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Austria, Countries, Deals, Europe, Skiing

They start them young in Söll

28th November 202528th November 2025 funtime65

They start them young in Söll in Austria which is why Junior is zipping by you as you snow plough down the run.

Junior, of course, has been waiting since April to get back out on the mountains.

And this weekend is when he/she and you get to strap on your ski boots again.

And if you feel deflated by them lapping you on the slopes there is the consolation that it’s not costing you.

Because the start of the ski season, sees kiddies go free.

In the Wilder Kaiser region, which includes our favourite, Soll, and Hopfgarten, Brixen, Scheffau and Ellmau.

Kiddies and big kiddies

It’s definitely child’s play in Söll this winter.

With the Hexenwiese Beginners and Family area at the Söll Valley Station offering exciting new attractions.

Including a Magic Carpet for Beginners, a Bewitched Lock, magical sounds from the Witches of Söll, and a tubing slide.

Now, us big kiddies don’t get left behind though with our hosts offering special rates.

It always helps when you’ve got an insider and ‘Austrian’ Aileen has done all the heavy lifting for us here.

To bring us up to date with what’s been happening around the Ski Welt since last we visited.

Kaiser Wilder things

And a sample range of accommodations when you book your five-night stay through Wilder Kaiser for January 10-15.

4 Star Hotel Feldwebel – 5 nights for 2 sharing – from €1,305 including full breakfast.
4 Star Hotel Alpenschlössl – 5 nights for 2 sharing – from €1,085 half board plus skiers afternoon snack.
4 Star Hotel Berghof – 5 nights for 2 sharing – from €1,135 half board.
Appartement Unterbering – 5 nights for 2 sharing – from €760 room only.
Haus Niederacher – 5 nights for 2 sharing – from €465 room only.

And seeing that Aileen flies the flag on Austria for the Irish market, she rightly bigs up the 30 direct flights per week from Ireland, including Aer Lingus.

Get there how you can

The Wilder Kaiser is just one and a half hours from Munich.

Winter season access is also available from Salzburg and Innsbruck.

With charter flights from operators including Crystal Ski, Topflight, and DirectSki.com.

There are access flights from Dublin, Cork and Belfast for Austria.

And, of course, check out their Black Friday deals.

Countries, Europe, Pilgrimage

The Romani Diaspora never forget

15th March 202517th March 2025 funtime65

The Romani Diaspora never forget though few us even know of their holocaust and only rub shoulders with gypsies on our travels when they entertain for us.

Gypsy music evenings we find in our loveholidays travel pack are a feature of Hungarian holidays while for a daily dose of traditional music it can be found in the Central Market Hall in Budapest.

Where, of course, I was dragged as a trade-off for my history binge in the Hungarian capital.

Pride of place above the food and merch stalls, and word to the wise the Hungarians love a tin of goose liver and a Russian doll with Putin and miniature Vlads, is Fakanal Etterem restaurant.

Spell it out: The Fakanel Etterem restuarant

Where we refuel after a day pounding the streets,

After a morning in the Budapest baths with our food du jour goulash.

And listen to the lunchtime entertainment, a gypsy trio.

Just as Margaret Thatcher, George HW Bush, the Emperor of Japan and Princess Diana had done before us.

And that would have been some dinner party although we suspect they weren’t all there at the same time.

A gypsy trio

Now our troupe clearly had their tourist audience down pat.

With the violinist asking each table where they were from and tailoring his tunes to their country of origin.

With the French getting La Vie en Rose and in the absence of a Japanese tune the staple Blue Danube for our eastern friends.

Gypsy songs like every tradition the world over harks back to history.

And while our Fakanal Etterem trio lift our spirits with their toe-tapping tunes.

They equally will have laments for those we celebrate this year on the 80th anniversary of the Romani Holocaust.

Romani Resistance Day

And reflect on an act of unimagined bravery and the Romani uprising against their overlords in Auschwitz.

When on 15 May 1944, 600 Roma prisoners from the 6000 then in the camp defied their guards who were planning to execute them all.

Instead they barricaded themselves into their barracks.

With hammers, pickaxes and shovels they had gathered after breaking into the equipment warehouse.

It was the bravest of resistances and no gypsies were gassed that day.

The Nazis responded by moving half of the prisoners to other camps and gassing the remaining 3,000.

All of which is commemorated on May 16, Romani Resistance Day.

What we all share

And which the Son and Heir who was invited out to Auschwitz last year to observe the commemorations learned from the community.

There is, of course, much to learn from reaching out beyond our own circle.

As I found first-hand when I found that I was actually booked to travel with a gypsy party on a Topflight working assignment.

To Marian site Medjugorje in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

And came away with a whole new understanding of a community which has been maligned and alienated.

The Romani Diaspora never forget though.

Nor those of us who reach out and share what we all do, music, faith and compassion.

Countries

30 years with the Travel and Strife

17th September 202417th September 2024 funtime65

You Pearler… 30 years with the Travel and Strife and time to look back and forward.

Our journey, in truth, started four years earlier in Herself’s Homestead, the Royal County of Berkshire.

With our first pitstop a city which for that reason, and its own, will always be magical to us, Amsterdam.

Off the beaten track

Can I be trusted on a bike? In Amsterdam

Twenty-five years spanned our visits to the pride of the Netherlands and we ditched the ubiquitous bikes along the way.

We had taken the road less travelled on our first trip, going to Edam on its half day.

And then taking the wrong fork on the road back to Amsterdam.

We took a different tack when we were invited out to the Dylan.

And so it was canal boats and the luxury of the hotel George and Amal frequent in theirs, and now our, visits to Holland.

Wear slip-on shoes

We all form attachments to those countries and cities we first go to as children and couples.

And Portugal holds a special place too in our hearts despite another cycling mishap in the Algarve.

But one we got to put right in Portugal Centro years later under the guidance of our own Special One Jose Madomis.

Malta would follow when in an unguarded moment I bent down at dinner to tie up my shoelace and she screamed ‘Yes’.

The Scot in me, I went back years later on my own to see if I could redeem on the bottle of Champagne we didn’t finish…

And so Corfu followed for our honeymoon when the handsome Greek waiter was most attentive to our table.

And my bride was blushing when it transpired he was eyeing me up.

On our Travails

We made the most of those intimate moments then, knowing holidays would never be the same when Him and Her came along.

And waited until we could take off again together, to the Soll slopes in Austria.

That road trip around Portugal Centro.

To George and Amal’s gaffe in Amsterdam.

And up the fjords of Norway and around the Rieperbahn of Hamburg.

Still stumbling along the way and trying to get back on track.

And all the time still following Her lead.

Even when that meant us getting on the bus to Berlin instead of Keil.

The Mother of all Dragons

Or turning up in Monaghan a weekend early and turning that Irish Midlands town upside down.

There have been travails aplenty and pleasures like poppy seeds in Rome and Venice and travels to come.

With an anniversary Loveholidays trip to Dubrovnik to come next month with my very own Mother of Dragons.

Just another marker in 30 years with the Travel and Strife.

Bring on the next 30.

MEET YOU ON THE ROAD

Africa, America, Countries, Europe, Ireland, UK

How happy on the mountain

11th December 2022 funtime65

How happy on the mountain are the feet of He who brings good news… that today is International Mountain Day.

And yes, of course, while there is a day of the year for almost everything, our mountains are there every day.

It took the United Nations until 2003 though before they advanced our peaks for an International Day.

Of course being from the mountainous top half of this septic island they call Britain I’d been to the roof and looked down.

And admired Scotland’s valleys and glens and looked out and wondered of the view from other peaks.

Nothing as adventurous or backbreaking as mountaineering, or bagging Munros, those Scottish peaks, of which there are 282.

Border force

Cross country: At the Austrian-German border

But leaving it to our dream makers, our holiday makers, to take us up where the air is fresh and sweet.

For some who are lucky enough to live in the mountains then gorges can be part of their daily routine.

And so it is nothing to locals who cross the border through a mountain gate between Austrian Tirol and the Bavarian Alps.

While others will trek across the Alps into northern Italy.

The mountains have long been routes through which people have traversed for trade, adventure, or in flight.

Although, as we’ve tracked already in these pages the most famous fleeing family most certainly never climbed every mountain.

But rather the Von Trapps took the train into Italy instead.

Mountain people

Only way is up: Jungraujoch in Switzerland

The most romantic way through the mountains is of course by foot but we’ve hit the peaks in all of those… trains, planes and snowmobiles.

Trains… on the Jungfraujoch Railway, the highest train route in Europe.

Planes and helicopters in the mountains above the Grand Canyon.

By coach up the Rockies on Colorado and Graaf-Reinet in the Eastern Cape in South Africa.

In the frame: With my fellow Jim in the Pyrenees

And with half the Atlas Mountains descending on your Scooby Doo van during a rainy Ramadan.

Mountains are to be admired, of course, but to be respected too.

And we continually wonder at the skills of those who keep an eye on them when they are stirring.

And point out nonchalantly when we’re in the Pyrenees that there’s an avalanche in the distance.

Slope off on your hols

This time of year is, of course, reserved for those who put planks on their feet and zig-zag down the mountains.

And whether that’s in our northern tip of Britain, my favoured ski slopes of Soll in Austria and Val D’Isere in France.

And on the dry slopes of my other land, Ireland, at Kilternan.

We’re all on the same page…

How happy on the mountain are the feet of those who bring good news.

Our dream makers, our holiday providers.

Countries

Here comes Frankie, Siena and the Italian cavalry

19th February 202119th February 2021 funtime65

Ciao tutti… and they’re off.

We bring you good news from Italia courtesy of Frankie Dettori, Italy’s brand ambassador for their new promotional campaign.

Frankie is Italy’s most famous horseman since well, ever.

Only the most devoted racing fans, or Italians, though would be able to name you another Italian jockey.

But, in truth, Italy has a rich tradition with the cavalli.

It goes back to the days of the Romans and the superstar chariot drivers.

Champion jockey Frankie is a proud Sardinian and waxes lyrical about his island, particularly the beaches.

While he also extols the virtues of Rome all of which I share.

Rock god

Being the rock god that he is, of course, Frankie namechecks other iconic Italian cities, fashionable Milan, Venice and cultural Florence

While he also bigs up the Amalfi Coast and Capri, and for the winter Cervinia

If it’s horses you want then the Palio di Siena on July 2 andd August 16 is a horse of another colour.

The Palio like all traditions in Italy has its origins in religion with the first running of the bareback race in the mid-1600s in honour of the apparition of the Virgin Mary.

The jockeys are kitted out in the colours of their districts, the Contradas of Siena as they race around the square.

Our friend Frankie has his English subtitled in the promotional video which is something Scots and Irish have become used to over the years so our sympathy.

Wait for it

For the women (and the men) it’s not what Frankie says but how he says it anyway, and how he looks and the background of Italia.

But wait for it, Frankie’s pay off is Italia Wait For It. And we will.

And when we get back it’ll be with our old favourites Topflight, the Italian specialists.

Now all I need are some suitable colours.

America, Countries, Culture, Deals, Europe, Flying, Ireland, UK

Holiday Snaps – United’s States

8th November 20208th November 2020 funtime65

No, you didn’t read that wrongly. Our friends at United Airlines might just get us back on transatlantic planes out to Bidenland as we’re now calling it.

United have launched the world’s first free transatlantic Covid-testing pilot programme.

For customers travelling from November 16 through December 11 from Newark to London Heathrow free of charge.

I touched down in the land of the Delta Blues with United a couple of years ago.

When I flew into Memphis from Newark for an MLK50 (Martin Luther King) road trip.

And sat beside a Memphian coming home who pointed out the Mississippi below.

As we drank craft beers and discussed the future travel for America.

And on the tee…

I thought it was just an hour the clocks went back… you know the old saying Fall back Spring forward.

But then I find that one of those Spring rites of passage, the Masters golf tournament will be held this year from this Thursday, in Augusta, Georgia.

Of course there will be more than a few references to azaleas, or the lack of them, this week.

We’ll miss the galleries though and the hollers of ‘You’re the Msn.’

I was one at Royal Portrush at last year’s Open Golf Championship when we were 20 deep shouting on Ireland’s Shane Lowry to victory.

All of which deviation off the tee brings me to Hastings Hotels and Slieve Donard‘s richly-deserved recognition as Northern Ireland’s Best Golf Hotel at the World Golf Awards.

Once I get these fingers repaired I’ll be bringing the game I’ve developed.

From watching from out of my window onto North Berwick on Scotland’s Golf Coast.

And on the toboggan run…

Now I don’t need an Austrian toboggan run to shred my body.

A shopping trolley and a supermarket car park will do just as well to break my fingertips and tear off my nails.

Of course the prospect of a toboggan run as a detour during my famed booze bus trip to the Oktoberfest had me salivating.

I didn’t trouble the Winter Olympics talent scouts at Kirchberg and Kitzbuhel.

Though with rider and toboggan going separate ways seconds after launch.

I reprised the high jinks on my Topflight for Schools trip to Ehrwald in the Austrian Tirol last year.

Who needs a toboggan or sled anyway? I’m the human sled!

Enough already… let’s get back on piste and Kitzbuhel is reopening to recreational skiers from November 30 with Covid restrictions.

Return flights from London Gatwick to Innsbruck with EasyJet are from €62pp and from Dublin to Munich are from €80pp.

And anything can happen in Munich… or is that just me?

Countries, Culture, Europe, Ireland, Music, UK

Rainy Days and Songdays – Roll Over Beethoven

5th October 20205th October 2020 funtime65

And because this week I’ll be hooking up with my German pals for a virtual celebration of Beethoven, this being the 250th anniversary of his birth, I give you the classics.

Ear, ear Beethoven

Beethoven, Teplice, Czech Republic: And you’d expect to see Ludwig in this wellness town back in the 18th Century.

Because Bohemia was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Vienna and Prague were musical centres where Germans flocked to.

I paid my tribute to The Great Man this year at the Beethoven Spa Hotel in Teplice where he stayed, and his room is still there for him.

And he got treatment for his ears, tried out some funky horns and left his death mask.

We also tried out the titular cafe, and the hot chocolate and chocolate cake for research purposes. An empty piano awaited the maestro.

If Beethoven had written a Fur Katarina I’d point you to that in celebration of our host and my pal, but we have the equally enchanting Elise, so here’s Fur Elise.

Rock me Amadeus

Eine Kleine Sadie Music

Mozart, Salzburg, Austria: And, yes, the Austrian singer Falco toasted Mozart with this hit.

A Wiener, he was what Mozart wanted to be, though almost certainly not in musical terms, but certainly in his origins.

Wolfgang was no fan of his home place, Salzburg, which he thought had a small-town attitude.

High standards. We loved it on out ski trip to Soll (it is a Sound if Music Mecca too).

Although the museums are too spread out, you do get right under Wolfie’s skin ;and hair). Here’s Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, pretty much the only German I know.

Vivaldi’s Veneto

The Dragon, Constsnce and Bandanaman in Venice

Vivaldi, Padova/Veneto: And for many, particularly the Eighties generation, punk violinist Nigel Kennedy, and his rendition of Four Seasons, was it for classical music.

I don’t know if Kieran ‘The Dragon’ who was in our party in Padova was an aficionado but he took casual chic to a new level.

I take some responsibility as I’d wheeled him and fellow Venice newbie Constance out to Lagoon City.

We were back late but had each taken a change of clothes while Dragon was still in his boardies.

While the orchestra were kitted out and the waiters and waitresses too in the sumptuous Padova Botanical Gardens.

Anyhoo, here’s an excerpt of L’Autunno from Il Quattro Stagione.

Boheme Rhapsody

Puccini, Prague: And long before rockers namechecked cities, the Classical composers were doing it.

Whisper it, the opera is set in Paris, the Bohemian bit is the fun label attached to what are modern-day Czechs.

And so, for me, the ideal place to watch Giacomo Puccini’s Classic is the State Opera in Prague.

Everybody loves to party in Prague, monks in the Strahov Monastery Brewery and priests swigging Champagne during the intermission at the State Opera.

Handel with care

Handel Dublin: And George Handel chose Dublin, the second city of the Empire, because he felt the London audiences had started to take him for granted.

No shrinking violet George, there was a statue to him erected in Dublin while he was still alive.

The premiere was packed and ladies were asked not to wear hooped dresses so as to allow more in.

That show was performed at the Musick Hall in Fishamble Street. Now you’ll want to go to Christchurch Cathedral for your opera fix.

But not the place for a cat or a mouse whose mummified remains are on display in the cathedral’s crypt…. they’d got stuck in the organ.

It’s immortalised in James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake.

Anyhoos Christ Church Cathedral puts on recitals and thanks to my friends at Travel Department we channeled old Handel one balmy evening.

Countries, Europe, Ireland, Music, Sport, UK

Rainy Days and Songdays – Austria you to me are everything

3rd August 20203rd August 2020 funtime65

I could move a mountain when my hand is in your hand – The Real Thing

Whether The Real Thing had the Alps in mind I don’t know but they know the band all right in Soll… and Austria you to me are everything.

Songs often jump up and hook us randomly in the places we hear them the most.

And You To Me Are Everything rocked out every night at the Whisky Muhle.

I skied some of those mountains… yeah, right!

Where Alex Johnson, the singer, belts out rock classics, while the locals pour Jagermeisters down his gullet.

And he announces every night that You To Me Are Everything is the best song of all time.

And Alex does the ‘best song of all time’ justice, and a bunch of others with his ‘Candy’ well worth a mention.

I even forgave him saying that Paolo Nutini had ripped it off REM.

I’ll be in one of those huts

All this, and did I say that they have a game where you hammer a nail into a block of plywood with the acute end?

Which funnily enough you won’t see in the pubs of Glasgow, Liverpool or Dublin.

We travelled to Soll with ski specialists Top Flight and I have hiked up the hills with them too since.

And that’ll be the beer then

Top Flight, who also with good reason call themselves the Italy specialists, are suffering like so many in Travel.

And they had to make the heartbreaking decision to let some staff go last week.

Which I know from dealing with them would have been the last thing they would have wanted.

It may seem like all uphill right now while downhill doesn’t seem too appealing either.

And the locals are real friendly

But skiing proves that we can ride the bumps and come out still standing at the end of it all.

And there’s a Jagermaester at the end of it all at the end of it all and a rocking music set. It’s apres-ski and it’s everything.

*Everything – The Real Life Story which chronicles the career of the first all-black British band to reach No.1 in the UK charts screens on BBC Four on Friday at 9pm.

Africa, America, Asia, Countries, Europe, UK

Fiveday Friday – take those drinks outside

3rd July 20203rd July 2020 funtime65

Just on a whim, and because this is how we’ll be drinking in the future, here is a new feature Fiveday Friday.

Five of the best travel experiences from around my world of travels (and some of them won’t involve drink).

I’m spurred here by a radio shout-out for the sprawling 500-year-old The Lindsey Rose.

The Rose lies near Ipswich, Suffolk in England’s East Anglia http://www.thelindseyrose.co.uk and https://www.visiteastofengland.com.

Southwold in Suffolk, which is about 118 miles east and a two-and-a-half hour drive from London, was recommended to me by my old boss.

And with its dainty beach huts and English Country Garden pubs it was very much like ‘somewhere different but the same’ for this Scottish family within your own country.

Which is what we’ll all be reengaging ourselves with more and more now.

That’s not to say we won’t be reflecting on those awesome outdoor drinks dats we’ve enjoyed around the world.

Beer o’clock in South Africa

The Brewery and Two Goats Deli, Nieu-Bethesda, South Africa: And this beer garden deep in the heart of Afrikans country even has a wooden hammock.

Where you can sleep off your wooden smorgasbord sample of beers and stouts.

There’s nothing wooden though about this little haven in Nieu-Bethesda. Visit https://www.southafrica.net/uk/en/ and What’s new pussycat?.

On the Bosphorus

TTG Travel/Turkey Travel Group: And if the back garden can be a stretch of water which splits two continents….

Pleasure cruises are perfect for small groups and you can work off that Turkish spread with a boogie on board.

While looking out on two continents on the Bosphorus.

See https://www.turkeytravelgroup.com, https://visit.istanbul, www.turkishIrlines.com and Wham bam, thank you Hamam.

Swiss for Prosecco

Interlacken, Switzerland: Well, you do build up a thirst whizzing through a wood and the main road on your tutti bike.

It’s an electric scooter hybrid, you understand.

And you’ll find a bar in the valley where your Prosecco Spritzer has never tasted so good.

See www.myswitzerland.com and Swhisskey on the rocks.

Der Plague and Der Great Outdoors

Oberammergau, Germany: And not a bad place to drop in on as the good burghers of this Bavarian town know all about pandemics.

They made a pact with God back in the Middle Ages where they would put on a Passion Play if He rid them of the plague.

And you’ll want to sit outside anyway to take in the murals that tell the story of Oberammergau.

See https://www.passionsspiele-oberammergau.de/en/home and https://www.topflight.ie and www.topflightforschools.ie.

Jocky Mountain High

Salt & Lime, Steamboat Springs, Colorado: Now Coloradans are ideally placed for this COVID crisis because they’re outdoors people.

They freestyle up the Rockies, white water raft on the French Powder River and then sit down in the open air on their ranches.

And rooftop restaurants such as this one, Salt & Lime Morning www.suckandlime.com in Steamboat Springs www.colorado.com.

Africa, Countries, Culture, Europe, Food & Wine, Ireland, Oceania, UK

The Sunday Sermon – Covid covert love

7th June 20207th June 2020 funtime65

Thou shalt not covert thy neighbour’s ass – The Ten Commandments

Aussie Di was on the next bus, Contiki https://www.contiki.com/six-two/bus-tour-seating-strategy/, and as everybody in coachworld knows Topdeck https://www.topdeck.travel and Contiki should never mix.

Only Di had golden shoulder-length hair and a smile as bright as the sun.

And I was the envy of all the bronzed Aussie dudes at the party because for the first time in my life I got the girl.

Longing for the Alps

All of which longings across a coachpark in Austria in the Eighties came flooding back to me.

As I digested the Covid times survey which said that four out of five of us are keeping our lovin’ to our own households just now.

I have oft times returned to those two carefree summer trips to the Oktoberfest and Austria.

And particularly when I have passed through Munich https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/2019/08/01/hungry-and-thursday-the-munich-beerfest.

Sound of Music sites in Salzburg with my blonde for life, Sarah the Scary One

The magic bus

And in Austria with www.topflight.ie, Soll Mates and all across the Alps https://www.google.ie/amp/s/jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/2020/04/27/rainy-days-and-songdays-yodeleeeee/amp/

Coach rides are still the best, and most economical, way for 18-35 year-olds to see the world.

I’d look back at other Topdeck routes between drinks on the coach which was reconditioned to include a kitchen, with the top deck bunks.

South African dreams

And I vowed that one day I would get down to South Africa, an ambition I realised last year when I visited Nelson Mandela’s state, the Eastern Cape https://www.southafrica.net/uk/en/ and What’s new pussycat? and Day in the life of a township.

I’d go again in a heartbeat.

And, in truth, it’s that sweaty mass of humanity (rather than the sweaty mass of the Son and Heir’s dirty washing) I miss most in this lockdown.

For the record I tried to revive my holiday romance with Di when I returned home.

Difficult though it was with me in Aberdeen in Scotland and Di 400 miles south in London.

The prospect of the Topdeck reunion on the horizon kept me going though through all those cold Scottish nights.

Plenty more fish

When the time came I made our appointment in Trafalgar Square near the South African Embassy where a protest was taking place to free Nelson Mandela.

But Di was nowhere to be seen.

She was though at the reunion later in Earl’s Court (where else?).

With her Scottish boyfriend!