The biggest hill: The Wrekin is a hunk of volcanic material that jutts out of the North Shropshire plain. It isn't and wasn't a volcano, it's volcanic rock moved here by the mystery of time.  It is a very pronounced geological feature, so much so that it spun a number of legends. The main one involves an unhappy giant. The giant was on his way to Shrewsbury with a huge shovel of earth to block the River Severn. He met a cobbler and asked how much further it wa...

One of the reasons we travel is to experience the little differences from place to place. One that is sort of subtle but pretty evident is how to interact with the person at the checkout. A few years ago in England my kids thought I'd gone crazy, we were in M&S or somewhere and I was chatting and joking with the checkout person. As we walked away my kids asked out I knew the checkout person, I replied, no that's just how it's done here. Well that was England,...

Berlin is thriving: I first came to Berlin in March 1990 a few months after the Wall officially came down, however it was still East and West Berlin and East and West Germany. The wall still cut through the city, no one knew what was coming, there was hope and energy and hammers left at the wall, I knocked off a few chunks, and left the hammer for the next person. Now the wall is gone except for a few pieces so we don't forget. There is a line of cobblestones se...

The biggest potential disaster of the trip was not getting the night train tickets in time. I bought the tickets online, only as I checked out did it say you cannot print them, but the must be mailed. It said you need 8 days, we had 10 so ever the optomist, I bought the tickets and crossed my fingers. You guessed it the tickets did not arrive before our flight to Prague. In Budapest they were not very helpful, I'd bought the tickets from Bann.de the Germany rai...

We arrived in Budapest from Vienna, a two and a half our train ride. We got to the apartment, small but really nice. The landlady has a big gentle Bull Mastif, called Charlie. Sjyana wanted to stay and pet the dog or bring it home to Boston. We're hoping Winston is doing ok back home. We headed up to the castle and palace and the Fisherman's Bastion on the Buda side. The bastion is fairly modern but looks historic, it gives fantastic views over the Danube, the m...