1

Exploring Europe
For me, travelling means to explore, see more while there is still time. Not the destination alone, also the road there. I feel I become a happier person with such rich experiences. A free spirit in motion, new personal growth, and new experiences. To meet new, interesting people. Learn more. Understand more. That is for me the importance of travelling.

2

Switzerland & Italy
Coming to Italy via Switzerland is relieving, good, warm. It smells of pine, sea and beach. Food and food culture is an integral part of the experience. Having moved all here south means freedom. The basic idea behind it to get away, have a holiday. The moving down here also means that we have seen many new places, new things. On our long journey...

3

Along the Riviera
We start the tour in Italy, in the beautiful coastal town of Portovenere. We enjoy a wonderful filletto with a rich, deep red Barbera on a board-walk restaurant. The next day the tour starts, along the Italian Riviera and the Cote d'Azur. We travel to France's best preserved medieval town.

4

From Strasbourg to London
I had long planned a drive from Strasbourg to England. So here I sit again. Browsing. I find that the very symbol of London, wax queen Marie Tussaud (1761-1850) was born under the name Anna Maria Grosholtz here in Strasbourg. I follow in her footsteps to London where…

5

Austria & Germany
At the turn of the 20th century, Vienna, capital of the vast but ailing Austro-Hungarian Empire, reflected on its past with pride and its future with uncertainty. The empire had nurtured Beethoven, Brahms, and Strauss. The city was home to Sigmund Freud, and considered a world leader...

6

Finland & Scandinavia
Scandinavia is fantastic in the summer as well as in the winter. Even though winter is a time when most of the peninsula is still covered in snow and ice, you will be surprised at how mild the temperatures actually are. In March, the sun is racing back and the days are already…

7

En route Warsaw - Budapest
A journey through the former Warsaw Pact countries. It hurts to come back to Eastern Europe after experiencing Scandinavia. Indeed, these countries have undergone great develop-meant since the Iron Curtain fell in 1990, but it is also terribly hard to think of…

8

Moscow and further east
It is January 1992. I am unexpectedly invited on a trip to the city of Orenburg on the border of Siberia. Along with two Britons whom I the last six months have helped to buy goods from Russia via Lithuania. Metals, timber and other things. As a Norwegian I cannot get a visa here..

9

The Baltic Hanseatic route
When I came to Vilnius for the first time it surprised me that I here found a city first and foremost influenced by Italy and other Mediterranean cultures, very different from the other two Baltic capitals, Riga and Tallinn, both built in accordance with German Hanseatic style.

10

Istanbul
I am in Conrad Hotel in Istanbul. The view from the terrace outside my hotel room is amazing. I look down at the beautiful city I've learned to like so much. The boats on the Bosporus Strait are crossing frantically back and forth between the Asian and the European side.