An Australian Experiences Europe

Thursday, July 19, 2018, 19:33
Urfeld, Bavaria, Germany.

I am over half way through on my first European holiday, and despite travelling alone, it has slipped before me. I have met many people, some I hope to reconnect with at a future date, and a very small few who I do not. I have learnt new things about myself, things that seem to have changed my perspective on my own life itself. And I have realised that while living in Australia is a blessing, Europe beckons me: it is exciting, cultured, and civilised in ways that I don’t know how I will be content to stay away from her.

At this point, I am nearing the end of travelling by myself and come this Sunday, I will be joining a few dozen young people on a tour through Central Europe. While I will enjoy being with people of my own age, and not having to stress about what my daily itinerary consists of, I have come to appreciate the joys of travelling with myself. I am not accountable to anyone and for once in my life I feel that I can dictate my destiny, or at least until I run out of money.

Let me recount my past movements to date. I arrived in London just over two weeks ago on Wednesday, July 4. I want to devote an entire article, or several on my experiences of London and each destination I later visited as well as things I have learnt about travelling.

London was incredible to experience firsthand and there are no adjectives that can justly describe it. I am not ashamed to say that Sydney, or any English speaking city in the world period can not compare. Sure I’ve never been to New York, and I know that there would be a magical quality about the Big Apple. But as somebody who has grown up in a country, and a family somewhat grounded in British culture and values, there is a indescribable lure to the buzz that is London.

By Friday, July 6, I departed Kings Cross for Plymouth to visit my Grandmother’s brother, Christopher. Christopher lives about 20 minutes north of Plymouth in area that is directly adjacent to the Devonshire National Park. This was the first time I have ever encountered a unspoilt European landscape. The expanse of rolling green barren moors to the horizon stunned me. I was taken through tight laneways enclosed by furs and oaks, and after seeing countless sheep and wild ponies; it was as though I had been transported back in time.

After my time in Devon, I headed back to London on Sunday, July 8, for one more day; and one insane evening where I met a truly awesome East Londoner called Abdul. The following day, Tuesday, July 10, I checked out of Kings Cross and boarded a train north to York. Unlike London, York was thankfully never bombed and remains an almost postcard perfect representations of what a English city should look like. If I ever had to move to England, York, would be my choice.

Spending three days in York was a pleasant shift from the intensity of London. After a sentimental day trip to where my father’s family descend from, Scruton, I boarded a flight from Manchester to Nuremberg. At this point I started telling myself that Europe couldn’t get any better, however it did. Wilkommen to Bavaria, or rather Franconia.

Thanks to an unusually long high pressure system I was blessed with sunny skies to enjoy the epic medieval architecture of Nuremberg. Despite being almost completely obliterated during the Second World War, Nuremberg was rebuilt almost exactly to its pre-war condition. If you want to see Germany proper, skip Munich: the crowds are overwhelming, the architecture lacking, and the romantic beauty pales in comparison to that of Nuremberg.

After spending five nights in Nuremberg, I headed south to the spectacular Bavarian alps on lake Walchensee. While every area of Europe of has unique beauty to it, Walchensee and the German alps have so far won in regards to natural beauty, sorry Devon. Steep grey faced mountains dotted with dense pines amongst a huge blue lake felt so perfect that I felt there might just be a higher power after all. But for now, this is where I’ll leave this article, writing these are tough, and I’m supposed to be on holiday.