Eurostar is a sweet way to travel. We left Gare du Nord mid-afternoon, and in less than three hours arrived at St. Pancras in the heart of London. Two Tube stops later, we reached Covent Garden, where we stayed with my brother. We came across this florist in our neighborhood, a nod to Eliza Doolittle … Read more
We were coming to the end of our Paris stay. I barely stopped those last few days, visiting and revisiting my favorite places, wanting to imprint everything in my heart. I had walked through the Luxembourg Gardens several times already, this would be my last. A brief stroll on a beautiful afternoon, the park incandescent. … Read more
Funicular, Pest side of Danube, Budapest Last summer, my brother’s big birthday bash launched our travels through Europe By Train. Cara Black was struck by my post from Budapest and asked me to recount it at her blog, Murder Is Everywhere. We were traveling when I wrote it and Cara’s invitation gave me the chance … Read more
We say we’ll never forget, but we do. When I look back at my 2012-13 Letters from Asia www.dianarchambers.com/passages.php (written for Sisters in Crime www.sincnorcal.org), I’m grateful for the memories. So I wrote Europe By Train, a dozen posts in all, one per city. Please hop aboard for the entire journey or join me for a … Read more
Do I really have to go to Rome? Already planning how to return to Tuscany, I watch the Mediterranean fall away. Too soon, we reach Orbetello for our final European train journey. Wound down almost to a stop, I don’t quite feel ready for the “big city.” And Rome’s Termini is big…mid-twentieth-century modern set against ancient … Read more
We had come to Europe for my youngest brother’s big birthday bash in Maremma, a remote coastal area of Tuscany. After three weeks of train travel, we are ready to unwind – little knowing how dynamic the week will be! Following my online booking with Italia Rail, I receive only an unfamiliar PNR code, to … Read more
Masculine. Stark. This is my first impression as we arrive at Firenze’s Santa Maria Novello railway station. One thing I’ve noticed as we travel Europe by train is I always prefer the place we’ve just left. It takes about a day to get into real time. Venice is so ethereal, so pastel, that I am especially … Read more
We all have our public and private faces. So does that very grande dame Venice. Venezia. Everyone knows her canals, bridges, and palazzi. San Marco… And the gondolieri with their blue-and-white striped T-shirts… Her grand churches… But we have been lucky enough to spend time in her “backwaters” of Castello, a former ship-building center nearer … Read more
Imagine you lived in a 600-year-old kingdom, Austria-Hungary, which ruled a vast swath of central Europe, its own world of high culture, literature, art, and music. And then one day at the end of the Great War, you awoke to see your grand imperial city, Vienna, reduced to the capital of a small, powerless state. … Read more
Merre va Margit Hid? Where is Margaret Bridge? No offense, only affection for both: Prague is the cool, chic, with-it sister while Budapest is the wry intellectual in arty vintage clothing. During our six-hour train ride to Budapest, we chatted with an Aussie couple bound for a Danube cruise and two young Scots sampling the local … Read more