My beautiful and memorable trip

HI LADIES
I would like to share my first Europe trip with all of you. Hope you enjoy my posts. I will post about one country at a time.
We planned our trip by SOTC tours, which started on the 19th evening. We left on the 17th night as we wanted to spend a day more in UK. One more family known to us also joined us on that day. We left Abudhabi andboarded our Austrian airways flight from Dubai to Vienna around 1.45 a.m. We reached Vienna as scheduled,then took a connecting flight to London.When we came out of the airport it was around 8.a.m. Pretty cold and windy. Our chec in time was only 3 in the afternoon. Luckily we brushed our teeth and washed our faces in Vienna airport, otherwise whole of London would be stinking........
We had the food sitting in the doorstops of the INN, put our luggage in the lobby. Boarded a train, underground at Bayswater station. We simply fell over for the place , it looked the same as described in many English novels. They have retained all old structures, even telephone booths look nice and cute. Cute windows with laced curtains, well laid out gardens, flowers on window sills and lovely brick houses.
We visited Madam Tussuad. Took snaps with the lovely Julia Roberts, Audrey Hepburn as well as Churchill, Gandhi, Tendulkar, Dalai Lama, Queen Elizabeth. Enjoyed the train ride going through London's history.
Went to hotel to check in, had a quick shower, went to see London eye as this place was bus tour ride in our tour itinerary, we wanted to go for a ride. We watched the 3D show of London Eye first.Superb. Then we went up in the London Eye. Awesome. The weather was cloudy and overcast. No words to describe. We were tired, headed straight for the hotel.
The next day visited British Library, the biggest in the world. Then we went to see Change of guards at Buckingham Palace. The whole place looked like a picture postcard. Then we walked up Piccadilly circus. The entire road was only for entertainment. We saw many elephant toys beautifully carved huge on the roads. It seems these dolls are being auctioned and fund goes to elephant rehabilitation. The entire road was vibrant and colourful. We came back to the room and moved to the hotel where our tour started that evening.

 

First and foremost hats off to SOTC for having made it so memorable. Sightseeing, hotel bookings, food everything was perfect. Imagine having dhokla, kachori, rasgolla, carrot halwa, pav bhaji, poha, idli sambar for lunch/dinner. Our tour manager was excellent, very informative. Previous evening he would keep us informed about the next day program. It was wakeup call at 6, breakfast at 7 and check out 8. We traveled across Europe by a/c bus. It was like a family, there were 12 families.

Now to the first evening.
We boarded our bus for a guided tour of London.
First it was through Baker street, where previous afternoon we had taken a photo along with Sherlock Holmes. Then we viewed London Eye, BuckinghamPalace, Big Ben, St.Paul's cathedral, National history museum, London Bridge, West Minister Abbey, Piccadilly circus, Trafalgar square, St.Martin's church,Tower bridge, Royal Albert Hall, Hyde park, Green Park, Thames river etc., We also passed through Oxford Street, Kensington, Chelsea, Downing street, Sloane square, most expensive place, Shop where Queen bought her stuff, Harrods, Eaton street,e tc.,. After having a photo session, we headed for the hotel, to prepare for the journey next day to Brussels. Now on to Brussels.

 

We left London around 8 a.m.to Brussels. We went by Euro tunnel. Our bus was boarded onto a train from a place called Calais in France-UK border. It took 40 minutes. Belgium looks beautiful. Green pastures everywhere. We reached Brussels in the afternoon. We had a bus tour of Atomium a huge structure in the shape of a an atom. Science shows are being conducted there. Then we saw St.Micheal's cathedral, Albert's home, Mannakan pis, statue of a boy pissing, Grote market, Town square, Basilica and chocolate shop. The town square was with old buildings with flowers all over.
Tha night we stayed in a place called Eindhoven in Holland. Very lovely. The sun was up till 1 in the night. We saw 2 horses in the hotel backyard unusual one was wearing a coat!!! That night when we went for a walk we found people up in their backyard gardening....Now off to Amsterdam............

 

Yeah, I will post some pictures shortly. Even Amsterdam is a lovely place. My son had some project work and he could not come with us. He wanted me to take lot of pictures of only Amsterdam. Somehow even we are attracted to that place.

Now hop on we are on our way to Amsterdam.
We left Eindhoven Netherlands at 8 clock.,in the morning. Netherlands go its name as it does not belong to country. People are patriotic here. They love to keep their nation in tact. Population is 12 million, whereas bicycles are 12 million, people use that more. We passed by windmills. Countryside was lovely with ponds, canals, lot of farmhouses with garden area, cows, ducks roaming all around. Garden chairs, tables kept ready for afternoon tea. Windows draped with lovely lace curtains. We stopped by for an Indian veg lunch in a farm house.
Post lunch we saw how cheese is made, some are preserved at room temperature upto 2 years. Then we visited a shoe factory, shoes made of wood. Tradition is that if a man likes a lady, he would a make a pair of shoes and leave at her door step. If she is fine with it she would wear it the next day....
We visited a Diamond factory as well, wherein there was an exact replica of Kohinoor Diamond.
Then we went on a cruise, round the city, houses on either side were of all colors. It has 1500 bridges. Houses on either side narrow and they had a hook on the top to hoist goods on to the top floor. As land is scarce less windows. Then we saw the house Anne Frank lived. We also visited Madurodam, miniature theme park depicting the whole of Amsterdam. We also saw Peace palace and International Court of Justice.

After that we returned back to Eindhoven hotel to move on to Germany the next day.

 

We left for Germany the next day. We visited Cologne. Nice place. We visited Cologne cathedral. It is known for stained glass paintings which took 600 years to built. It was built for St.Peter and Virgin Mary. One of the tallest buildings prior to Eiffel tower. We were allowed to shop for an hour, where cuckoo clocks and cologne are famous.
Then we took a cruise from Boppad to St.Goar on the river Rhine. It was beautiful. Saw castles, houses, vineyards on both the sides. Legend says a lady fell into the river after having fallen in love with a sailor. Even now accidents happen in that spot. We saw Heidelberg castle. We walked over a wooden bridge where there was a statue of a monkey with a mirror. Tale goes that it warned the soldiers of a upcoming war and they won it. The reflection of the sun on the mirror gave a signal to the soldiers.
Then we went around the town of Heidelberg, saw the town hall, Cathedral, hotel killer, 500 age old five star hotel. We also the university there which has sanskrit as one of the languages. There are students from all over the world. That we stayed in a hotel there.

 

We left for Austria the next day.The drive was lovely,countryside awesome.We went to Swarovski Crystals Museum at a place called Wattens.The place was beautifully situated in the backdrop of the mountains and valleys.We saw various shapes of crystals of horses,ducks teddy bears,even crystals like sun and moon dancing together in the backdrop of lovely music.Plus there were crystals of all colors and shapes.One was India.Sekhar Gupta's film was being relayed as well.Chandelier of white cut crystal was also displayed.There was a circular room in the shape of a ball reflecting colors from all sides.It was lovely.
Then we went to Town called Innsbruck where we saw St.James cathedral,a17th century fountain with King Leopold's statue on a horse,Town hall,King Maximillian's old and newpalace with golden roof,an ornate Gothic balcony,statue of Virgin Mary built in the middle of the market.This is the place where 2 winter olympics were held.Then we were allowed to move about on our own.We listened to old classical music being played by a band of musicians and walked down a park.Lots of opera programs were going on in halls.We could hear that.All the window displays looked cute.Background of mountains made it look like setting out of the Movie SOUND OF MUSIC.We simply fell for the place.After dinner we set out for a walk,where we saw people enjoying their meals in road side cafes and enjoying World cup football matches.That night we stayed there.