Bencard's Bites turns 15 with 855 articles in the archive

Today marks the 15th anniversary of a rainy bank holiday Monday when I sat down to experiment with the then fairly new trend of blogging. Since then, I've written an average of 59 articles a year covering arts and culture, travel and restaurant reviews. While I've always done this primarily for myself ... and it's proved jolly useful when trying to remember what I did, when ... I've built up a modest readership and am always hoping for more.

If you're reading on a mobile phone you are, sadly, not getting the full experience. It's only on the full-screen version that you see the side-columns and the all-important search function. In the side columns are round-ups of articles from various locations and themes: London, around England, Rome, Japan, wine tourism, etc. New since our last trip is an index of 23 articles on Germany and Austria. My favourite index is probably the list of 23 luxury hotel reviews; lots of precious memories and fantasies of return trips there. You might also enjoy all the Michelin-starred restaurant reviews I've written (27) in one place. Always fascinating is the automatically-generated list of the 10 most popular articles at any one time, which tends to be a mix of the most recent and the wildly random.

Originally called Ferrara's View, I started the blog after a high school reunion where classmates were disappointed that I wasn't writing anything they could read and were dazzled by the excitement of my life in London. I thought it was going to mostly be a food blog filled with restaurant reviews stemming from a 
job that saw me taken out to nice places a lot. (Check out London: A Golden City Built on Expense Accounts) Little did I know that I was starting my blog at the very end of that time of big marketing budgets and lavish hospitality. While fabulous work-related experiences have continued to spice my content, by the end of the '00s my stories came primarily from self-funded experiences; thus the shift to travel, museum exhibitions and opera. Though there is, naturally, a lot of food on offer.

My busiest year thus far has been 2015, with 72 different articles thanks to trips to Gascony, Denmark, Austria and Bavaria, my husband's 50th birthday celebrations, visiting American family and loads of cultural activity. But 2014 lagged by just one article. That was my 50th birthday year, when I celebrated in Sicily and the Maldives and packed in a giddy social schedule. Unsurprisingly, the pandemic years were the worst, with just 33 articles in 2020 and 29 in 2021. I'm not on track for many more this year, however, which does remind me that since February of 2020 I've been employed at the biggest and busiest job of my career ... which has nothing to do with this blog.

Average readers per article hover around 50, but a fair few stories have shot into the 1000s. Generally, they're entertainment or travel articles widely-shared by those reviewed. The magnificent Yeatman hotel, for example, is responsible for Porto appearing in three of my top ten. I'm amused that of the scores of art exhibition reviews I've written, it's one of the shows I liked least, the Royal Academy's exploration of Abstract Expressionism, that makes the list. I rather suspect it was my Trump reference and a mention of the Make America Great Again movement that sent search engines my way. It's also a charming mystery how, of all the many hotels I've written about ... famous and undiscovered, big and small, many in exotic locations ... a tiny, not particularly memorable B&B in Kent that's now out of business is my most-read accommodation review. I rather suspect it's because, with their own website taken down, my review is the top result when you Google them. Such are the vagaries of the internet.

My most popular articles of all time by reader's clicks are:

1. No resting on laurels: Longborough kicks off a new Ring June 2019

2. Killer Queen brings a legend to life with near-perfect illusion September 2017

3. Romden Castle: Kentish B&B let's you in on the "Tottering" life August 2015

4. Head to Porto to discover the range, beauty of Portuguese wines October 2016

5. RA's Abstract Expressionism show leaves me confused, but reflective November 2016

6. Four tips (with restaurants) for dining well in Porto October 2016

7. From the glorious Yeatman to a curious club ... places to stay in Porto November 2016

8. Mozart at his sublime best in original setting November 2016

9. Wisley's Garden Glow creates astonishing holiday magic December 2016

10. Six reasons Viking has exceeded expectations December 2016

The cluster of high numbers in 2016 tells me that something in the mysterious world of internet algorithms was going my way back then. I suspect that the more popular photo- and video-driven social media has become, the less popular my blog has been with search engines. I could work harder on promotion, and I always say I'm going to, but that gets very close to my real job. Thus the last thing I want to do in my free time.

Even if my promotion lags and my stories aren't as abundant, I will keep writing for you, dear readers. After 15 years, recording the loveliest things in my life here has become habit. And reading past entries gives me joy. As Oscar Wilde wrote:

"I can never travel without my diary, one should always have something sensational to read on the train."

The Hungarian horsemanship dazzled, but a few smiles would have helped

Hungarians trace at least some of their roots in the nomads of the Eastern Steppes and have always been revered as horsemen, so we jumped at the chance to take in an equestrian show when in Budapest. 

A bit of research shows that the Lázár Equestrian Park, 35 kilometres from Budapest in the valley of Domonyvölgy, is an overwhelmingly local facility, popular for weddings and family outings. While I suppose you could make your own arrangements, TripAdvisor reviews suggest that Viking passengers predominate amongst the foreigners who manage to get here, making this another exclusive win for the cruise line.

The 20-year-old facility, set in rolling parkland and luxuriously appointed, is a passion project of the Lázár brothers, affluent Hungarian businessmen who have a passion for international carriage racing, and hold a dazzling array of trophies in the sport.

On arrival, we gathered on a broad patio overlooking verdant lawns, noble trees and a sanded performance arena. Locals served snacks and shot glasses of pálinka, Hungary’s traditional eau de vie.  This was closer to the Everclear with which we almost killed ourselves in high school than the sophisticated distilling of the monks at Göttweig, but it certainly added local flavour. Jolly locals were celebrating family occasions in the adjoining restaurant. 

We, however, headed across the lawns to rows of covered benches adjoining the arena. Our crew, and a group from another Viking ship, were the only people here, about 60 people in all making this an intimate performance. The show featured plenty of derring do, most notably a daredevil who stood on the backs of his team of four as he drove them around the arena and a Mongolian lad who showed off his prowess shooting from horseback at full gallop. The announcer made a specific point of saying they’d invited him to join the company because nomadic Mongolians closely resembled the people from whom modern Hungarians are descended. We saw a bit of traditional carriage racing, and solo horsemen doing impressive things with whips, plus more sedate modes of transport like a plodding oxcart drawn by nobly-horned beasts. 

After the show, visitors had a chance to stroke the horses and take pictures with the performers before walking to the side of the arena where we climbed into farm wagons for a horse-drawn ride through the local countryside. This ended up at a museum where the Lázárs tell the story of the history of carriage racing before moving into a room that tells the story of the brothers themselves. You exit through a lucite-walled tunnel, on all sides of which are trophies won by the brothers. You may have never heard of the Lázárs or carriage racing, but by the time you leave you’ll be impressed with their accomplishments. 

The final stop is a petting zoo, notable for a kennel full of Hungarian Puli dogs and curly-haired Mangalitsa pigs. The Hungarian breed looks like a bizarre cross between pigs and sheep, and has been trending recently in the UK … even getting a mention on The Archers. It was great fun to see one for real.

The excursion wasn’t perfect. The show was remarkably brief and the performers perfunctory; I never saw a smile. It felt like they’d done the routine so many times it was tedium to them, and they were going through the paces to get through work and home to their families as soon as possible. The wagon ride was also fleetingly brief; I would have liked to at least double the time.

But, overall, it felt like something exciting and different from what most people would do in Budapest, and it was fun. For those reasons, it became one of my top Viking excursions … even if the grumpy performers weren’t happy to see us.

Exclusivity, contentment and apricots: The magic of Göttweig

In these days of abundant travel, when anyone can go anywhere with a credit card and an advanced booking, exclusive access makes an experience particularly special. That’s what distinguished our visit to the Benedictine abbey of Göttweig.

Anyone can visit the abbey during the day, and it’s well worth the effort. It’s known as the Austrian Montecassino because of its lofty, isolated position and the stunning views from its terraces. The layout is based on the Escorial in Spain, and the interiors are blockbuster Baroque, including one of the largest painted staircases in Austria. It looks over the Wachau Valley, so gorgeous in both landscape and architecture the whole landscape is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

But thanks to our excursion with Viking Cruises, we entered after the place closed to the public. Being there in the early evening meant the light was exquisite and the surroundings silent. A sense of peace prevailed. I would have signed up on the spot to return for one of their residential prayer retreats had a monk popped up to give me the hard sell. (Given that our brother school, where my mother once taught, was a Benedictine priory, I have a soft spot for the brothers in black robes in any case.) Göttweig is spectacularly beautiful; the conditions pushed it to magical.

We had a local guide with us for the drive up to the abbey, who then took us into the church. We’d toured Melk earlier in the day, the magnificence of which certainly risked making Göttweig a pale second. Not so. The church here is far simpler, but in some ways better for it. Melk was all about drama and show, while Göttweig felt like a place for contemplation. That’s not to say it wasn’t also spectacular, with virtuoso paint effects on its walls and ceiling and an altar of writhing, golden, Baroque magnificence. Unique, in my experience, were the barley twist columns on either side of the altar piece in a duck egg blue, shimmering as if they were glass Christmas ornaments. I was mesmerised.

We’d return to the church later, but next we crossed the inner courtyard … framed on three sides with a horseshoe of buildings but the fourth left open to the stunning landscape, letting God have a hand in the design …to the palatial wing with the ceremonial staircase. And palatial is an appropriate word to use here, since the royal family treated abbeys as their homes away from home when they travelled around their dominions.  The monks were the caretakers of these adjunct palaces, not their residents. They would have occupied something far more austere in another wing.

The staircase is as good as promised, an enormous white way climbing from two sides, combining into one, beneath the painted ceiling. 

The lack of colour below the roofline emphasises the magnificence of the fresco above, a rather ludicrous depiction of the Emperor Charles VI as Apollo. As flattering as the artist Paul Troger could be … and you assume it was in his job description to sex the emperor up … Charles was no Greek god. It doesn’t matter, however. The whole thing is such a pastel-coloured scene of joyfulness you can’t help but smile.

At the top of the stairs, we got to poke our noses into two royal apartments full of museum displays and blessed with the same view as the courtyard. The real wonder, though, was the blue panelling with painted insets of classical scenes and birds and beasts of the rivers. Check out the fabulous beaver in the scene below; the animals would have been just about hunted to extinction in Europe at the time this was painted.

We descended the stairs to discover a modern treasure of the abbey awaiting us: the apricot brandy and liqueur produced here. The Wachau valley is famous for its apricots and the monks do them justice. The liqueur isn’t the sickly sweet stuff you think of when you hear “schnapps” but more like a dessert wine subtly flavoured with ripe apricot. The brandy is, naturally, fiercer, but still retains its fruity aromas and flavours. I regret not buying, but my available luggage space was mostly gone by this point.

We descended further to another surprise. Built into the foundations of this building is a restaurant with outdoor terraces hugging the hillside. Here, the view is even better than from the courtyard and the palace rooms, as it extends all the way to the Danube snaking through lush agricultural land. (There were a lot of apricot trees down there, somewhere.) 

We walked through the now-empty restaurant, which only opens to the public at lunch, to a private dining room with an enormous window that took in that view. The food was beautifully presented, and tasty other than an over-cooked piece of chicken, the local wines were excellent and the service spectacular, but all of this faded in comparison to that view. Only one thing rose above it: Marillenknödel. This apricot dumpling was the single best dessert I had on the trip, and considering we spent most of our two weeks in Germany and Austria, that is saying a lot. I might not have come home with any alcohol, but I have the monks’ dumpling recipe.

After dinner, we climbed back up to the main courtyard, crossed it and entered the church as the low angle of the setting sun turned parts of it a colour you might just find on a blushing, ripe … apricot. 

Inside, one of the monks waited to give us a traveller’s blessing. Maybe you need to be Catholic to really comprehend this, but between the full stomach, the setting sun, the kindness radiating from the priest and the embrace of that gorgeous architecture, it was as if my mother had popped down from heaven for a few minutes to wrap a warm blanket around me and hold be in her arms. Such peaceful contentment is a rare and wonderful thing, and not something you associate with sightseeing excursions. And that, even more than the aura of exclusivity, is why Göttweig made my list of best excursions this holiday.

Rothenburg ob der Tauber is the Germany of your dreams

When Disney's designers return to a place for inspiration repeatedly for more than 80 years, it deserves the adjectives "fairy tale". So it is with Rothenburg ob der Tauber, model for Geppetto's village in Pinocchio (1940) and Belle's village in the 2017 live action version of Beauty and the Beast. It makes no difference that the wooden puppet's tale comes from Tuscany, and that Belle is supposed to live in France. Rothenburg is what fairy-tale villages are supposed to look like. You expect the seven dwarves to go high ho-ing around a corner, off to at work any minute. And while it's not a direct copy, the German pavilion at Epcot is a hotch-potch of architectural elements lifted from this Franconian town. 

It was also the village that the childcatcher stalked in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, and has shown up in more than 30 other films. It’s seared into your imagination even if you haven't been there. No wonder this is the most famous town on the 220-mile stretch known as the Romantic Road; Rothenburg is the pattern from which a thousand Germanic fantasies have been cut. (The Nazis felt the same way, but Germans and visitors alike have agreed to overlook that darker history; architecture can’t help what people do with it.)

It was the first place on our holidays where the pandemic felt well and truly over; by 11am every street was packed and queues spilled from popular establishments. Rothenburg teeters perilously close to being one of those places, like Versailles or Mont Saint-Michel, where crowds make the experience so miserable it’s not worth going. So a good reason to bother with a guided tour here is to be with people who can work around the traffic flow.

We started from Karlstadt at 8:15. Early for a holiday, to be sure, but it meant we were rolling into Rothenburg around 9:30, well before things got too crowded. We were also treated to a gorgeous drive along a stretch of the Romantic Road with deep valleys, winding streams, verdant pastureland and picture-postcard half-timbered hamlets. It would have been easy to drive yourself, but it was nice to be a passenger and just take it all in.

Our early arrival meant our walking tour was relatively unencumbered by crowds, people only starting to jostle as we finished and rolled into time on our own. The included lunch later was at a restaurant within a hotel. Whether it had been booked exclusively for us or the hotel just doesn’t get much lunch traffic I don’t know, but finding someplace to sit down for a leisurely lunch without local knowledge would probably have needed queuing.

The tour was also pleasingly efficient in its route. The bus dropped us off in the car park near the Klingentor, quite literally at the top of things as the whole place cascades down a hill. This upper bit of the old town has fewer shops and tourist attractions, so is much quieter while still being picturesque. There’s also a large and spotlessly clean public toilet just inside the walls, at the edge of the Schrannenplatz, always a useful thing to know about. Our explorations took us ever downward, gently, and across town, until we finally rejoined the bus at a car park near the Spitaltor, on the far side of the historic district from where we entered.

And, of course, going with a local guide gives you the inside scoop on history, local attractions and culture. Most of that can be found in books or audio guides, of course, but they don't have the charm of human interaction.

Was Rothenburg worthy of its reputation? Absolutely. It is heart-stoppingly beautiful. Like Bruges and Venice, Rothenburg was a much bigger deal in the past than it is today. In the high Middle Ages it had a population four times its current one and was one of the richest and largest cities in the Holy Roman Empire. A favourite of royals, a hub of trade and a popular home of religious orders, it was packed with impressive churches, gorgeous mansions, showy towers and attractive shops. Then came the Thirty Years’ War.

The town's most enduring story from that time is a cheerful one that explains the clock on the market square. A Protestant leader captured the town and threatened to burn it down and kill all within. The Catholic councilmen tried to get him drunk so he'd go on his way. He refused, saying he would back off from his threats only if someone could drink all the wine he'd been offered ... 3 1/4 litres ... in one go. The mayor downed the prodigious quantity in one, the general left, and both are now automatons facing each other across the clock, with the mayor raising his oversized stein on the hour.

The reality of the war was far worse, bringing famine, conflict and the disruption of trade routes. Toward the end came plague. Rothenburg never recovered, a much reduced and much less affluent population maintaining what was there but never adding anything. It was the Romantic artists of the 19th century who "re-discovered" the place and it's been on tourist maps ever since. The money that comes with visitors has allowed all of those churches, towers, mansions and shops to be in a robust state of preservation, decked out in cheery pastels and enlivened by highly-decorative half-timbering. And yet the modern stores and housing ringing the historic centre, and signs for civic government, doctors and schools within the walls suggest this isn't just a tourist venue but still a living town.

There's far more for a tourist to do here than a few hours of free time can conquer. Many will head for the town walls, which completely circle the old town and are amongst just a few complete circuits left in Germany. The views must be spectacular throughout; the bit we ventured onto above the river Tauber was glorious. We skipped the Criminal Museum with its collection of torture instruments. Funny how such things intrigued me as a child but, as I've grown up and appreciated the reality of the world, I now find distasteful. Being history buffs, we naturally headed instead to the Imperial City Museum. It's a charmingly home spun affair, with a crowded jumble of artifacts and mannequins that look like they were liberated from store windows in the late 1960s before donning their 17th century costume, but we enjoyed it. There's a bit of everything, from weapons to furniture to historic documents to art and decorative objects, but the main focus is on the Thirty Years' War, with costumed figures set up to portray different scenes from history.

Another highlight is the headquarters location of the Käthe Wohlfahrt Christmas retail empire in two buildings facing each other over the road. There is no better Christmas shop in the world, a truth I understood the moment I stepped into the UK branch in York. That wonderland was just a teaser for the enormous sprawl in their home town. I have never seen more ornaments, nativity sets, nutcrackers and the like in one place in my life. The fact that I raced through, and bought nothing, is only due to a husband at my shoulder with a raised eyebrow and an aversion to excess that leaves a third of my existing Christmas decorations in their boxes in the garage.

Wohlfahrt is not alone. This is a town full of galleries, boutiques and quirky retail offerings. There's even a sprawling shop dedicated to historic cosplay. If you fancy your own hauberk and chain mail, this is the town for it.

One of the most famous views in a place packed with instagrammable scenes is at the Plönlein, a place where the cobbled street divides on either side of a mustard yellow, half-timbered cottage (Belle's, in Beauty and the Beast), and both lanes, lined with interesting architecture, lead off to picturesque city gates. The Glocke Winery and Hotel is a bright blue building whose location across from the street-splitting cottage must give it as many social media appearances per year as a Kardashian. This is where we had our lunch, in a cozy dining room looking over the Plönlein. The room was decorated with local memorabilia and had particularly interesting chandeliers with rearing lions and inscribed metal tags I wish I would have asked about.

Our meal of soup, followed by sausages, cabbage and potatoes, ended with strudel and was accompanied by local wine. The focus was supposed to be on Franconian food, and on wine after days in beer country. Here’s my only complaint of the day: the epicurean in me could have used some explanation of the meal before us. What were the differentiating qualities of the wine? What makes Franconian food distinct from other German regions? I was too busy talking to my fellow travellers to ask, and the waiting staff didn’t volunteer. I suppose it gives me a reason to return.

And I would like to return to Rothenburg. As an independent traveller I’d happily settle into the Glocke hotel, or better yet check out something like the Gasthaus Schranne in the much quieter area where we entered town. I’d spend my early mornings and evenings in town, and the heart of the day in a car exploring smaller and lesser known areas of the Romantic Road in either direction. Rothenburg would be the perfect location for a week-long water colouring or drawing course, so I could improve on this effort:

As an introduction to the town, however, our guided excursion within our Viking Cruise was an excellent investment.

Forget the cathedral. Beer, and a distinctive drinking culture, is the reason to head to Cologne

Sightseeing-wise, Cologne was a bust. I found the much-celebrated cathedral inferior to a long list of others*. The famous perfume is perfectly pleasant but I can buy scents I like better for a more reasonable price. Much of the city centre is remarkably ugly. Like many German cities, it was flattened by bombs in WWII, but post-war construction here veered towards modernism and away from re-creation. (In this, Cologne should be twinned with London.) For me, its star sight is a roman mosaic from an ancient dining room on display in a brutalist concrete museum now closed to the public but, fortunately, you can still see the floor through a window at the back and to the right of the cathedral.

The city was redeemed, however, by its beer. There's only one thing on tap here: Kölsch. It's pale, dry, crisp, and served pleasantly cold. It's all highly regulated, with ingredients limited, processes defined and the ability to call it Kölsch restricted to 50 km from Cologne. But that doesn't mean it's all the same. Many of Cologne's copious drinking establishments brew their own versions and aficionados claim different varieties have different fruity notes you don't often find in a German lagers. Anyone can wander into a Cologne pub and get a drink, but going out for an evening with a local guide brought us to the right places and helped us understand the distinctive drinking culture.

Kölsch is served in what, at first, may seem a laughably small glass. The tall, thin, 200 ml (6.8 oz) cylinder is called a Stange, and may strike you as an oversized shot glass. A thirsty drinker could down it in a few gulps. But here's the magic: it just keeps coming. 

You don't order a beer in Cologne. You enter the brew house , find your place, and a waiter (the Köbes) will come up with a circular tray with a tall handle in the middle (the Kranz), full of glasses, and give you one. Because this is really the only thing you drink in Cologne. When your glass is empty, your lovely Köbes is at your elbow with another. And he will be there, again and again, until you place your beer mat on top of your glass to stop the flow. While the initial 200 ml won't go to your head, you can imagine how constant top ups across the evening could do damage to your equilibrium and your wallet. Fortunately, all the evening’s drinking was covered by the excursion price, no matter when or if we decided to deploy our bar mats. This made the price better value for money for some than others.

While our guide on the day’s earlier walking tour (included in the basic cruise price) had focused understandably on history and architecture, the evening’s guide delved deeper into the people and culture. The locals, it turns out, are quite an anarchic bunch. Fiercely independent, fond of parties, lovers of food and drink and … according to our Cologne-born guide … have the best sense of humour in Germany. I couldn't help remembering the fun-loving the Osakans and their prickly relationship with Tokyo. 

Predominantly Catholic, Cologne was absorbed into the staunchly Protestant Prussian kingdom after the Napoleonic era and it was never a comfortable fit. Though there are statues of Prussian kings dotted around the place, they’re treated with mocking contempt. A pre-Lenten Carnival is the party of the year, characterised by Venetian levels of costume, drinking and mayhem. Naturally, the locals kick off the party under a statue of Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm III, a devout Protestant who hated the whole Carnival idea and tried to shut it down.

We started our evening at the Brauerei zur Malzmühle across the street from the Heumarkt, the enormous town square on which that king’s equestrian statue prances. The Schwartz family have been brewing and hosting visitors here for 160 years, and they’re now one of the few establishments still brewing on site in the city centre. The decor is traditional but restrained 19th century German beer hall, with lots of stained glass, wood, festoons of dried hops and memorabilia from carnivals past.

In the best tradition of pub crawls, we lined our stomach here with a hearty dinner to better absorb the alcohol of the evening. Local delicacies here mean pork. Our group shared platters of pork knuckle, sauerbraten, smoked sausage, black pudding, and even a pork tartare. It was both delicious and a bold statement of faith in the freshness and purity of the local meat. (I suspect serving raw pork would be illegal in England, despite the quality of our pork industry.) On the side came fried potatoes and a lightly pickled sauerkraut that bore no resemblance to the cheek-puckering stuff sold in groceries. Even professed sauerkraut haters tried it and found it tasty. Of other vegetables, there was no sign and,  in the local mind, no need. It wasn’t the first time it occurred to me that a vegetarian might starve to death in Germany, and devout Jews and Muslims would be eating from a very reduced menu. My husband, meanwhile, was nearing a coma of transcendent happiness with so many interpretations of his favourite protein in one place.

After a stroll across the Heumarkt to let the food settle, we landed at the Pffafen Brauerei on the square’s northeast corner. You can’t miss the dignified, salmon-pink Baroque building with its ornate wrought iron pub sign, but it’s the crazy interiors that make this place memorable. There’s stained glass here, too, but more abundant and more modern, particularly in the multi-story entrance hall with its enormous chandelier that feels a bit like a cathedral of beer. Push in to the long, narrow building and you’ll be dazzled by a profusion of woodcarving. Local artists have been adding to the place since the current brewer took it over in the 1970s. There are carnival goers, cherubs, monks (pfaffen in the local dialect), hops and foliage. Much is traditionally decorative, but some gets quirky, with heads springing from barrels, figures holding up tables and mischievous faces looking around corners. Here’s Cologne’s anarchic sense of humour at work. 

While the brewers here, Päffgen, supply a variety of brew houses across the city, this is the only one where it comes straight from the wooden barrels. Which, experts tell me, makes a difference. I found their version slightly hoppier and heavier than the Malzmühle Kölsch, but I'd be hard pressed to tell the difference in a blind taste test.

A lane called the Saltzgass leads east from the corner, down a hill towards the Rhine. Its name, “salt alley” gives a nod to a precious commodity mined in Germany and shipped up and down the Rhine since Roman times. The street is all restaurants and brew houses now, our last stop dominating the middle stretch.

Bierhaus en d’r Salzgass is in a historic former brewery dating back 400 years. Brewing stopped here in 1907 and the place changed hands as a restaurant multiple times through the 20th century, but it saw new owners and a major renovation in early 2003. The beer was the same Päffgen we’d just left at Pffafen, just not out of a barrel. No, I couldn’t tell the difference. But that didn’t matter, because it’s the interiors that made this place. Polished, dark wood abounds: columns, panelling, an impressive central bar soaring two stories. In fact, the whole central room is double height, with a second story of revellers able to look over their wrought iron balustrades onto the drinkers below. Another festive establishment with the ambiance of a cathedral. I have a feeling that’s no coincidence in this city.

We Brits could have happily explored one or two more places, but our American fellow travellers were lagging and quick to raise their beer mats. We adjourned to the ship's bar and continued our celebrations there. No Germanic woodcarving, and Kölsch only in bottles that ... gasp ... exceeded 200 ml. We coped.

At 5pm that day, I'd considered Cologne a wasted stop on the cruise. By 11pm I was wondering if we could come back for the Christmas Market or Carnival. That's the difference some good local insight can make. Prost!

*To be fair, because it was the week before Easter the cathedral's ambulatory ... that horseshoe of chapels ringing the high altar ... wasn't open. Most of the cathedral's treasures are back there. If the building has any chance of competing with places like Chartres, Milan or Canterbury, you need to see it outside of Holy Week.

 

People, pace and a handful of special excursions top our river cruise memories

 Looking back with a month’s perspective on our European river cruise, three things made it unique. The people, the pace and a handful of special excursions coordinated by Viking. I’m not talking about my favourite sights (the Baroque palaces), or the places I’m most keen to return to on my own (the stretch known as the Romantic Rhine), but the things we couldn’t have replicated if we’d defaulted to our usual continental holiday and organised ourselves. 

The People

We inevitably chat with people and strike up new acquaintances on holiday, but river cruises should be thought of in the same way as an organised group tour. You are with the same people for the duration, and numbers are small enough that you’ll be on nodding terms with almost everyone in a few days. There’s only one dining room and one lounge, so unless you seek the solitude of your room, you’re sharing your holiday with these people. While I wouldn’t want to do it all the time, it was a pleasant novelty, and there was great joy in comparing each others’ days, seeing familiar faces and forming a little community, albeit temporary. 

The staff added to this, with their incomparable skill for making each cruises’ passenger list feel unique. (It’s hard to believe they’ve delighted two more iterations since we left and probably don’t remember a thing about us.)

The surprising imbalance of nationality … given the scope of Viking’s marketing in the UK … was a distinctive factor of the trip. Of 90 passengers we were the only two resident outside the US. If I ever needed proof that I’ve “gone native”, this was it. My accent may still be American but my world view, behaviours and conversational topics are solidly English and European. While the near-celebrity status our foreign origin gave us was fun, and I rather enjoyed everyone seeking my opinion on the Royal family, we found it a bit odd to consistently feel the outsiders, especially when cruising through places so close to home. If either Americans or group togetherness bother you, this may not be the trip for you.

The Pace

I adored the stately pace of river travel. Though my love of art and architecture will always push me into a sightseeing frenzy in historic territories, some of my favourite memories of the trip will be of the cruising times. (This is radically different from ocean cruises, where the flat, blue expanses of days “at sea’ generally offer little to interest the eye.) While the two afternoons of scenic cruising down the Rhine and Wachau valleys were as spectacular as promised, it was solitary mornings on my balcony that I’ll treasure most. 

While the waterways we travelled are full of big, industrial cities, Viking plans the route so the ship is going through less attractive areas when you're asleep, or off sightseeing. Most mornings brought the joys of a pastoral riverbank.  In many cases the scenery wasn’t noteworthy, but the peace of the riverside, the babble of brooks joining the river, the morning chorus of wildfowl in an otherwise silent world soothed the soul. Of course the misty morning on which I stepped out to see King Ludwig I's circular temple celebrating the defeat of Napoleon, the Befreiungshalle, looming over the trees as we pulled into the riverbank to tie up was a special combination of art and nature.

Both of those elements are probably typical of other cruise companies, but Viking would certainly argue that they differentiate themselves on the quality of their special excursions. Marketing solidly into the cultural tourism space, Viking includes one guided tour at each destination and these are always with thoughtful, well-educated guides. (Although we were really curious if those guides would have given us a different take on things had they not been using their script for Americans.) But there is almost always the chance to add on specialist tours (for a fee, naturally), and some of these were particularly good.

The Excursions

We were a bit profligate with our excursion booking, given that our starting point was a very large credit with Viking. (Due to the cancelled cruise you can read about here.) They weren't all a success. The cruise on the salt barge on the River Inn was too brief (Our time on the boat was roughly equal to the time on the bus to get there), the "baroque town" of Scharding was pleasant but didn't live up to its promise and the salt making pit-stop was so brief as to be almost pointless. That excursion needed another hour or two to live up to its billing. The special access to the Lipizzaner stallions and stable in Vienna sounded good, but reality was one group moving through immediately after another at maximum density, while a quick search shows you can book the same tour for yourself on multiple websites for less. So not so special. 

The deep dive into Gouda cheesemaking was good, and I loved the fact we were on a family farm where dad took us through the dairy operation before handing over to the daughter who made the cheese. But I really wanted us to then sit down and get guided through a tasting, with some attention given to why Gouda is special and what differentiated the different varieties. Instead it was a rushed visit to the store where we could spear samples on toothpicks while the bus waited. Almost great, but not quite.

But a pub crawl with a fantastic local guide, our ship's hotel manager adding to the local colour, redeemed an otherwise unimpressive Cologne and gave us some proper local food. A tour of storybook Rothenburg not only gave us the main sights but some quiet backstreets; the drive there was spectacularly beautiful. A private tour and dinner in a Benedictine abbey felt properly exclusive ... we only saw a few other people ... and was made all the better by a traveller's blessing by one of the monks in their spectacular, off-the-beaten track church.  In Hungary, a drive out of Budapest brought us into beautiful horse country where daredevil riders showed off equine skills dating back to their nomad forefathers who originally established the country.

I'd advise anyone on this cruise to go easier on the extra excursions. We overdid it, pumping up the base cost of the trip substantially, and ending up with a schedule so busy we undermined the R&R part of the holiday. The four above, which I'll cover in the a coming article for each, are the ones I'd do again.

Raphael and Wagner make an ordinary London Saturday extraordinary

Standing room only on suburban trains. The Tube packed body to body. Central London’s pavements heaving with people as far as the eye can see. The world is starting to return to normal. Except that this was a Saturday. A Saturday without major festivals, landmark concerts or sporting events. And not many foreign tourists; the voices around me were British. It was an unexceptional weekend. On which the commuter lines were more crowded than any weekday in our post-Pandemic world.

I suspect that this is the new normal. Workers who now commute to London just one or two days a week, if at all, have a whole new attitude towards heading in for fun on the weekends. We’ll see if the trend holds, and if the rail companies continue to treat the weekends as off peak, or see a cheeky chance to raise their rates.

We were in the crowds for the Raphael exhibition at the National Gallery and Tannhauser at the Royal Opera. Though fellow attendees would have made up a tiny proportion of the crowds surging through the West End, both are perpetually sold out activities drawing rave reviews and steady bookings. While not necessarily comfortable bedfellows, I’m glad we were able to book both on the same day.

I had an art history professor at university who claimed that people’s instinctive love for the landscapes of Tuscany and Umbria came from the dreamy backgrounds of the paintings of Raphael and his school. We’re offered heavenly scenes of Mary, Jesus and the saints, always sitting in verdant valleys with picturesque hill towns over their shoulders. Heaven = Italy. I’m not sure about my professor’s argument … there are a lot of picturesque towns in the back of renaissance German and Netherlandish paintings as well … but there’s no question Raphael works very hard to transport us to a slice of heaven.

Having so much of his work in one place proves what anyone who knows Raphael instinctively senses: let others be edgy or provocative, Raphael is the Disney animation of the Renaissance. Good triumphs over evil, people are impossibly beautiful and the world is a pastel-tinted garden of delight. This is a man who painted far more madonnas and children than crucifixions. When he offers us a martyr, it’s Catherine standing demurely by her wheel, looking like she never suffered more than a mild cold in her whole life. 

No surprises there. If this show treads any new ground, it’s about giving us Raphael in the round. Not just the child prodigy painter and beloved party boy famed for irritating Michelangelo, but a sophisticated workshop owner and businessman who designed medals and objets d’art, worked as an architect and followed Albrecht Durer’s lead in printmaking. The rooms on these lesser-known endeavours are the most interesting in the exhibition and I wish they’d been bigger. All of his architectural work, and most of his monumental frescoes, are crammed into the smallest gallery in the show. That includes a fabulous video of major buildings in Italy that deserved a space where people cold properly enjoy it.

Raphael can actually be a bit divisive: you either love him or he leaves you cold. I’m the former, Mr. B the latter, and the show sparked a lot of conversation about whether the warts-and-all precision of the Northern Renaissance is actually better art. My point: Raphael is as much about how he makes you feel as what he’s painting. His world is as comforting as a scented bubble bath, and suffused with love. I’m happy with that.

Lohengrin, of course, is suffused with love, too. But things don’t end as well in this Germanic take on the Cupid and Psyche story. In short: one of the knights entrusted with the sacred duty of guarding the Holy Grail gets a pass from his usual duties to go into the world to save a damsel in distress. They fall in love. He marries her, but the catch is that she … and no one else … can ever ask his name or where he’s from. Scheming busybodies ignite our heroine’s curiousity, she forces her new husband to reveal his identity, he does, but then has to leave forever. 

This being an opera by Wagner, that simple storyline takes four and a half hours to roll out, accompanied by a lot of majestic music. Best known, amongst many familiar snippets, is the wedding chorus most people know as “here comes the bride.” Mr. B and I used that at out wedding, with the choir singing the original German lyrics, so seeing Lohengrin on stage for the first time together carried an additional spark of joy for us.

It had been eight years since we’d stepped into the Royal Opera House, deciding after the mixed bag that was Maria Stuarda that the ticket prices and add on costs of seeing opera in London just weren’t worth it when we could access so much in the country house season and in the cinema. But our go-to Longborough Festival Opera had never done Lohengrin, and we were eager to see it live. Given our limited expenditure on entertainment during COVID, we even splurged on better seats than usual.

We made a good call. The performers delivered a stellar performance (with the baddies stealing the show), the orchestra was magnificent and if you’re going someplace that has the ability to put a huge chorus on stage, Lohengrin is a fabulous opera to deploy it in. The pacing and acting were fantastic. I had no sense of so much time passing; we could have been binge watching something at home.

My only gripe was with the fascists at war staging, which had me looking for an evil dictator and a brainwashed populace. Neither are part of the story. The sets and costumes looked good, they just didn’t add to the storytelling. 

Because the opera had started at three we were spilling out into Covent Garden at 7:45, looking for someplace to dine. The crowds were still formidable and anything in the market halls was packed solid. To my husband’s great disappointment, the Brasserie Blanc there didn’t survive the pandemic. So we wandered towards Angela Hartnett’s Cafe Murano, which did. There were no tables available, but there’s a bar with comfortable stools and gregarious barmen to handle walk-ins, and we had a celebratory round of cocktails before a delicious dinner. I gave this place a lukewarm review when we went in its preview week, but it’s settled in to become a dependable provider of excellent, upscale, authentic Italian fare with a gourmet twist. 

The train home was as crowded as the one in the morning, now boisterous and more than a bit drunken. It still felt bigger than the average Saturday. For us, it certainly was.

When will you realise? Vienna waits for you

 If you're only allowed one adjective for Vienna, it must be elegant.

Other European capitals are edgy, cosmopolitan, exciting, even more beautiful. But nothing is quite like Vienna on the elegance scale. You can watch it on television every year as formally-attired Viennese turn out for New Years' concerts and balls. See it in their love of grandiose architecture and formal coffee houses. Hear it as Mozart and Strauss still offer a soundtrack for the city. Touch it in stiff white tablecloths and tightly clipped park greenery. Live it if you ever have to assemble a guest list to a business event (the
Viennese demand the use of, and respect for, every title they've earned.) Though it's been more than a century since her heyday, Vienna is still a grand dame of the late 19th century; affluent, rigorously intellectual, traditional to a fault yet adventurous enough to let Klimt paint her portrait. And seemingly completely unaware that the Austro-Hungarian empire has been consigned to history.

Mr. B and I both knew the city already, me from a flurry of business conferences I attended in the late '00s when the entry of a group of Eastern European countries into the EU en masse meant Vienna seemed to be the centre of everything for a while. I hadn't been back since, but little in the centre has changed beyond continuing cleaning and restoration projects. The grande dame is looking better than ever. 

Having done the basics, we ignored most of the cruise ship's organised activities to head off on our own. Here's what Vienna lovers get up to on a repeat visit.

Arms and Armour

Vienna's Imperial Amoury is, in my experience, the best collection of Western arms and armour in the world. Because my husband hadn't seen it, our plan was to spend a big chunk of a day here. Then circumstance smiled upon us. The Armoury's curators have plucked the most beautiful examples from the collection, augmented them with some unique loans and created Iron Men: Fashion in Steel, running in the main Kuntshistorisches Museum until 26 June 2022.

The show concentrates on those years, roughly aligned with the Renaissance, when armour was losing its efficacy on the battlefield but gaining ground as a symbol of authority for leaders on parade. Though there are plenty of examples of outrageous fashion from earlier eras, most notably ridiculously pointed metal shoe tips that must have been like walking in swim flippers, 

the displays really get going from 1500. Freed from most defensive requirements, armour's artistic qualities came to the fore and much in this show can be considered enormous slabs of body jewellery. 

Some of the more spectacular examples include a suit where a special process turned the steel blue-black, then makers embellished the borders with gold; detachable armour sleeves meant to look like the billowing, puffy fashion of the age; a "repousse" example where scores of writhing figures and foliage were punched out from the inside to make 3-D scenes, and enameled examples bold with colour. 

There are helmets so outrageous I refused to believe they could have been worn in a joust until I saw the 14th c illustrations that proved it. 

The exhibition is rounded out with accessories, design sketches, contemporary illustrations, reliquaries, and even toys, but the main draw here is case after case of spectacular suits of armour and their matching helmets. 

If you happen to be in Vienna before 26 June do check out this fantastic show, otherwise head to the Armoury to seek out these pieces in the larger collection.

Art ... and one of the best Cafes in Vienna

The exhibition meant I didn't even have to cajole my husband into the art museum. We were already there. As you might expect, the Habsburgs accumulated an astonishing art collection, much of it hanging on the walls here. And they housed it in one of the most spectacular buildings to call itself a museum anywhere in the world. The central hall and magnificent staircase have turned up in historical films as a proxy for royal palaces. Frankly, it's more opulent than many real palaces. You don't even need to go into the galleries to be impressed. 

When you do, you'll find at least one of pretty much every great master, with a concentration on Northern European art. They have more works by Bruegel here than anywhere else in the world. If you have time for only one painting, head for his Tower of Babel and ponder this timeless metaphor for the pointlessness and danger of human ambition. 

But there's more than paintings here; my favourite part of the museum is the Kunstkammer ... 20 rooms of treasures collected by Habsburg rulers from the late Middle Ages to the Baroque. Essentially a vast assortment of decorative tchotchkes and pointless oddities people tend to collect as they travel the world, but on steroids. 

Rock crystal dragons. Gold encrusted drinking horns. Jewelled game boards. Gilded and lacquered robotic sailing ships designed to roll across dining tables firing tiny cannon. Scores of figurines created in every precious material known to mankind. Most famous of all, Cellini's golden salt cellar. 

It's like a garage sale of the impossibly rich with good taste. I could spend days in here; every cabinet contains quirky, extraordinary wonders.

And if you need sustenance, you can slip out to the museum cafe, paved in coloured marbles and housed beneath a towering, ridiculously lavish dome. No shortcuts here, we're in Vienna. The waiters have the same bow ties and starched aprons of the more famous cafes, the menu features the same gorgeous cakes. But the surroundings are incomparable. If you don't want to bother with art, come here, sip a Cafe Mozart and pretend you rule an empire.

Horses ... and another famous cafe

Our one excursion with Viking was a behind-the-scenes tour through the Lippizaner's stables. Honestly, I was underwhelmed with the value offered for the money on this excursion (approx €90 per person), but if you're not in Vienna on a day where the famous white stallions perform, this is a way to see the horses and get inside the arena. You start in that famous performance space, where you learn about this history of the horses and why they're still doing what they do, and private access does give you the ability to get some fine photos...

Then you head across the street to the stables to learn more about how the horses are bred, selected and trained. The stables are impressive, with an interior courtyard surrounded by colonnaded upper stories that wouldn't embarrass a human palace. Strictly no touching allowed, but you can get nose to nose with some of the most pampered high performance horses on the planet. They are exquisite. (But for the total equine experience, the Lippizaner stables, performance and flamenco show in Cordoba trounces Vienna.)

Part of the price tag on this excursion was afternoon tea at Cafe Central, one of Vienna's most famous cafes guaranteed to have a long queue outside it at most times. The bonus of jumping the queue is delightful, getting seated in the back room set aside for groups not so much so. Mind you, this room was nothing to sneeze at, with a soaring atrium and a formal split staircase ascending to higher floors all in a late 19th century gothic revival, 

but it was a bit grey and gloomy compared to the light filled white and gold arches of the front room, where a pianist serenaded diners. The Sacher Torte, coffee, service and bathrooms were the same, however, and at that point in the afternoon such comforts probably trumped the effort of waiting in a queue.

An astonishing library

Given my love of a lazy day curled up with a good book, it's no surprise that my ideas of heaven include a magnificent library. (There's a dining room and a beach, too, of course.) I've already mentioned the wonders of Melk on this trip, and there's a host of English country house libraries that are candidates for my vision of paradise. Add the State Hall of the Austrian National Library to the list, claimed (by the Austrians) to be the biggest Baroque library in the world. If, like me, you are made happy by simply being surrounded by books, this place is an enormous hit of dopamine.

Architecturally, it's like a cross-shaped cathedral, with two long naves coming off a domed centre point with extending apses on either side. There are two enormous stories of books, with a balcony running around the space between. All those leather tomes are embraced in warm, gleaming wood, accented by marble columns and plenty of gold gilt. Above, the requisite Baroque deities frolic across tromp l'oeil scenes celebrating the Habsburgs and the joys of learning. All that's missing is properly comfortable furniture to sink into while enjoying your book. 

Visitors are treated to a rotating exhibition of the library's treasures in these exquisite surroundings. (People my age will note that this all feels a bit like visiting the treasures of the British Library once felt, when they were housed in Georgian splendour at the British Museum, before they moved out to the modernist brick bunker in Euston.) The current exhibition is The Emperor's Animals, a beguiling set of watercolours cataloging all the magnificent beasts that either lived in the Habsburg's menagerie, or whose images were captured in the wild for Habsburg delight.

Music ... and a proper Viennese dinner

Had we booked a little earlier, our night in Vienna would have seen us swept away by the magic of Tristan and Isolde at the Vienna State Opera. It was sold out by the time we booked the cruise, unfortunately. Viking, undoubtably like every cruise on the river, offered the inevitable Strauss and Mozart concert. Which would have been fine, and which got rave reviews from our fellow guests. But we were looking for something different, hopefully with a broader programme and a smaller audience.

I'm not sure if we fully succeeded, but we were happy with our night out in the red salon of the Palais Schönborn Batthyány, where a sextet provided the music while a soprano and tenor dropped in and out for some classic arias and a bit of dancing. The conductor and lead violinist was a stern woman who seemed capable of organising armies as well as musicians, and the delivery was flawless except for an overly-loud piano and soprano, both of whom hadn't quite gotten the hang on modulating their power for such a small audience (there were about 120 of us). They were both excellent, however, so the excess volume could be forgiven.

In addition to the expected Mozart and Strauss (the singers delivered a sexy Là Ci Darem La Mano and an amusing excerpt from Fledermaus) we were treated to one of Brahms' Hungarian Dances, a bit of Haydn and Bach and some erroneous but pleasant Vivaldi.  The drawing room was exquisite, most notable for its wood-panelled window apses decorated with gilded floral curlicues and modern art on the red damask walls.

The concert came with dining vouchers at Cafe Landtmann, a traditional, multi-roomed place across from the Burgtheatre and tucked in the university district. While not as fancy or well known as Demel or Cafe Central, it has a long history with intellectuals and an impressive Weiner Schnitzel. I'd like to come back here and linger rather dashing off to a concert.

Vienna, after all, is a place best enjoyed at a leisurely pace. It's something Billy Joel told the world in 1977 in Vienna, one of the lesser known tracks on the perfect album that is The Stranger.

Slow down you crazy child
Take the phone off the hook and disappear for a while
It's alright, you can afford to lose a day or two
When will you realize... Vienna waits for you?

It was a sentiment that the 13-year-old me couldn't really grasp. These days, I both understand and yearn after it. I need more Vienna in my life.