Life at 60 degrees north
It's been snowing in Oslo more or less continuously since the early hours of Monday, and it's now late Wednesday evening. We had a lot of snow here from before, so the result is a snow record: the last time we had this much snow in Oslo was 1968. Altogether it's about two feet. ...
Read | 2006-03-01 21:39 | 2 comment(s)
Beer hunting in Fränkische Schweiz
The Fränkische Schweiz, or Franconian Switzerland, is a small, hilly area north of Nürnberg between Bamberg and Bayreuth which is full of idyllic small towns and villages, strange rock formations, and small streams and rivers. More importantly, it's also full of small family breweries. After we left Bamberg we headed into this area towards Kulmbach, and after visiting Kulmbach and Bayreuth we headed back in for some sightseeing (and beer research).
...Read | 2006-02-12 23:47 | 2 comment(s)
The year 2005 in travelling
Norm Walsh had the excellent idea of publishing a map showing his travels (via Column Two), and I couldn't resist the temptation to do the same. Of course, I used what I've learned about the Google Maps API to create an interactive map instead.
...Read | 2006-01-05 21:55 | 2 comment(s)
Beer tasting in Bamberg
Bamberg is an outstandingly beautiful city and also home of the Rauchbier (literally "smoke beer"), and so the visit here was one of the high points on our trip. It turns out that Bamberg has no less than nine breweries, so sampling all the Bamberg beers actually requires quite a bit of work. All of the breweries have their own taverns or biergartens serving the beer, and two also combine the tavern with an inn where you can stay at a very reasonable price. ...
Read | 2006-01-02 02:12 | 3 comment(s)
A visit to Nürnberg
Our recent beer holiday started in Nürnberg, a city of roughly 500,000 people in Upper Franconia. (Nürnberg is usually spelled "Nuremberg" in English, but I can't quite bring myself to do it, hence the spelling in the title.) As a tourist destination, Nürnberg has some attractions to recommend it, primarily the Altstadt (old town) with its town wall, and the Kaiserburg (imperial castle). For beer hunters it's an OK place to visit, but not really outstanding. ...
Read | 2005-09-25 19:52 | 2 comment(s)
Franconian beer
Beer in Franconia is something of a paradox: on the one hand there is a great profusion of breweries and beer styles, but on the other hand modern beer interest as found in other countries seems completely absent. This makes tasting beer in Franconia more of a challenge than in many other places, but also more rewarding. ...
Read | 2005-09-15 23:40 | 1 comment(s)
Franconia
When covering our holiday in Franconia, I figured it might be useful to start by explaining a little about Franconia, since it's an area few people really know much about. Most people, I think, know about Bavaria (Bayern in German); the southeasterly state of Germany, famous for wheat beer, Octoberfest, and so on. Franconia (Franken in German) is part of the state of Bavaria, but don't call a Franconian a Bavarian, as this is much like calling a Scotsman English. Franconia considers itself a separate region, and really is quite different from Bavaria, despite formally being part of the same state. ...
Read | 2005-09-10 21:34 | 9 comment(s)
A blog
I've been thinking about starting a blog for a long time, maybe a couple of years now. It always seemed like a good idea, but I was always held back by uncertainty about what to write about, how to write it, and how to find the time to write. Ideas for things to write would crop up now and then, but they never really excited me enough that I found myself doing anything about them. ...
Read | 2005-09-04 17:14 | 0 comment(s)