if we were related. As it turned out, we are.
This yesr we made a trip to the US. We had to visit a few locations, where stayes were taken care of by a time-sharing company, and we were obliged to visit sales meetings. But for the rest, we were free to go. So I set out a trip so we could see most of it, and visit our relative.

Of course, this implied a lot of pictures be taken, were it not that most of the time this trip meant travellling - by air (we crossed the US a few timed) and by car. But we did see some famous locations.

Publised is a day-by-day report - including scanned maps on which I could note the road we took - and a lot of pictures.

In 2003, we made a three week holiday to the UK, with the kids.
Crossing the Channel by Hoverspeed Seacat, crosssing England to Dartmoor, to make some walks in this wild area. We stayed on a little camping site near Clifford Bridge, an area where the writer Thomas Hardy had stayed for a period. From there, we could undertake some nice walks on Dartmoor and visit a number of National Trust sites.
Next stop was the Nothern coast of Cornwall, near St Agnes, on the Northern slopes of the St Agnes Beacon. Just a few hunderd meters from the coast, Kim and Kasper could spend their days on the small beach, while Rita and I coulad make our walks. When the weather turned, we visited some historic sites - mainly previous tin mines. On the wettest day, we visisted the Eden project.
The last week was spent near Londe, where we did some site-seeing by foot and visited a number of interesting locations.

A report - in pictures - can be found here