Discovering the Best of Europe

Introduction

Finally, you’re taking that long-awaited trip to Europe. Congratulations! You’re about to embark on a great adventure, and part of you may feel a bit overwhelmed. You have lots of plans to make: where to stay, where to dine, how long to remain in each country, and which attractions to see — but I can help you every step of the way. You already took the first step in the right direction by buying Europe For Dummies, 3rd Edition!

You need to get started on plenty of details a few months before you leave — things such as passports (see Chapter 9), rail passes (see Chapter 6), plane tickets (see Chapter 5), and traveler’s checks (see Chapter 4). But for now, just sit back and dream of the possibilities.

In Europe, you find some of the world’s most outstanding museums, his toric sights, culinary creations, and architectural wonders. In this book, I guide you to the best of the best.

You can sail past decaying palaces and sinking churches on Venice’s Grand Canal for the price of a bus ticket. You can drain creamy mugs of Guinness while clapping along to traditional Celtic music on a pub-crawl through Dublin. You can splurge on a 5-star meal in Paris, the mecca of haute cuisine.

You may want to stare for hours at the famed finger-almost-touching scene of God Creating Adam on Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel ceiling in Rome. Or sit atop Switzerland’s Schilthorn Mountain, surrounded by peaks covered with snow and glacier-filled valleys, while eating break fast in a revolving restaurant at 10,000 feet. Or enjoy a picnic lunch on the Greek island of Santoríni hundreds of feet above the Mediterranean amidst the ruins of a Mycenaean city.

Europe is yours to discover and experience. This book opens the doors.

The Top Museums

I give away no secrets by admitting that Europe is home to some of the world’s greatest museums, displaying a cultural kaleidoscope of Western culture from classical busts and Renaissance frescoes to Impressionist landscapes and postmodern sculptures.

The Louvre (Paris): The short list has to start with the Louvre (see Chapter 13), one of those great catchall museums that opens with ancient sculptures (including that armless beauty Venus de Milo), runs through Egyptian mummies and medieval artifacts, and then showcases some true icons of Renaissance art, including Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa and Delacroix’s ultra-French Liberty Leading the People.

Musée d’Orsay (Paris): After exhausting yourself at the Louvre, you can cross the Seine River to visit an old train station that’s been transformed into the Musée d’Orsay (see Chapter 13). The Orsay picks up the thread of French art where the Louvre leaves off, high lighting the best from the Romantic period onward, including the world’s greatest collection of crowd-pleasing Impressionists like Manet, Monet, Degas, Cézanne, Renoir, Gaughin, van Gogh, Seurat, and more.

The Vatican Museums (Rome): Arguably, Europe’s greatest collec tion of museums all in one place belongs to the Vatican Museums (see Chapter 19). The Vatican’s Painting Gallery houses Raphael’s Transfiguration and Caravaggio’s Deposition. A slew of antiquities collections together preserve some of the best bits of ancient Greek, Egyptian, Etruscan, and (naturally) Roman sculpture on the conti nent. Then you find the former private papal apartments frescoed by the likes of Pinturicchio and Raphael, and, of course, the Sistine Chapel with its ceiling frescoed by Michelangelo.

The British Museum (London): You can get up close and personal with artifacts from the dawn of human history at London’s renowned (and admission-free) British Museum (see Chapter 10). No nook or cranny of the ancient European, Mediterranean, or Middle Eastern worlds is overlooked, from Celtic treasure hordes to the Elgin Marbles of Greece’s Parthenon, from the remains of Assyrian palaces to the Rosetta Stone that helped archaeologists crack the language of hieroglyphics, and from intricately decorated Greek vases to room after room stacked with Egyptian mummies and their fabulous treasures.

Museo del Prado (Madrid): The Museo del Prado (see Chapter 22) stands on equal footing with the Louvre and Vatican Museums but is (quite unfairly) not nearly as well known. So much the better, really, because that means you get to enjoy its paintings by the greats of Spanish art — the courtly and insightful Velazquez, the creepy and dark Goya, the weirdly lit and uniquely colorful El Greco, and the truly warped and surreal Hieronymus Bosch — without the huge crowds and long lines

The Uffizi Galleries (Florence): Take a spin through the Uffizi Galleries (see Chapter 20), a veritable textbook on the develop ment of painting during the Renaissance. Compared to the great museums of other cities, the Uffizi is small, but it houses an embarrassment of riches, from earlier works by Giotto, Fra’ Angelico, and Botticelli (the goddess-on-a-half-shell Birth of Venus and flower-filled Primavera both hang here) through the height of the Renaissance represented by Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, and Michelangelo.

The Deutsches Museum (Munich): Overloaded on art and ancient relics? Head to the Deutsches Museum (see Chapter 15), one of the greatest science and technology museums on Earth. Whether you’re turned green with envy at the fleets of early Mercedes, wowed by eye-popping electrical demonstrations, impressed by a hangar full of historic aircraft, intrigued by the lab benches where some of the earliest experiments in nuclear physics took place, or entertained by the giant machines they use to dig tunnels under the Alps, this informative and often hands-on museum is a delight for all ages.

The Top Historic Sights

Europe is the wellspring of Western culture, a living textbook of human history. People think in terms of centuries and millennia here, not decades. Americans may speak of fond memories of the ’60s; Italians just as breezily refer to fond collective memories of il seicento (the 1600s). Europe allows you to dip into history at just about any point

Best Greek and Roman Ruins: You can see remnants of the ancient Greek and Roman empires, some 1,500 to 3,000 years old, with half ruined temples at the Acropolis or Ancient Agora in Athens or at Delphi in inland Greece (see Chapter 24). Or how about the Roman Forum, the ghost town of Ostia Antica, or the ultimate sports arena, the Colosseum — all in or near Rome (see Chapter 19)?

Best Prehistoric Sites: Prehistoric standouts include sites such as Stonehenge (see Chapter 10) in England, Akrotiri (see Chapter 24) on the Greek island of Santoríni, the passage tomb of Newgrange (see Chapter 12) in Ireland, and the remnants of the earliest settle ments of what is now Paris excavated under the square in front of Notre-Dame Cathedral (see Chapter 13).

Best Castles: You’ll find castles from the Dark Ages and Middle Ages (from A.D. 500 to 1500) strewn across Europe, such as the Tower of London (see Chapter 10), with its bloody legends and famed crown jewels; Edinburgh Castle (see Chapter 11), glowering atop a volcanic hill in the center of the city; and Prague Castle (see Chapter 18), with its soaring cathedral and half-timbered lane of old alchemists’ shops.

Best Medieval Neighborhoods: This era also saw the development of major cities, leaving the world with cobblestone medieval quar ters such as the Altstadt of Bern (see Chapter 17), the Staré Mesto in Prague (see Chapter 18), Trastevere in Rome (see Chapter 19), and the Barri Gòtic in Barcelona (see Chapter 23).

Best Hill Towns: Tiny hill towns and hamlets sprang up between A .D. 500 and 1500, too, and this book describes the best of them, including Chartres in France (see Chapter 13), Innsbruck in Austria (see Chapter 16), the Tuscan hill towns of Siena and San Gimignano (see both in Chapter 20), and Spain’s time capsules of Toledo and Segovia (see both in Chapter 22).

The Top Culinary Delights

European cuisine runs the gamut from the rib-sticking röschti (deluxe hash browns spiked with ham and eggs) of the Swiss Alps to France’s traditional coq au vin (chicken braised in red wine with onions and mushrooms); from 101 types of sausage in Prague to the incredible yet unknown cheeses of Ireland nibbled after dinner in a countryside B&B.

Best Mediterranean Meals: The cooking of Italy (see Chapters 19 through 21) goes far beyond pasta — though it’s so good here you may not care. You can sample Adriatic fish in a Venetian trattoria patronized by local gondoliers, a mighty bistecca fiorentina (an oversized T-bone brushed with olive oil and cracked pepper then grilled) in Florence, or gnocchi al pomodoro (potato dumplings in tomato sauce) followed by a saltimbocca (wine-cooked veal lay ered with sage and prosciutto) in a Roman restaurant installed in the ruins of an ancient theater. A night out in Madrid (see Chapter 22) — where dinner starts at 10 p.m. — may mean a traditional roast suckling pig in a restaurant unchanged since the days when Hemingway was a regular, or a giant Valencian paella (rice tossed with a seafood medley) to share with everyone at the table under the wood beams of a country-style inn.

Best British Meals: England (see Chapter 10) once had a reputation for serving what was considered the worst cooking in Europe, fea turing shepherd’s pie (beef stew capped by whipped potatoes) and bangers and mash (sausages and mashed potatoes). But, oh, how times have changed. Much to Paris’s chagrin, London now enjoys the hottest restaurant scene in Europe, and its celebrity chefs and designer dining spots surf the crest of modern cooking trends and serve the hippest fusion cuisines.

Best Bets for a Sweet Tooth: Sure, French and Italian pastries are divine, but you can also sate your sweet tooth in Vienna (see Chap ter 16), home of the Sachertorte, the original Death by Chocolate. And what better way to cap off a night of clubbing in Madrid than to join the locals for churros y chocolada (fried dough strips you dip in thick hot chocolate) as the sun rises? Don’t worry: You’ll do so much walking on your trip that you probably won’t gain too much weight . . . assuming of course you don’t discover the gelato (super-rich ice cream) of Florence (see Chapter 20) or toffee trifle cakes in England (see Chapter 10).

Best Beer and Wine: Most travelers know that, to wash it all down, you can tipple some of the finest wines in the world in France and Italy or take a swig from a liter-sized mug of beer in Germany. But did you know that Eastern European beers are finally getting the recognition they deserve in Prague (see Chapter 18)? And rightly so, because all Pilsners, and what became Budweiser, originally hail from the Czech Republic. And how about the heuriger in Vienna (see Chapter 16)? These small family-run wine estates serve up samples of their white wines accompanied by simple, hearty Austrian dishes

The Architectural Highlights

Europe is home to some of the world’s greatest cathedrals, palaces, and castles. You can marvel at the diversity of gargoyles and sparkling rose windows on Paris’s Notre-Dame Cathedral (see Chapter 13), gape at Michelangelo’s Pietà sculpture and Bernini’s towering altar canopy in Rome’s St. Peter’s (Chapter 19), and admire many creations of medieval masonry or Renaissance engineering in between.

Chartres Cathedral (Beyond Paris): Chartres Cathedral (see Chapter 13) is a study in formal Gothic, from its 27,000 square feet of stained glass to its soaring spires and flying buttresses

Salisbury Cathedral (Beyond London): Britain’s answer to Chartres is Salisbury Cathedral (see Chapter 10), spiking the English countryside with one of the medieval world’s tallest spires.

St. Mark’s Basilica (Venice): The multiple domes, swooping pointed archways, and glittering mosaics swathing St. Mark’s Basilica (see Chapter 21) hint at how this great trading power of the Middle Ages sat at the crossroads of Eastern and Western cultures; it’s as much Byzantine as it is European.

The Duomo (Florence): When the Renaissance genius Brunelleschi invented a noble dome to cap Florence’s Duomo (see Chapter 20), Europe’s architectural landscape changed forever. Domes started sprouting up all over the place. Visit Florence’s original, and you can clamber up narrow staircases between the dome’s onion layers to see just how Brunelleschi performed his engineering feat — and get a sweeping panorama of the city from the top.

Residenz Palace and Schloss Nymphenburg (Munich): In the 17th and 18th centuries, powerful kings governing much of Europe felt they ruled by divine right — and built palaces to prove it. The Bavarian Wittelsbach dynasty ruled for 738 years from Munich’s Residenz Palace and the pleasure palace outside town, Schloss Nymphenburg (see Chapter 15).

Hofburg Palace (Vienna): The Hapsburg emperors set up house keeping in the sprawling Hofburg Palace (see Chapter 16), where the chapel is now home to a little singing group known as the Vienna Boy’s Choir, and where museums showcase everything from classical statuary and musical instruments to medieval weaponry and the imperial treasury.

Buckingham Palace (London): You can line up to watch the chang ing of the guard at Buckingham Palace (see Chapter 10), and even tour the royal pad, assuming Her Majesty Elizabeth II isn’t at home

Versailles (Beyond Paris): You can ride the RER train from downtown Paris to the palace to end all palaces, Versailles (see Chapter 13), where Louis XIV held court, Marie Antoinette kept dangerously out of touch with her subjects (who were brewing revolution back in Paris), and the Treaty of Versailles was signed, ending World War I.

Neuschwanstein (Beyond Munich): Tourists aren’t the only ones looking to recapture a romantic, idealized past. Mad King Ludwig II of Bavaria was so enamored by his country’s fairy-tale image that he decided to build Neuschwanstein (see Chapter 15) in the foothills of the Alps south of Munich. This fanciful 19th-century version of what Ludwig thought a medieval castle should look like is a festival of turrets and snapping banners that later inspired Uncle Walt’s Cinderella castle in Disney World.

Sagrada Famiglia (Barcelona): Lest you think the architectural innovations are all relics of the past, head to Barcelona, where one of the early 20th centuries’ greatest architects, Antoni Gaudí, used his own unique riff on Art Nouveau to design everything from apartment blocks to a cathedral-size church, Sagrada Famiglia (see Chapter 23), still under construction