Travel Think Tank
My Berlin is a Wendersness. It is an existential black and whiteness where Bono and Lou Reed are singing a song on streetcorners and Nick Cave is crooning hypnotic tunes in some run-down basement … Berlin in the map of the imagination
I arrived in Paris on a charter plane from Ibiza after sunset one summer. I wanted films, interesting conversations about cinema and books, moonlight walks by the Seine, museums with fabulous art and everything the city had to offer. … Paris with no money and a wish to see it all
Messina, Sicily is forever linked in my memory with a rather peculiar character I met there. To add to my list of ” random people met on trips” meet Carlo. … In Messina with chameleons.Sicily.
The Greece I found; after a train to Bari and a ferry to Korfu, was different from Miller´s untrodden paradise. Still, I fell in love with it forever; I fell in love with its musical language, its delicious food, its people, its traditions, and the sheer beauty of its perfect little white towns overlooking the blue Aegean sea. … Mykonos: the modern thrill of ancient Greece
She would always speak of crystal-clear waters and untrodden paradise beaches, but, somehow, though we lived only a few kilometers away from the port of Sant Antoni in Ibiza, where one could take an inexpensive boat ride to the island, over 10 years went by before I saw Formentera with my own eyes. … Formentera: once a hippie paradise, still a killer vacation spot
Anyways, after this colorful ride, we were in Herculaneum. The differences with Pompeii are directly apparent on arrival. This is like looking at a whole city from above, only the roofs have been removed. Buildings here are much better preserved than in Pompeii, as Ercolano inhabitants were killed by the tremendous heat, and not by the ashes.
Herculaneum used to be a beach resort for rich Romans, so the ruins, located below ground level, are looking at an imaginary sea, as the water has long ago retired. Pompeii is huge, while Ercolano is rather manageable and, provided you have a good guide, you can get a pretty clear picture of it in one day. … ERCOLANO RUINS: Beyond Pompeii
It is very hard to connect the images of charming little Dubrovnik on the Dalmatian coast; with its cliffs overlooking blue seas and the perfect beige buildings with their orange roofs scattered across the hills, to Croatia´s violent past. … Dubrovnik, Croatia: A Mediterranean Phoenix
Making wine and building mansions hardly seem to be activities to carry out next to a time bomb like Vesubius, but, since this type of volcanoes can stay calm for a couple of thousand years, people tend to feel safe there, and so did I, as you can see in my video.
(Top photo by Kris de Curtis) … Mount Vesubius adventure video
Venice is a labyrinth of canals. It is easy to get lost on its narrow meandering streets, no matter how many maps you are carrying. The good thing about Venice is that getting lost there is a bliss. … Venice: Silent Gondolieri and fairy-tale romance
The Med is one of my favorite places on the … Mediterranean on a budget: Ten + travel tips